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Thu. Aug 05, 2004

Your Safety: Even or Odd?

Once upon a time, this country suffered a devastating surprise attack that killed thousands. As a result, the country went to war, but after it was over there were many serious questions to be answered. How could our defenses have been so weak, how could our vast intelligence systems fail us, and even, did the President know this was coming and deliberately allow it to happen? The result was an investigation and intense look at reorganizing America’s intelligence services from top to bottom.

The catalytic surprise attack? Pearl Harbor. 60 years later, here we are again.

But there’s some differences this time. After 9/11, for over 9 months the Bush administration was adamantly opposed to any commission investigating the attacks. Yet now I hear some of those opposed to this commission’s recommendations (i.e., those invested in the status quo) say that they have come too late, and many of the needed changes have already been made before their delayed report. Well, nearly a third of the “delay” was due to the Bush administration’s stonewalling.

Can anyone remember what Good Reason they had for refusing to support any investigative commission? I’m just curious, since they now seem to be falling all over themselves to quickly give the appearnace that they’re implementing the commission’s recommendations.

And wasn’t that press conference outside the White House Monday ... just odd? It starts off with the whole deck of cards standing on the steps waiting for the President; Rumsfeld, Powell, Ashcroft, Ridge, Mueller and the acting CIA Director whose name I can never remember. They’re chatting with each other, and Rumsfeld and Powell … two men who supposedly dislike each other quite intensely … are yucking it up! Powell walked over to Rumsfeld, and they quietly shared some words that just broke both of them up. Even after Powell walked back to the other side of the podium, he and Rumsfeld continued to look at each other … giggling like schoolboys! While marvelling at this, I see the President hurriedly nearly stomp out to the podium, and quickly begin reading his prepared speech. In an almost angry and somewhat distracted way. Like he didn’t really want to do it. I’ve watched I don’t know how many of his speeches over the past few weeks. And his tone and presentation was distinctly … odd. I have no real point to make, just observations of some very out-of-character behavior at that press conference.

But here’s another question. Can anyone remember why Republican leadership in the House, in the form of Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert, first said that nothing could be done in Congress about the commission’s recommendations until next year? In the first 24 hours after the commission’s final report was released, all we heard about was the fact Congress was leaving for vacation, already had a full plate in the fall session (flag burning amendments and the like), and would likely be totally hamstrung on this issue until January. I’m just curious, since yesterday I watched special hearings in the House and the Senate on the commission’s recommendations, hearings where Representatives had given up their vacation time in order to move the matter forward quickly, and Senators who weren’t even on the committee in question gave up their vacation to be present.

You know what? I truly believe that if this year ended with an odd number instead of an even one, it would indeed be January before any of this moved forward. I think many of these Congresspeople expected the War on Terror to fit into their already full dance card (i.e., next year), on which the next partner was “vacation.”

Fortunately, it didn’t take them long to put two and two together. Let’s see, I’m going on vacation, what shall I do? Oh, yes, I must spend that time campaigning for my re-election. And, oh my, people are going to ask me … what are you doing here?!? As Sen. Joe Lieberman said, “You know, when members of both houses go home for this recess, the folks back home are going to say: ‘Why are you home? Why aren’t you in Washington dealing with the recommendations of the Sept. 11 commission?’ I’ve already heard this in a few conversations with people back in Connecticut, who said: ‘Get this done quickly. It’s our safety and well-being at stake.’”

The implication being that the safety and well-being of the American people is more important than your vacation, and if you can’t act on that simple and obvious principle, you will be judged on it in a very few weeks. At the ballot box. The Bush administration could see which way the wind was blowing, too.

If there was no election in a few months, there would have been no hearings in the past few days.

And while we have this leverage, let’s be careful about watching the tussle and the timeline. In order for this restructuring to be effective, i.e., not be neutered in its creation, a lot of bureaucratic entities are going to have to give up a lot of control. Currently, the Department of Defense controls 80% of the budget for this country’s intelligence services. The entity that controls the budget also controls the setting of priorities. Let’s watch to make sure that the new position of Intelligence Director doesn’t just get responsibility, but also gets authority. Budgetary and personnel authority. Without it, it’s a paper position.

Without the power to set budgets and hire and fire senior managers, the new intelligence czar will lack the clout to make major changes at the nation’s 15 spy agencies, the commissioners told lawmakers at the first House hearing prompted by the panel’s 567-page report on the Sept. 11 terror attacks.

“The person that has the responsibility needs the authority,” Democratic commissioner Bob Kerrey, a former Nebraska senator, told the House Government Reform Committee. “Absent that, they’re not going to be able to get the job done.”

Republican commissioner John Lehman, a former Navy secretary who has been seen as a possible replacement for retiring CIA Director George Tenet, also urged the president to reconsider his proposal to base the director outside the White House. The commission recommended establishing the position within the White House to keep the director from being overshadowed by powerful Cabinet members, such as the defense secretary.

“Our recommendations are not a Chinese menu,” Lehman said. “They are a whole system. If all of the important elements are not adopted, it makes it very difficult for the others to succeed.”

“We think right now that balance of power is heavily tilted toward departmental priorities, to the department that owns their budget,” [Philip] Zelikow told the Senate panel, “and we suggest that that balance needs to be altered so that national priorities are dominant.”

Kerrey said lawmakers should prepare to be lobbied heavily against the panel’s suggestions by top officials at the Pentagon, CIA and other agencies who will resist giving up any of their current authority.

“I know that Secretary (of Defense Donald) Rumsfeld is going to oppose this,” Kerrey said. “And if they win one more time, if the (Department of Defense) wins one more time, then next time there’s a dustup and there’s a failure, don’t call the director of Central Intelligence up here. Kick the crap out of (the defense department) because they’re the one with the statutory authority over the budget.”

SF Chronicle: “9/11 panel dismayed by Bush’s reaction”

But we’re not exactly off to a good start on that issue:

In its report, the bipartisan commission called for establishment of the job, saying it was necessary to end turf battles and duplication among intelligence agencies.

But while Mr. Bush agreed on Monday to create such a post, he rejected the commission’s recommendation that the national intelligence director have direct control over the intelligence community’s $40 billion annual budget and veto power over the people named to head intelligence agencies. Under the White House proposal, the intelligence director would have far more limited budgetary and personnel authority.

At a House hearing on the commission’s report, Bob Kerrey, a Democratic commissioner and a former senator from Nebraska, said Tuesday that a national intelligence director without the full powers envisioned by the commission would only add to the mismanagement of intelligence agencies.

“We have to be respectful of the president,” Mr. Kerrey said. “But in that moment of being respectful, we have to point out that if all it is is consultative, if all it is is advisory, then you’re better off not doing it.”

He added, “You’re better off not taking action if the action produces another agency that doesn’t have real statutory authority.”

Mr. [Philip] Zelikow, a Republican historian who served on Mr. Bush’s 2001 transition team for the National Security Council, suggested that the commission believed that there was little room for compromise on the essential powers that needed to be granted an intelligence director.

“Creating a national intelligence director that just superimposes a chief above the other chiefs,” he said, “without taking on the fundamental management issues we identify, is a step that could be worse than useless.”

NYT: “Critics Say Bush’s Intelligence Chief Would Be Toothless”

Worse than useless. That sounds about par for the course, eh? But these commissioners are … serious:

The chairman of the Sept. 11 commission said on Wednesday that voters in November’s presidential election should weigh how President Bush and Senator John Kerry respond to the commission’s final report in determining how they vote.

The chairman, Thomas H. Kean, a Republican and former governor of New Jersey, said he was “gratified” by the way both Mr. Bush and Mr. Kerry had responded to the recommendations of the bipartisan commission, which has called for an overhaul of intelligence agencies.

But despite his praise for Mr. Bush, Mr. Kean’s comments in an interview carried an implicit warning to the president, who has already rejected specific recommendations in the commission’s report, including its call for the establishment of a national intelligence director who would have direct control over the budgets and personnel of the C.I.A. and other intelligence agencies.

Mr. Kean said he thought it was appropriate for Mr. Bush and Mr. Kerry to be judged in the election by the way they respond to the work of the commission.

“I think it will be an issue and should be an issue,” said Mr. Kean.

“And even if the commission didn’t want to make it an issue, the families would,” he said, referring to the victims’ families. “The families have told me that, as an organization, they are going to monitor the elections, both at the presidential level and at the Congressional level. They are going to alert people as to where the candidates stand on these recommendations, and that’s wonderful.”

NYT: “9/11 Panel Chairman Urges ‘Vote’ on Report”

It would certainly center a politician’s focus, too, one would think. One would hope. We shall see.

On the legislative side of the fence, there’s about umpteen House and Senate committees that have some form of official oversight over the intelligence community. They, too, are going to have to give up some control. Congressional oversight must be streamlined and consolidated, so that the Director of Homeland Security (and other intelligence officials) doesn’t have to make 140 appearances before Congress in one year. There is no logical reason that this oversight could not be confined to, at most, one committee on each side of Congress. And I can see how one combined committee of Senators and Representatives would be even more effective, both in terms of simple efficiency, and security (on these matters, less ears is better, yet representative oversight would be maintained).

This is where it will get ugly. Everyone wants to look like they’re pulling an oar and be perceived as a team player right now. However, the Pentagon, the White House, and the Capitol are not places that freely surrender any control. There will be turf wars and bureaucratic infighting to sabotage any such attempt. But if they aren’t willing to give up control, this reorganization will be hamstrung.

So that’s the thing to watch; see what vagary gets pushed through quickly, and what “details” get put off until January. January is in a year that ends in an odd number. Meaning, they will have far more leeway to do what they want, rather than what we need.