I tell you, we have sappers inside the perimeter and they need to be rooted and routed out!
AG, see Travis's post that this responds to. More info for your China files, another important name that I was unaware of, but in a critical position and placed there by the traitormeister.
Thursday, Sep 19, 2002
Politics
Posted on Mon, Jun. 24, 2002
Miamian is overseeing terror probe
By FRANK DAVIES
Miami Herald
WASHINGTON - With a reputation for quiet efficiency, Miami native Eleanor Hill has just tackled one of the toughest jobs in town, overseeing the highly sensitive, complex investigation into the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11.
If the intelligence community underestimates her ability to probe federal agencies for lapses and mistakes, the bureaucracy will be in trouble, say those who have worked with Hill.
''She's one of the most charming, friendly people you could hope to meet,'' said Chris Hoyer, a Tampa lawyer. ``Then, in the courtroom, she could eviscerate you in the most effective way. She's very disarming.''
Hill and Hoyer were federal prosecutors pursuing fraud and organized crime cases in Central Florida in the 1970s. Hill went on to Washington, where she became Sen. Sam Nunn's top aide for the Iran-contra hearings and staff director of a legendary Senate investigations panel.
The targets ranged from Medicare fraud to money laundering and the emerging threats of a post-Cold War world. It was the same subcommittee that took on defense fraud under Harry Truman and racketeering under Estes Kefauver and Robert Kennedy.
''There's a great tradition of nonpartisan investigations on that subcommittee,'' said Dan Gelber, who succeeded Hill as staff director. ``She was a supreme professional -- smart, steady and never got flustered. Above all, she is an investigator.''
Gelber, now a state representative from Miami Beach, said Hill's 15 years on that subcommittee taught her skills she will need handling a high-profile inquiry that has raised public expectations for improving how intelligence agencies deal with terrorism.
''She's good at navigating the personalities of members and staff, and she'll follow leads where they take her,'' Gelber predicted.
Hill, 51, began the job three weeks ago and has declined to give interviews. She faces the task of catching up with a 23-member staff that has already spent three months digging into the CIA, FBI and other agencies. And she must deal with 37 House and Senate members with their own requests and agendas.
She had to jump into an investigation well under way.
Sen. Bob Graham and Rep. Porter Goss, the two Floridians who chair the joint inquiry, hired her to replace L. Britt Snider, who resigned after a personnel dispute involving the security clearance of a staffer.
Snider, a former inspector general at the CIA with long Capitol Hill experience, had a stronger intelligence background than Hill. But some senators, especially Richard Shelby, R-Ala., questioned whether Snider was too close to CIA Director George Tenet.
RIGHT FOR JOB
Graham said Hill's résumé is just right for the job. He points to her four years as inspector general in the Pentagon during the Clinton administration, where she investigated waste and fraud in defense spending.
(I KNOW she has to be worthless if that's the case- the inspector general's people NEVER made an unanounced visit and so, people likely to reveal waste or fraud were routinely sent home or sent elsewhere on days when the inspectors were due. The inspectors never seemed to catch on!)
''She had involvement with intelligence at Defense,'' Graham said. ``She has a knowledge of the field, but a certain distance from the agencies to be objective.''
Hill also came to the job with the high recommendation of her former boss and mentor, Nunn, who lured her to the law firm of King & Spalding in 1999.
''Eleanor Hill has done an excellent job in all that she has undertaken,'' Nunn said. ``She is smart, thorough and diligent, and her integrity is beyond reproach.''
Shelby said he was sold on Hill's ''impressive credentials in the investigative field'' and cited her ''professional detachment'' from intelligence agencies.
Hill has also worked with and observed some of the agencies, and their chronic bureaucratic problems, that she is investigating.
She watched several FBI investigations and visited new FBI offices overseas. As inspector general, Hill resolved conflicts in fraud investigations among military branches that did not work together or even talk to each other -- a problem before Sept. 11 when different agencies did not share information.
While at the Pentagon, she supervised a staff of 1,612 that shrank by almost one-third due to budget cutbacks.
Hill's Pentagon work should be an asset in an investigation looking at a dozen intelligence agencies, while her relative lack of experience in the intelligence field might hinder her some in learning the language and culture of the CIA, one analyst said.
''But you don't need to be a 20-year veteran in intelligence to see what some of the problems are,'' said Charles Peña of the libertarian Cato Institute. ``And if you're too close to the intelligence community, you may not be able to see the forest for the trees.''
Hill has come a long way from Miami Shores, where she grew up in the 1960s and attended Notre Dame Academy. She graduated with honors twice at Florida State -- from the university and the law school.
UNDER PRESSURE
Now she must complete a demanding job under public and political pressures in a tight time frame.
Goss and Graham have promised a full report by February.
The two committees and the staff are trying to stop leaks, win cooperation from the Bush administration and the agencies they are investigating and satisfy critics who say only an independent commission can do the job.
Hoyer, her former colleague, said Hill will be up to the task: ``I think she'll get the job done, smiling the whole time.''
While Hill has not talked publicly about the job, she gave a clue about her approach to the work when she was interviewed as inspector general at the Pentagon. She was asked about the legacy she would like to leave:
``That on my watch, the investigations and the work that came out of this organization consistently met the highest standards of accuracy, professionalism and fairness. You need to be thorough, you need to be accurate, but you need to be balanced and fair.''