By Allan Lengel ticklethewire.com I think the American public in general has been blown away by recent news of the lapses in Secret Service security involving the President. I have to think, had terrorists any clue that it was so easy to breach security and get into the White House, they would have tried something…
By Allan Lengel ticklethewire.com Thirteen years ago today, I was walking down Connecticut Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., on my way to work, about to get on the subway, when I ran into a friend who asked if I had heard about a plane crashing into the World Trade Center. I hadn’t. By the time…
By Allan Lengel ticklethewire.com Last time I checked, John Mitchell of the Nixonian era was no longer our Attorney General. But you’d be hard pressed not to feel that the crooked Mitchell was heading up the Justice Department, which we now learn, secretly obtained two months of telephone records of reporters and editors for The…
By Allan Lengel ticklethewire.com It’s nauseating to say the least to see how spineless our Washington lawmakers are, how fearful they are when it comes to standing up to the NRA and the people who insist that universal background checks are too intrusive and assault weapons are necessary to own. The Newtown shootings should have…
By Allan Lengel For Deadline Detroit During my visits to Israel, the idea of security was never far off. At the train station, at the bus stop, I went through a metal detector. An armed guard checked through packages and asked if I was carrying a gun. After Sept. 11, 2001, I thought the U.S….
By Allan Lengel ticklethewire.com WASHINGTON — Looking at the mass shootings in the U.S. in recent years, from Tucson to Aurora, Colo. from Columbine to Oak Creek, Wisc., two things become apparent: The gunmen all had easy access to guns and they all had severe psychological problems. I won’t address the issue of the guns. Not…
By Allan Lengel ticklethewire.com There’s a lesson to be learned from the Jerry Sandusky-Penn State child sexual abuse scandal for institutions, including federal law enforcement agencies. The main lesson is that institutions aren’t more important than people. We’ve seen this play out so many times before. Institutions protecting their image, avoiding disgrace. We’ve seen it…
By Allan Lengel ticklethewire.com Some federal cases are too complicated for jurors. Some may be borderline illegal. And some may end up being a waste of taxpayer money. The trial against ex-presidential hopeful John Edwards was probably all of the above. A jury on Thursday acquitted him on one count and deadlocked on five others…
