Author:
and..... The Veeckster
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Date Posted: 22:27:04 06/11/02 Tue
Author Host/IP: 67.25.99.5
In reply to:
The Equalizer.
's message, "He is trying to put the spin on it that a cabinet level post was his idea. But it wasn't." on 09:19:57 06/11/02 Tue
we can always refer to the back issues of the New york times and salon fer Elucidation of whose ideas SHRUB has stolen!@!!
:)
HEH HEH HEH!@!!!!!
>He rejected the findings of the bi partisan committee
>in 2001 because he is a partisan fool!
>
>This is a great article Veeckster. Thanks for posting
>it.
>
>Bush was more than a year late in executing this plan.
>
>Totally irresponsible.
>
>
>>Bush blew off the Hart/Rudman congressional committe
>>recommendations a year ago! WHAT A FOOL AND LIAR!!!
>>
>>PATHETIC!
>>
>> June 7 — Give President Bush some credit. He said
>>all the right things in his speech, and his government
>>reorganization plan is necessary (though not
>>sufficient) for improving the war on terrorism. But
>>for the White House to say that Bush has always been
>>“open-minded” about a Cabinet-level department of
>>homeland security is pure spin.
>>
>>
>> IN FACT, the president is more than a year
>>late in executing an urgent reform that was clearly
>>laid out for him by a presidential commission. The
>>best that can be said for the plan now is: Better late
>>than never.
>> The reorganization outlined by Bush Thursday
>>night — almost certain to be approved by Congress —
>>will improve accountability by consolidating agencies
>>from nine different Cabinet departments into a new
>>major department. It closely resembles the plan
>>recommended in early 2001 by the Hart-Rudman
>>Commission on Homeland Security, co-chaired by former
>>Sens. Gary Hart, a Colorado Democrat, and Warren
>>Rudman, a New Hampshire Republican.
>> But don’t expect the White House to admit that.
>>According to Hart, it took Hart and Rudman five long
>>months after September 11 even to get a meeting with
>>Tom Ridge. How pathetic.
>> Here’s a short and depressing history of the
>>report, now the blueprint for the most important
>>government reorganization in more than half a century:
>> In 1995, Hart wrote President Clinton urging a
>>reorganization of the national defense bureaucracy. “I
>>used the analogy of 1946-47,” Hart told me this week,
>>just hours before the president used the same
>>post-World War II analogy in his speech. “I said,
>>‘It’s now five years after the Cold War. Why not
>>appoint a half dozen people to think about it?”
>> Hart heard no reply from his fellow Democrat.
>>In 1998, however, House Speaker Newt Gingrich had the
>>same notion, and when Gingrich floated it, the Clinton
>>White House jumped at the idea and appointed the
>>Hart-Rudman Commission.
>> In September of 1999, two years before the
>>terrorist attacks, the commission offered a
>>preliminary conclusion about the terror threat:
>>Without dramatic bureaucratic changes, “Americans will
>>die on American soil — possibly in large numbers.” The
>>reaction from the Clinton administration? More
>>meetings on terrorism, but no great urgency.
>> The final report — recommending a Cabinet-level
>>department — was delivered on January 31, 2001, eleven
>>days after President Bush took the oath. Bush and his
>>aides, especially Karl Rove, bore a grudge against
>>Rudman, who had chaired John McCain’s presidential
>>campaign in 2000. And Hart is a Democrat. So it was no
>>surprise that they totally ignored the report.
>>
>> President Bush is proposing a Cabinet-level
>>Department of Homeland Security with a $37.4 billion
>>budget. Under the proposal, the department would be
>>organized into four broad divisions, plus the Secret
>>Service and an office for coordination with state,
>>local and private-sector efforts. Here are the
>>divisions, with the agencies to be brought under their
>>umbrellas and where those agencies are now.
>>Immigration and Naturalization Service: (Justice
>>Department) Regulates immigration, travel into the
>>country and provides border security.
>>Customs Service: (Treasury Department)
>>Regulates importation of goods and combats smuggling.
>>Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service:
>>(Agriculture Department)
>>Monitors and manages animal and plant pests and
>>diseases.
>>Coast Guard: (Transportation Department) Provides
>>coastline and waterway security and rescues.
>>Federal Protective Service: (General Services
>>Administration) Works to keep federal buildings safe.
>>Transportation Security Administration:
>>(Transportation Department) Ensure security for
>>nation’s transportation systems.
>>
>>Federal Emergency Management Agency: (Independent
>>agency) Provides assistance before, during and after
>>disasters
>>Chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear
>>response assets: Various agencies and groups respond
>>to specific disasters and threats.
>>Domestic Emergency Support Team: (Interagency group)
>>Interagency team responds to domestic terrorism.
>>Office of Nuclear Security and Incident Response:
>>(Energy Department) Sets nuclear security policy and
>>regulates handling of nuclear materials.
>>Office for Domestic Preparedness: (Justice Department)
>>Works with state and local jurisdictions to prepare
>>for and respond to terrorism.
>>National Domestic Preparedness Office: (FBI)
>>Clearinghouse for information on weapons of mass
>>destruction.
>>
>>Civilian biodefense research programs: (Health and
>>Human Services Department) Oversees research into
>>defenses against biological weapons.
>>Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory: (Energy
>>Department) Scientific and engineering research
>>targeted toward national security.
>>Plum Island Animal Disease Center: (Agriculture
>>Department) Research and diagnosis to help stop
>>foreign animal diseases.
>>National Biowarfare Defense Analysis Center (new)
>>Critical Infrastructure Assurance Office: (Commerce
>>Department) Coordinates federal initiatives to protect
>>U.S. infrastructure.
>>Federal Computer Incident Response Center: (General
>>Services Administration) Coordinates response and
>>analysis of computer security threats for federal
>>agencies.
>>National Communications System: (Defense Department)
>>Prepares for and coordinates communications in
>>national emergencies.
>>National Infrastructure Protection Center: (FBI)
>>Assesses and coordinates response to threats to
>>critical infrastructure.
>>National Infrastructure Simulation and Analysis
>>Center: (Energy Department) Studies U.S.
>>infrastructure systems for interdependence and
>>vulnerabilities.
>>
>>
>>WE’LL GET BACK TO YOU
>> One far-sighted member of Congress, Rep. Mac
>>Thornberry, Republican of Texas, took Hart-Rudman
>>seriously. He offered legislation proposing a
>>Cabinet-level department of homeland security. But in
>>May 2001, Bush said that reorganization was
>>“premature” and asked Vice President Cheney to report
>>back to him on the matter. “This was a de facto
>>statement to Congress — ‘Don’t do anything until you
>>hear from us,’ ” Hart recalls.
>> They never did hear back. Over the summer, the
>>Bush White House did nothing. Today, Cheney claims he
>>was just about to act when the terrorists struck on
>>September 11. The best evidence that this is untrue is
>>that the administration barely even acted afterward.
>
>>
>> Instead of a Cabinet-level department, Bush
>>established a White House Office of Homeland Security,
>>with Ridge as the chief. From the start, Democrats and
>>a few Republicans complained that without a budget and
>>some accountability on Capitol Hill, Ridge could do
>>nothing significant to reshape the government’s
>>anti-terrorism efforts. This has proven to be true.
>> But the conservative wing of the GOP was
>>against a new Cabinet department, and politics-even
>>after September 11 — trumped reform in the Bush White
>>House. Bush said repeatedly that he opposed a
>>Cabinet-level agency, and he opted for a tepid
>>homeland security plan recommended by Virginia Gov.
>>Jim Gilmore, a GOP loyalist. The results were
>>predictable. While the war in Afghanistan went well,
>>the effort to secure American borders fell short.
>> As for finding out what went wrong before 9/11,
>>the policy here was to stonewall. Bush now says he
>>supports the inquiry by the Joint Committee on
>>Intelligence, but as recently as two months ago he was
>>dead-set against it. And he continues to oppose the
>>kind of independent outside commission established
>>after Pearl Harbor.
>>
>>
>>DAMAGE CONTROL
>> The White House says today that it has been
>>planning this announcement for weeks, and simply moved
>>it up from July. Perhaps so, but it looks more like
>>old-fashioned damage control. If this had been in the
>>works so long, why was FBI Director Robert Mueller
>>allowed to step out last week with an FBI reform plan?
>>Normally, the president speaks first when it comes to
>>sweeping reorganization of this kind. More likely,
>>Bush finally recognized that he made a mistake, and
>>moved this week to correct it.
>> The next big bureaucratic question — perhaps
>>requiring its own commission — is painfully clear: Is
>>the culture of the FBI so entrenched that the bureau
>>should be abolished, renamed and reconstituted? When
>>Mueller says, as he did Thursday, that it will take
>>two to three years just to install a new computer
>>system, the answer may be yes.
>> The president has begun the reorganization of
>>the federal government. That’s good. But let the
>>lesson be — think harder, bolder and earlier about the
>>tough choices.
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Yep!! but FORTUNATELY History does not occur in a VACCUUM