How many people today do you think read a newspaper? More than you think. According to Vivian, approximately 116 million Americans read one every day, nearly one third, and that doesn’t even account for the immense number of people reading an RSS feed from the Times. Regardless of the mode of delivery, when there is a major incident breaching our national security, it is fairly consistently printed in nearly every newspaper, nationwide.
Today, this article was about the terrorist attacks against the Moscow (Russia) Metro system. As some of the worlds worst offenders for being cultural imperialists, the articles generally twisted to the “What if: Securing America’s Subways” piece, covering New York and Washington DC, and their efforts to avert a similar attack locally.
With all the focus on the most recent attack on Russia, and what US airports will be first implementing the full-body scanners, you have to turn to more narrow casted (localized) newspapers to find out anything pertaining to the physical borders of this country. Some news is alarming. Searching for local news yielded one article warning of a budget cut for port security in one of the most critical areas of the country (the New York Tri-State area) and another about a new building at the border. If Americans are cultural imperialists, the airports are the subject imperialists of this topic.
Rarer even, are those articles in praise about National Security, the headlines always go to the screw-ups, and whatever is the most visible on a daily basis. This leaves the land and ocean borders out of the news, and honestly is not a good thing. These crossings account for most cross border traffic, and are (and have been exploited) as our weak points, and need some more attention if we want to truly keep our borders safe.
My hometown’s port, which is secured by the department of homeland security, through special funding and a specialized zodiac boat to the local police department