US tax dollars OK for terror drills if bad guys are portrayed as white American racists, Iowa public school drill canceled at last minute

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UPDATE #2, 3/26/11, "'Beat Whitey Night' a big success at Iowa State Fair August, 2010, but Iowa 'terror' drill was planned with bad white guys shooting racial minorities"

UPDATE, 3/25/11, Cancelled. "Threats cause Iowa community to cancel controversial anti-terror training." The massive, murderous white racist training extravaganza involving 30-40 local agencies, endorsed by the US Dept. of Homeland Security, is cancelled for now. Naturally, they are blaming 'threats' from the same law abiding citizens they demonized in the first place. So they got a two-fer.


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3/24/11, "County, DHS officials stage mock terror exercise featuring 'anti-immigration' shooters," New Media Journal

A Dept. of Homeland security endorsed 'terror' drill featuring white Americans as the bad guys is to being staged in an Iowa public school. In the planning of this event alone, unformed minds of school children are being filled with hate and fear to carry all their lives. Officials in Iowa's Pottawattamie County have organized a 4 hour taxpayer funded terrorism exercise/drill with endorsement and cash from the Dept. of Homeland Security, along with school children, parents, police, fire fighters, government officials and others. Many terrorist attacks have occurred or have been uncovered in the planning stages in the US in the past 10 years, but the Iowa drill ignores those. Instead they stage an elaborate drill INSIDE A SCHOOL based on Caucasian Americans getting guns and shooting illegal immigrants--although no such crime is known to have happened, and investigators found

• no evidence that one is in the offing.

Not too far from Iowa an Islamist murdered 13 innocent Americans which I guess is forgotten. Exactly who decided on this particular theme in a backdrop laden with law enforcement and rescue personnel, a hateful, racist, slanderous murderous event to create a particular connection in the public mind? Caucasian Americans whose only offense may by supporting existing law? The Iowa EMS official said DHS gave them money for a 'terror' drill but who decided what the components of the drill would be?

3/24, AP,""But the drill's director Doug Reed said Thursday that the scenario is "completely fictitious" and the immigration issue was incorporated to get Homeland Security funds to cover the costs of the training exercise."...
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To brush this decision aside by saying, just a fictional idea, avoids the point. If it's so fanciful and meaningless, why harness a cross section of authority figures, parents, children, and apply for US taxpayer dollars through the Dept. of Homeland Security

• if it doesn't mean anything?

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3/24/11, "Group criticizes mock Iowa school shooting drill," AP, T. Ross

"A mock school shooting training drill involving a teen who vents his anger over illegal Immigration by using violence has angered an anti-illegal Immigration group in Iowa, which claims the fictitious scenario is in poor taste and has a political agenda.

The four-hour exercise scheduled for Saturday at Treynor High School would include

• police,
• firefighters,
• hospitals,
• government officials
• and others.
  

Officials said the drill's fake scenario would be based on a school shooting involving two teens, including one with ties to a white supremacist group who was angry with illegal Immigration. A description of the exercise said the teen's frustration stemmed from an influx of minorities into the community that lead to economic instability and sparked racial tensions.

• Robert Ussery, state director of the Iowa Minutemen, an anti-illegal Immigration group, criticized the training drill's scenario.

"I think it's terrible that they're trying to paint people who believe in enforcing our laws as criminals," he said.

But exercise director Doug Reed said the scenario incorporated the Immigration issue to get Homeland Security funds to cover the training exercise. To qualify, Reed said, the exercise needed to be about terrorism, which

• the federal government defines as the use of violence to intimidate or coerce a government or population as a means to further a political or social objective.

Reed, who is the county's EMS coordinator, said he's received several emails from upset people but characterized them as being misinformed about the intent of the exercise, which he said is to train emergency responders.

• He said it was unlikely such as scenario would ever play out in the western Iowa community.

"It has no reality attached to it," Reed said. "It is completely fictitious."

Ussery didn't buy the explanation: "If they want to do a terrorism exercise, they could do one with a terrorist coming across our southern border

• and attacking our schools."

Details of the scenario were not supposed to be made public in advance of the exercise so as not to influence participants, but the information spread Wednesday and Thursday through social media websites. The online campaign urges people angered by the scenario to contact Reed or Republican Rep. Steve King. King's office declined Thursday to comment. "
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3/24/11, "County, DHS officials stage mock terror exercise featuring 'anti-immigration' shooters," New Media Journal

(This report references a threatening 'hand written note' reportedly found in a cafeteria recently. It says other incidents may have gone on in the community but gives no specific examples. They could have been made up or planted. In any case,

• investigations took place and found nothing):

""Law enforcement, aware of the situation, have found no strong evidence to take action or make an arrest. "...

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Nothing was found to corroborate the reports, but someone went forward with the 'white American bad guy' 'terror' drill anyway. Funded by US taxpayer dollars from the Dept. of Homeland Security.

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photo above from New Media Journal, caption, "Citizens and grassroots organizations in Treynor, IA, are expressing concern over the proposed scenario for a "domestic terrorism/school shooting" mock drill

• that depicts "anti-immigration, gun enthusiasts" as the shooting suspects."

via Weasel Zippers