Dog day in DC

Congress went to pot and to the dogs Wednesday.

Jacko, Quan and Skeet _ law enforcement canines _ were brought before the House Homeland Security Committee to demonstrate their skills. They performed flawlessly, finding hidden explosives and a bag of marijuana that had been placed in a desk.
Lawmakers are considering federal standards for how these dogs are bred and trained, and a possible boost in funding. The canines sniff out explosives, narcotics and suspects at crime scenes, border crossings, airports and _ coming soon _ mass transit systems and commuter trains.

Three federal agencies alone have over 2,000 dogs. We've talked about this before. These dogs cannot be cross-trained to sniff both drugs and bombs. I would bet TSA has both. One wonders if we should be funding more drug dogs with our tax dollars rather than exclusively training them to sniff explosives.

Beyond that, the article ominously notes that none of TSA's 350 dogs were allowed to participate in the demonstration.

TSA dogs were not part of the demonstration Wednesday. While the Homeland Security and Justice dogs are trained for "passive response" _ they sit when they locate explosives, drugs or people _ the TSA dogs bark and make a scene.

Oh really. They don't want to upset a few Congressmen with the dogs but they don't have a problem with them carrying on in airports and train stations where there are kids around? "Brilliant" public safety strategy.

[hat tip JackL]