2005 Year in Review

Homeland Security?

John Lehman, a Reagan-era appointee and member of the 9/11 commission appointed by President Bush, in an column in the Washington Post today, makes the point that as much time has passed since 9/11 that it compares to the time between Pearl Harbor and the defeat of Nazi Germany and Japan at the end of World War II.

Yet, he notes that:

Since Sept. 11 there's been no real action to fix our government's most glaring failure: the dysfunctional intelligence bureaucracies whose incompetence exposed us to surprise attack. Not a single person has been disciplined, and most have been promoted.

He says that the Bush administration thinks that creating more levels of bureaucracy is the same as creating effecting government agencies and compares its response to terrorism to its ineffective reaction to the Katrina hurricane:

The administration just does not seem to get it. It appears to have a childlike belief that creating a new bureaucracy is the solution to every problem. Creation of the Department of Homeland Security has not improved our homeland intelligence. The bureaucratic method was amply demonstrated when DHS held 150 firefighters for three days in Atlanta while people died in New Orleans, so that the firefighters could be given the requisite instruction in avoiding sexual harassment. That's all about process, not results.

The administration has duly reported that it has responded to almost all of the recommendations proposed by the Sept. 11 commission and the commission on Iraq's weapons of mass destruction. But intelligence reform is more than checking off a matrix of action items that consist of enlarging and renaming staffs and playing musical chairs with career bureaucrats. Reform requires inspiring leadership, bold vision and, above all, decisive action. We have not seen it.

At the same time the Bush administration is attacking those that question its competence and veracity by arguing that others got the WMD evidence wrong, too (not much of a defense – I wasn't the only one that was wrong) and saying that it is unpatriotic to criticize the government for hyping pre-war intelligence to go to war with Iraq.

Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) strongly criticized this tactic yesterday. He said that: "the Bush administration must understand that each American has a right to question our policies in Iraq and should not be demonized for disagreeing with them." He added that the Bush administration is guilty of "dividing the country" with its rhetorical tactics.

Since 57% of the American public thinks that President Bush lied to them about the Weapons of Mass Destruction in Iraq, it would see that he should take responsibility for the war and not blame those that unwisely voted for the Iraqi war resolution.

The Senate voted yesterday a resolution requiring President Bush to explain his policies and document the results. It would seem that he should explain to a skeptical public how this war is going to end in a positive way for America – without many more American deaths.

by John Legler, Guest Columnist
November 16, 2005