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**** SCROLL DOWN FOR UPDATES ****
Earlier today, I noted that the (for the pizza shop his family owns).
I wondered why this is the case. A military reader very much in the know has the scary 411:

In your post you mentioned that one of them had “secure access to the base” as a pizza delivery man. In fact, most military bases allow delivery people on the installation. There is usually a segregation at the entrances. People with DoD [DS: Dept. of Defense] decals on their cars move forward to simply get their IDs checked. Those without the decals go to a separate line and must show license and registration to get a one-day pass. On most posts, these vehicles are routinely inspected. Sometimes the inspection is cursory, sometimes it is very detailed. The same is true of locations where city buses and school buses go onto the base. It depends on the location and what the installation commander deems the right security precautions are.
Hopefully this will wake up the stateside installation commanders so that they’ll ratchet up their security.

Yes, hopefully, but don’t count on it. 9/11 didn’t achieve that. What will?

I love how the FOXNews [DS: a/k/a ] article ends:

“If these people did something, then they deserve to be punished to the fullest extent of the law,” said Sohail Mohammed, a lawyer who represented many of the detainees. “But when the government says ‘Islamic militants,’ it sends a message to the public that Islam and militancy are synonymous.”
“Don’t equate actions with religion,” he said.

Well, that’s actually a good point. I don’t EQUATE actions with religion. It’s just that in this case, I think they’re closely related. And by “closely related” I mean “cause and effect.” But you know, the term “Islamic militants” isn’t inaccurate or misleading. Are they Islamic? Yes. Are they militant? Well, I’d say the jury is still out ‚Äì literally ‚Äì but given that they wanted to buy AK-47s and RPGs to attack soldiers at Ft Dix, I’ll have to give that a qualified yes also.

He adds, and I agree:

If these guys are recent converts who became militant, shouldn’t we be looking at the people who converted them? Because OBVIOUSLY those guys are also militant. Otherwise, you’d have to go with the idea that Islam is so militant in and of itself that anyone who converts to it wants to attack his own government.
As you said before, move along, nothing to see here, go back to sleep.

Yes, who converted them (if we are to believe the apparently phony convert story)? As , the man who converted Adam Gadahn a/k/a Azzam Al-Amriki (Azzam the American), , remains a target for gushing by the media and law enforcement bureaucrats of the Bush administration (as well as most Democrats).
**** UPDATE: Reader Mike writes:

I grew up an Air Force Brat, spent 4 years in the Army, and have been working on an Air Force Base as a civilian since 1992. I’ve commented on the ease with which pizza delivery vehicles bypass security since I was in the Army in the mid-80s. When I enter the base, a guard takes my DoD-issued photo ID, examines it for authenticity/tampering, and compares the picture to my face. A pizza sign on your car at lunch time seems to earn you a wave-through (though I admit I haven’t observed the lunchtime gate process for a couple years, so it may already be “fixed” here).
I hope the Dix Six will lead to a fix. (Sorry ‚Äì couldn’t resist.) We already have fast-food places on bases ‚Äì why not pizza places that deliver on base? That way, the employees can be subject to background checks, issued photo IDs, and be screened on their way to work (assuming they’re not family members living on base), completely obviating the need for pizza delivery vehicles to pass through the gate during lunch. For those who want pizza delivered, require them to meet the delivery driver outside the gate, complete their transactions, then return to base under the normal scrutiny. Lunch is no justification for short-circuiting security.
Also, I just thought I’d pick one exceedingly minor nit. While the Marines, the Navy, and the Air Force refer to their major installations as “Base,” the Army used the term “Post.” Thus, Fort Dix is a “Post,” not a “Base.”

Another reader, a Police Detective in a major American city writes me:

Deb,
That photo looks to me like the soldier has a blank adapter on the muzzle of the M-16 rifle he is holding which would make it useless for doing anything but making noise with blanks. If it is an adapter the rifle is unable to fire live ammo while it is attached.
What gives?

What gives is that America is, like Adam Ant, Desperate but Not Serious.
**** UPDATE, 05/09/07: Reader Joe, a retured U.S. Army man provides answers about the “blank adapter”:

Hi Debbie!
In answer to the question about the blank adapter on the front of the rifle, it is obviously just a stock photo of troops undergoing training. It is not a picture related at all to the actual story. Troops “train” with blank ammo, which does not have the oomph to cycle the rifle’s action. The blank adapter provides the resistance to the light powder load of the blanks, thereby allowing the rifle to cycle properly on semi auto and automatic.
Plus, no one gets killed while training, which is seen as a good thing.