Obama Secretly Ends Program That Allows Pilots To Carry Guns On Planes

After the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001, commercial airline pilots were granted the ability to carry a concealed weapon with them in the cockpit after their succesful completion of a federal firearms safety course.

Now President Obama is silently and he is hoping for secretly, trying to end that program that allows pilots to defend not only themselves but the passengers they are responsible for.

President Obama is diverting money away from the pilot training program. He is instead using that money to hire more government supervisory staff that will engage in field inspections of the pilots.

An editorial in The Washington Post brings to light just how unnecessary this change of practice and diversion of funds is.
"This looks like completely unnecessary harassment of the pilots. The 12,000 Federal Flight Deck Officers, the pilots who have been approved to carry guns, are reported to have the best behavior of any federal law enforcement agency. There are no cases where any of them has improperly brandished or used a gun. There are just a few cases where officers have improperly used their IDs.

Fewer than one percent of the officers have any administrative actions brought against them and, we are told, virtually all of those cases “are trumped up.”

Take a case against one flight officer who had visited the Virginia Department of Motor Vehicles within the last few weeks. While there, the pilot noticed that federal law enforcement officers can, with the approval of a superior, obtain a license plate that cannot be traced, a key safety feature for law enforcement personnel. So the pilot asked if, as a member of the federal program, he was eligible. The DMV staffer checked and said “no.” The next day administrative actions were brought against the pilot for “misrepresenting himself.” These are the kinds of cases that President Obama wants to investigate."

I, for one, cannot understand for one second what this diversion of funds is to accomplish. No American of sound mind would have a problem with a properly trained pilot being able to carry a gun in the cockpit. The only people I can see that would have a problem with this practice are terrorists or anti-gun whackjobs who are no better than terrorists.

Founder Of Prison-based Terrorist Group Sentenced To 16 years

Story from National Terror Alert:
The founder of a prison-based terrorist group that targeted the U.S. government and supporters of Israel was sentenced Friday to 16 years in federal prison.

Kevin James, 32, who founded Jam’iyyat Ul-Islam Is-Saheeh, or JIS, pleaded guilty in 2007 of plotting “to levy war against the United States through terrorism.”

On Friday, U.S. District Judge Cormac J. Carney described James as “the mastermind and architect of a terrorist conspiracy” to attack LAX, Army recruiting centers and the Israeli Consulate. Still, Carney said he believed James felt genuine remorse and had written him “the most powerful letter I’ve ever received” as a judge.

In the letter, portions of which the judge read aloud, James described his violent upbringing in Inglewood, harsh conditions he endured at the California Youth Authority and the horrors of prison, where James has spent much of his adult life.

Assistant U.S. Atty. Gregory W. Staples, arguing for an 18-year prison term for James, said that when authorities stopped the conspirators, “they were gearing up and accelerating.” He said James’ group planned to stage attacks on political targets with the proceeds of gas station robberies, and the group’s writings contained calls to acquire remote-controlled bombs and silencer-equipped guns.

At New Folsom prison in 2004, James recruited fellow inmate Levar Washington, who was released that year and in turn recruited Gregory Patterson. When Torrance police focused on Washington and Patterson as suspects in a series of 2005 robberies, a search of their South Los Angeles apartment turned up the JIS manifesto and a list of potential targets of attack.

In James’ prison cell, authorities found a statement he had written to be distributed to the media in the aftermath of such an attack. It warned “sincere Muslims” to avoid supporters of Israel and promised more attacks intended “to defend and propagate traditional Islam in its purity.”