Is this how Bush makes us safer?

Rep. John Mica, R-Fla., said the LNG security provision could hamper the flow of much-needed natural gas as energy prices and demand rise. "We're creating more red tape and more impediments," Mica said.

The Government Accountability Office says a terrorism attack on an LNG tanker arriving at a terminal could ignite an explosion and fire so fierce that people a mile away would be burned. But GAO auditors also say the Coast Guard is already stretched too thin to meet its own standards for protecting arriving LNG tankers from attack. (YUP, and a freak accident could result in the same, to wit

Columbia Encyclopedia: Texas City,
city (1990 pop. 40,822), Galveston co., S Tex., on Galveston Bay, opposite the city of Galveston. In Apr., 1947, a nitrate-laden ship exploded, causing a series of blasts and fires in the city; over 500 people were killed.

The bill also sets stricter crime reporting requirements for cruise ships and requires double hulls around fuel tanks on large cargo ships to prevent catastrophic oil spills like the one in San Francisco Bay in November.

To address complaints that crimes aboard cruise ships are underreported, the bill makes line operators report to the Homeland Security Department all security incidents, including deaths, serious bodily injuries and sexual assaults.

Cruise lines also are required to post crime statistics on an Internet site maintained by the Coast Guard, with links from the cruise line public Web sites.

" Cruise line industry officials say the reporting requirement is redundant, since they are already doing so voluntarily.

The bill also addresses a problem that has plagued the Great Lakes region: invasive species that sneak into U.S. waters aboard oceangoing cargo ships and wreak havoc. Oceangoing ships would be required to install ballast water treatment equipment to keep foreign species from U.S. waters.

The bill also would increase the Coast Guard by 1,500 members to 47,000. Another provision would tighten agency management controls over Deepwater, the $24 billion program to modernize the agency's aging fleet. It has been plagued by cost overruns, design flaws and lax oversight.

The bill also would increase [/b]the Coast Guard by 1,500 members to 47,000. Another provision would tighten agency management controls over Deepwater, the $24 billion program to modernize the agency's aging fleet. It has been plagued by cost overruns, design flaws and lax oversight.

the $24 billion program to modernize the agency's aging fleet