Security

Yes, Virginia, there is a Benghazi scandal. The scandal is that Rep. Darrell Issa (R., Calif.) and some Republican colleagues are dishonoring the memory of Ambassador Chris Stevens and three other Americans by making a political circus out of their deaths. As chair of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, Issa is ready to manipulate the pain and anger of relatives and colleagues of the victims, but shows little interest in making U.S. diplomats safer. The hearing he held last week ignored the real issues raised by Benghazi in favor of promoting conspiracy theories about "talking points" that administration officials used after the tragedy.

CAIRO - The Egyptian military on Monday assumed joint responsibility with the police for security and protecting state institutions until the results of a Dec. 15 constitutional referendum are announced. The army took up the task in line with a decree issued Sunday by President Mohammed Morsi. The Islamist leader on Monday also suspended a series of tax hikes announced the previous day on alcohol, cigarettes, and other items. The presidential edict orders the military and police to jointly maintain security in the run-up to Saturday's vote on the disputed charter, which was hurriedly approved last month by a panel dominated by the president's Islamist allies despite a boycott of the committee's liberal, secular, and Christian members.

It is ironic that in his May 14 Letter to the Editor Noah Barsky defends President Reagan's "Star Wars" program saying that the longer it is delayed, the longer it will be before we Americans have a "sense of security" from nuclear attack. That's all anyone can hope to have from this program: A sense of security. Clearly we will not have genuine security, because not even the President's most ardent advocates are willing to commit to the idea that we would be 100 percent secure from attack with this system.

Greg Kern, the Philadelphia Housing Authority's acting executive director, thinks he has signed an all-star. Dorothy Cousins, the first woman inspector of the city Police Department and the first female chief of county detectives, is the authority's first female security director. Cousins, who started working at the authority this week at an annual salary of $49,500, will run a stronger security department. Unlike her predecessor, Eugene O'Neill, who will stay on as director of investigations, Cousins will report directly to the authority's executive director.

When the Phillies resume play Monday with the first of four games against the Atlanta Braves, fans no longer will be allowed to bring coolers, backpacks or large bags into Veterans Stadium under a new policy announced yesterday by Major League Baseball. "Fans should expect a close inspection upon entry," Michael R. Stiles, Phillies vice president for operations and administration, said yesterday. "We're going to have a heightened security effort, and that may account for a delay in fans being admitted," he said.

SAN'A, Yemen - A masked gunman assassinated a Yemeni security official who worked for the U.S. Embassy in a drive-by shooting Thursday in the capital, officials said, adding that the assault bore the hallmarks of al-Qaeda's Yemen branch. The attack comes amid a sharp deterioration of security in Yemen and several other Muslim countries since the collapse of police states controlled by autocratic leaders during a wave of uprisings known as the Arab Spring. An elite team of 50 Marines that was sent to San'a to bolster security at the U.S. Embassy after a Sept.

"Hooligan" is defined by "Webster's New Collegiate Dictionary" as "ruffian, hoodlum. " In this country, it seems that a hooligan is thought to be anyone who attends soccer games in Europe. And, of course, we're about to be invaded by all of them in 1994 during the World Cup. Look at the Daily News headline on Tuesday: "Hooligan alert. " Edgar Best was introduced Monday as senior vice president for security for the 1994 World Cup, ostensibly the man to save us all from them.

More than $20 million of SEPTA's railroad switching and signal equipment is housed in ramshackle sheds unprotected by fencing or any other security barriers, according to an internal survey of property by transit authority police. A report written by SEPTA police Sgt. Steven Harold noted 50 locations throughout the Regional Rail system where equipment, ranging in value from $50,000 to more than $1 million, was ill-housed and underprotected. "It certainly doesn't make any sense for there not to be better security around these locations," said SEPTA police Chief Howard F. Patton Jr. "I have spoken to the acting general manager about it. Taking some steps to secure them will cost only about $300,000, which, given the value of the equipment out there is certainly a worthwhile investment.

TRIPOLI, Libya - Rooftop snipers and knife-wielding assailants killed six soldiers in Libya's eastern city of Benghazi early Saturday, officials said, in the largest attack on the country's new security forces to date. The brazen overnight assault by hundreds of plain-clothed gunmen on security installations forced soldiers to withdraw from some of their bases. In one case, soldiers fled out the back door of the First Infantry Brigade's headquarters in Benghazi as assailants stormed the main gate, torching the building and two military vehicles.

Philadelphia City Councilwoman Cindy Bass announced a $3.6 million initiative Wednesday to install surveillance cameras in every city recreation center over the next three years. Rather than being linked to the Philadelphia police surveillance-camera system - which continues to experience problems - the new cameras would be monitored by staff at each center. Each of the 150 staffed recreation centers will have from four to eight cameras, Bass spokesman Joe Corrigan said. Police will help Parks and Recreation officials place the cameras, most likely in areas of highest need, beginning July 1. Michael DiBerardinis, deputy mayor for parks and recreation, said he did not anticipate hiring staff to watch the cameras.

WASHINGTON - Defying GOP critics, President Obama named outspoken diplomat Susan Rice as his national security adviser Wednesday, giving her a larger voice in U.S. foreign policy despite accusations that she misled the nation in the aftermath of the deadly attack on Americans in Benghazi, Libya. The appointment, along with the nomination of human-rights advocate Samantha Power to replace Rice as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, signals a shift by Obama toward advisers who favor more robust American intervention overseas for humanitarian purposes.

WASHINGTON - President Obama will be looking for signs from China's leader at their upcoming meeting that Beijing is ready to address its reported high-tech spying, which the White House sees as a top threat to the U.S. economy and national security. The talks between Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping will be followed by a July meeting between U.S. and Chinese officials focusing on cyberespionage, along with other strategic and economic issues. Secretary of State John Kerry announced the U.S.-China meetings when he visited Beijing in April.

R ICHARD COTTOM, 51, of Newtown, is president of Sovereign Security, a minority-owned Center City provider of security personnel and services. He's a former vice president of public safety at Drexel University. Sovereign ranked No. 11 on the 2013 Inner City 100 list of fastest-growing businesses in U.S. cities, compiled by the Initiative for a Competitive Inner City. Q: How'd you start the biz? A: My position at Drexel was eliminated and I took a couple of months off and started the business in October 2004.

Cooper University Hospital in Camden has beefed up security slightly after two incidents. In one a nurse was assaulted, in the other a staff member was robbed. The two staff members were outside the hospital when the incidents occurred. Although both crimes were in the last two weeks, they were described as isolated by the hospital and police and do not appear to indicate a trend. Both led to quick arrests. "These are isolated incidents that just happened to be on our campus. . . . Totally separate incidents, but we look at every incident that happens.

BAGHDAD - Officials in Iraq are growing increasingly concerned over an unabated spike in violence that claimed at least 33 more lives on Thursday and is reviving fears of a return to widespread sectarian fighting. Authorities announced plans to impose a sweeping ban on many cars across the Iraqi capital starting early Friday in an apparent effort to thwart car bombings, as the United Nations envoy to Iraq warned that "systemic violence is ready to explode. " Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, meanwhile, was shown on state television visiting security checkpoints around Baghdad the previous night as part of a three-hour inspection tour, underscoring the government's efforts to show it is acting to curtail the bloodshed.

The Philadelphia Orchestra always expected to expand its pool of unlikely bedfellows in what is becoming its annual spring visit to China. But could anybody have predicted its new relationship with Shanghai's most popular stand-up comedian? Next to such venerable sponsor names as Cigna and Drexel University for its 2013 Residency and 40th Anniversary Tour of China, which begins Tuesday, sits the logo of the Shanghai Charity Foundation showing a man in a hipster hat and bow tie - Zhou Libo, a dapper, surprisingly outspoken comic who has rock-star status in China.

Starting Tuesday, Cherry Hill parents will have to stop at the reception desk or main office in the district's schools to drop off homework, lunches, or musical instruments for their children. That restriction is one of several new measures going into effect as the result of a districtwide security assessment conducted in the wake of December's school shooting in Newtown, Conn. The rules, announced by Superintendent Maureen Reusche at a PTA meeting earlier this month, place limits on parents' presence in the district's 19 schools.

PETARE, Venezuela - Stern-looking soldiers clutching assault rifles wave down the beat-up Chevy Caprice entering this sprawling slum on the outskirts of Caracas. Flashlights in his face, the driver steps out and places his hands on the roof while the soldiers frisk him for drugs and weapons. He's clean, and a hand gesture from the commanding officer sends him off into the maze of ramshackle homes that is Petare, one of the most dangerous parts of Venezuela's notoriously crime-infested capital.