From a New York Times editorial, 1/6/05:
http://www.nytimes.com/2005/01/06/opinion/06thu1.html
Homeland Security Goes Begging
Congress has a critical role in protecting the nation from terrorists
by exercising careful scrutiny of homeland security programs.
But so far, the House and Senate have been contributing to the problem
rather than the solutions, distracting antiterrorism efforts by
forcing officials to report to dozens of competing, power-hungry
committees.
The independent 9/11 commission cried out for an end to this
"dysfunctional" system.
Its solution was clean and obvious: create a single streamlined
homeland security committee in each house, with both budget power and
responsibility for oversight.
Yet no national priority has been more shamefully subject to evasion
by a truculent Congress ensconced in the traditions of turf battles.
Currently, the leaders of the Department of Homeland Security report
to more than 80 committees and subcommittees in the House and Senate,
each with a zealously guarded slice of the budget for securing the
nation against terrorists.
There is no one in Congress with the power or the responsibility to
make sure the secretary of homeland security has the manpower and
money he needs and to hold him accountable for the department's
performance.
Like the 9/11 panel, any average American could have seen the answer.
But not Congress.
In its latest evasion, the House Republican leadership this week
announced, with great fanfare, that it was granting "permanent" status
to the existing House Select Committee on Homeland Security.
All that was lacking was jurisdiction over homeland security
budgeting, spending or performance.
Besides leaving the committee squarely in limbo, Speaker Dennis
Hastert appeased powerful rival chairmen who were already sniping away
at the homeland panel, which has spent the last two years scrambling
for survival and office space.
The committee's Republican chairman, Christopher Cox of California,
can look forward to an inch-by-inch struggle for jurisdiction in
arcane debates in the parliamentarian's office as his rivals - the
ranking committee "bulls" of the Judiciary, Energy and Transportation
Committees - invoke historical precedence over the newcomer.
Even as the new permanent homeland panel was proclaimed, rivals
already conspired to deprive it of the jurisdiction for overseeing
such basic essentials as the Coast Guard, border entries and
cybersecurity threats to the country's electric power grids and other
vulnerable infrastructures.
"This is the speaker's committee," says Mr. Cox, expecting help from
on high.
But even for an old wrestling coach like the speaker, refereeing the
looming food fights over oversight and appropriations is no way to see
that the people get proper vigilance and protection from their
government.
Comparable cosmetic changes have been loftily proclaimed for the
Senate committee system, but the same blur of jurisdiction, power
jockeying and eventual inertia can be expected to continue.
Three years after the 9/11 attacks, House leaders dared to defend
their system in Orwellian terms as "purposeful redundancy" and a
"competition of ideas."
The bulls of Congress should only guard the nation this zealously.
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"Congress consists of 1/3, more or less, scoundrels;
2/3, more or less, idiots; and three thirds, more
or less, poltroons."
H.L. Mencken
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