Texas Evacuates for Hurricane Ike - TIME
The frail and elderly were put aboard buses Wednesday and authorities warned 1 million others to flee inland as Hurricane Ike steamed toward a swath of the Texas coast that includes the nation’s largest concentration of refineries and chemical plants.

FEMA Wasted Millions on 4 Contracts - TIME
The government wasted millions of dollars on four no-bid contracts it handed out for Hurricane Katrina work, including paying $20 million for a camp for evacuees that was never inspected and proved to be unusable, investigators say.

Security Debrief and CNN contributor George Foresman, during an interview on CNN, discusses the state of emergency preparedness — what worked, and what still needs to be done.

DHS Enters the MySpace World with Hurricane Awareness Widget | Homeland Security Digital Library Weblog
The Department of Homeland Security announced today on the National Council on Readiness and Preparedness website their partnership with the popular social networking website MySpace to design a web-based application (a “Widget”) in order to better alert web-based populations to information [...]

On Hurricanes, Fear and Fatigue - The Lede - Breaking News - New York Times Blog
Complaints about the media blowing things out of proportion are commonplace, especially in this period of nonstop election reporting. But a quotation from today’s Houston Chronicle was surprising nonetheless:
“There are so many names coming by — it’s Gustav, then Hanna, [...]

Hurricane Gustav, Social Media and Real World Social Change
Recent examples of social media banding together online to organize and help people offline happened this past weekend as Hurricane Gustav barreled down on the Gulf Coast.
Within hours of the projected path hitting weather sources, social media types like Andy Carvin have spearheaded efforts to create a [...]

It was not too long ago that I was proud to wear a badge watching marchers walk by with signs for one cause or another. The lines of law enforcement officers were there to ensure that all Americans could exercise their rights to express opinions without negatively impacting the rights and freedoms of other citizens. Because of a few angry and violent people, the role of a police officer has had to change. These small groups of people that have no opinions and have no respect for constitutional rights. Destroying property and harming others is not a constitutional right.

Tropical Storm Hanna Threatens US - TIME
Coastal residents moved boats and booked inland hotel rooms while National Guard troops prepared to deploy along the Southeastern coast as Tropical Storm Hanna plowed through the Atlantic on a shifting track toward the U.S.

Homeland Security Today - news and analysis - Lessons of Hurricane Gustav–and Katrina
New officeholders should take heed of the lessons of natural disasters.
Credit must be given where credit is due: Government officials at all levels did indeed absorb the lessons of Hurricane Katrina and prevented a repeat with Hurricane Gustav.

In our first major test since the Hurricanes of 2005, America is making the grade and so far, we’re passing. The very places and organizations that showed our nation the painful lessons of disorder and dysfunction three years ago are now the same places and organizations that may become the models for the culture of preparedness that we desperately need to take root in this country.

Minneapolis St. Paul Star Tribune:McCain’s response to Hurricane Gustav, directing that all but official business be called off Monday, received a big endorsement from Asa Hutchinson, a former undersecretary for border and transportation security at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.

How Internet Social Media Sites Are Helping In Recovery & Rebuilding Of Post-Katrina New Orleans
With anniversary of Hurricane Katrina approaching, CIO magazine has an interesting article titled “How Social Networking Saved New Orleans” about how web-based new media tools such as Flickr, Yahoo Groups, wikis and Google Maps have been integral in citizen efforts to [...]

Police & Law Enforcement News - PoliceLink
The price of gasoline is currently hovering a little under $4 a gallon and the price of diesel is around $4.50 a gallon. Public service agencies buy fuel in bulk and do not pay taxes, saving on the overall cost of fuel, said Howell Police Chief George Basar, president [...]

From In Case of Emergency Read Blog
In a blog posting titled “Crises Tracking on Twitter: The Benefits -and Dangers- of New Media,” Jeremiah (Jeremiah Owyang, a Senior Research Analyst at Forrester Research), offers a helpful narrative of how citizen ‘tweets’, photos and videos reported the story.

New Study Indicates Voters Reward Politicians Who Push Disaster Relief Not Disaster Preparedness
When most of us think of what we should be doing to prepare for disasters, we often forget that exercising our role as citizens and voters can be as important as the more well known tasks like storing emergency supplies or creating a [...]

Counterterrorism Blog: Ortega Steps Into the Breach with the FARC
While Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez seem content for the time being to keep is distance from his (erstwhile?) allies in Colombia, the FARC guerrillas-tied to international drug trafficking, kidnapping and assorted criminal and terrorist activities-Nicaraguan president Daniel Ortega seems to have few such qualms.

How Much Is Too Much When It Comes To Alerting The Public Electronically
As governmental authorities expand their technological capacity to alert the public the challenge will be to find a balance between informing and overloading us.

Beirut Comes to Washington - HUMAN EVENTS
Today, Pennsylvania Avenue is a maze of bollards, vehicle barriers, high fences and heavy gates. Without the appropriate pass it is practically impossible to get a vehicle anywhere near the White House — or any other federal building. In the parlance of security specialists, this is called “offset protection.” [...]

From “In Case of Emergency, Read Blog”: Helping Citizens Get Necessary Extra Prescription Medicine Before A Disaster
Practically every government preparedness site recommends that people store an extra supply of the prescription medicines they use in case of an extended emergency. For example, the Department of Homeland Security’s Ready.Gov site suggests that every American, as part [...]

FEMA Higher Education Program 2008 Report - Homeland Security Digital Library Weblog
Emergency Management Education: A Status Report
This document is the 2008 FEMA Higher Education Program Report and it summarizes the current status of emergency management higher education in the United States. “The goal of this report is to assist the FEMA Emergency Management Higher Education [...]