America needs to wake up to the terror at its doorsteps

The New Year should be a moment of joy and peace, but the residents of New Orleans woke up to sounds of horror blanketing Bourbon Street as Shamsud-Din Jabbar, an Islamist terrorist, drove into a crowd, killing 14 and wounding at least 35.Terror has arrived at America’s doorsteps — and we should be asking tough questions about how and why this has happened.How, for instance, was law enforcement so ill-prepared to recognize the signs of terror in New Orleans.

And why aren’t Americans adequately educated to identify potential terrorists themselves? Most urgently, what more can police do to detect and prevent explosive devices from being planted in our streets? Unfortunately, lax laws dating back decades have enabled terrorists to use the United States as a base, and the internet as their tool for recruitment. The 1996 Communications Decency Act, for instance, was designed to incentivize big-tech to remove content deemed harmful to children.  But Section 230 of the Act shields tech platforms from liability for harmful content posted by users, including extremist and terrorist material.Terror-related content can proliferate without consequence, facilitating real-world violence. Despite enhanced surveillance resources under the controversial 2001 USA Patriot Act, Federal law efforts failed on Bourbon Street.

Law-enforcement agencies issued pre-holiday warnings that low-tech vehicle-ramming was a key area of concern.But street barriers known as “bollards” that would have closed Bourbon Street had been removed for repair and were not in place. This is inexcusable — especially coming so close to last week’s Sugar Bowl.

Police discovered improvised explosive devices (IEDs) and an ISIS flag in Jabbar’s truck — painting a chilling picture of his motives and the severity of the threat.What sets the NoLa attack apart from similar events in the past is that it took the police a mere four hours to publicly acknowledge this was a terror.Yet authorities r...