jim blog

9/11/01-1/6/21 and Beyond - Is the Homeland Secure? By Jim Mullen Emergency Management, Once Removed Unrelenting false claims of election fraud led to the attempt to violently overthrow the government of the United States on January 6, 2021. Sometimes it sucks to be prescient. In June 2020’s “Emergency Management Once Removed,” I wrote this: “… how huge a leap is it from refusing to honor and enforce existing laws to threatening to take up arms against the state or national government (which has and is happening), to refusing to accept election results?” 9/11 demonstrated our vulnerability to external forces. However, [...]

9/11/01-1/6/21 and Beyond – Eroding Confidence in Government By Jim Mullen Emergency Management, Once Removed Although the 9/11 terrorists owed their success in some measure to poor coordination between federal government agencies, the feds “generously” sought to share responsibility for their lack of preparedness; protecting the “homeland” suddenly became a shared responsibility that local and state governments were “unprepared” to fulfill (duh!). In 2003, twenty-two federal agencies, including FEMA, were merged into the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Congress and the Administration enticed participation in “protecting the homeland” - dangling vast grant sums in front of governors, mayors, police, and [...]

9/11/01 -1/6/21 and Beyond By Jim Mullen Emergency Management, Once Removed On September 10, 2001, I naively thought I had enough problems on my plate. The new Bush Administration was attempting to redirect virtually every unallocated federally appropriated dollar to address “new” priorities (emergency managers may recall the assault on funding for “traditional” natural hazards programs). My Seattle Office of Emergency Management was wrapping up the previous February’s Nisqually Earthquake recovery process. I was immersed in internal budget battles with Seattle’s Police Department hierarchy. Everything changed shortly after 6 AM on September 11, 2001. In rapid succession, terrorists had hijacked [...]