BOVARD

“Strength� & “Gravitas,� - or, Nitwits on Parade

7:50 pm | Uncategorized

The creation of the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) — a vast amalgamation of 22 agencies and 170,000 government workers - has been one of President Bush’s biggest bragging points. The Washington Post published the first of a series today on how DHS has been a pathetic farce since the day it was created.

In the early months of the department’s existence in 2003, at a time when Bush & team were rattling terror alert warnings again and again, DHS busied itself arranging focus group tests of a new seal for the Department that was “designed to convey ‘strength’ and ‘gravitas.’â€? Former DHS inspector general Clark Kent Ervin recalled that DHS senior staff meetings in the first months were dominated by “weekly, even daily talk about structure, ‘branding’ the department, coming up with a mission statement and bringing a sense of esprit de corps.” Ervin lamented that very little attention was paid at such meetings to America’s “key vulnerabilities” to terrorist threats.

Unfortunately, since Osama Bin Laden did not go to Harvard Business School, a good mission statement might not be sufficient to make him cease and desist.

The Post article did not mention one of the biggest “Three Stooges� examples from Homeland Security. Last October, DHS finances were so screwed up that that some antiterrorist agencies were saving money by banning agents from using government cars and even prohibiting photocopying.

I will wager a case of good German beer that the revelations of inanities in this and subsequent exposes DHS do nothing to dissuade Washington Post editorial writers from hectoring Americans about their duty to trust the government.