I just saw the latest from the Sec. Of Energy-this performance is worthy of a high-school dramatics class! Other than the fact that some very high-level top secret information has been missing for weeks, nobody-NOBODY is responsible! This administration scares the hell out of me-but NOBODY CARES! When I was in the navy, if you had to borrow a codebook (communications officer), you had to sign out and get the CO’s signature as well, so somebody knew where that codebook was at all times.-Now we have the situation where a massive case of espionage has (apparently) taken place, and no one is accountable.
Well, I guess we will wake up when the Chinese start manufacturing atom bombs and missiles to our own specifications.
What really puzzles me is the weird way that all of these screw-ups have been announced to the public-it is almost as if Clinton WANTED to give the info to the Chinese in the first place-then decided to allow them to steal the stuff.
I’m not so sure that the problems at Los Almos didn’t start back under the Bush administration. I had heard on NPR that there were security issues there dating from the late 1980’s. There is, without a doubt, a general malais when it comes to security. Security isn’t that much of an issue if you work as a fry cook at McDonalds, but when you are dealing with advanced nuclear secrets the lapses are mindboggling. It also makes me think that the DOE really made Wen Ho Lee (Sp?) a scapegoat for nothing. And what he is accused of is not as bad as what others have gotten away with, with no more than a slap on the wrist.
<snort>
Try Reagan. Carter. Ford, Nixon, Johnson, Kennedy . . .
There have been big gaping holes in US nuclear security security since WW2, especially at Los Alamos. The big problem at LANL now is that there still remains a culture of arrogance among the employees. Used to be, LANL scientists and X Division specifically were the best of the best–they were amon the smartest, the brightest, and ususally the most patriotic people in the country. In recent years, however, the best and the brightest are finding that they can make better green in the private sector, and the nat labs are no longer the only game in town. The problem is, they still think they are. X Division scientists still feel that they are the only scientists in the world that matter and can get away with anything. Their management has only fostered this, letting things slide that obviously should not.
I feel for Secretary Richardson on this one. He’s facing a Congressional witchhunt (in an election year) over something couldn’t control. Looks like his subordinates at LANL, from the Lab director down to the scientists themselves, have deliberately kept information from him. I know it’s his job to be crucified, but it still sucks for him. I think it’s a shitty way to have a career destroyed.
eg, I think Richardson’s been saying all along that heads are going to roll. I haven’t seen any indications that he, the DOE, or the Evil Clinton-Gore Administration ™ “don’t care.” I agree that it would be nice to see someone martyred, but there were 86 people with access to that safe. Should we fry them all because one person either is a spy or a fuckup?
But FWIW, my guess (and it’s only a guess and an opinion) is that someone broke the rules, had the disks out of the safe, and panicked during the fires. I think he/they took them home or hid them somewhere and then pulled a bonehead high school maneuver and tucked them away behind the copier.
He/they needs to be fired, post-haste, but my WAG is that the data was not leaked and the disks were not tampered with. We’ll see soon enough.
-andros-