Posted on 11/25/2002 9:12:06 AM PST by Sparta
WASHINGTON — On his first working day after a four-nation tour of eastern Europe, President Bush planned to sign the new Department of Homeland Security into law Monday, marking the biggest overhaul in the federal government in more than 50 years.
The president was expected to "thank Congress for its bold and historic action in creating a new department largely along the lines of his proposal," said Gordon Johndroe, spokesman for Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge, who was to be named the new secretary of the department and newest member of the Cabinet.
Navy Secretary Gordon England was also expected to be named Ridge's deputy.
The department will have "one primary mission — protecting the American people, and it will allow 170,000 people to work more efficiently and effectively than ever before," Johndroe said.
Not since the creation of the Defense Department in 1947 has the government had so large an overhaul. The new department will employ 170,000 workers and encompass all or parts of 22 federal agencies. It has a $38 billion budget, estimated from the allocations of the existing units being incorporated.
Though the president originally wanted homeland security directed by the White House, Bush relented last June and proposed a new agency that could coordinate all the disparate bureaus and provide a cohesive front against terrorist threats.
Bush's proposal came after reviews of intelligence agencies revealed that a lack of coordination hampered efforts to foresee and prevent the Sept. 11 attacks.
After the bill was introduced by Senate Democrats, partisan wrangling slowed down progress as Democrats demanded worker protections that Bush said were too strict for an agency that would need the highest quality of workers and flexible staffing to confront fast-changing threats.
The sides finally agreed to limited collective-bargaining arrangements after Democrats lost the majority in the Senate on Election Day.
The agency has 90 days to get its leadership structure in place, but was expected to take more than a year before it would be operating at full speed.
Senate Republican leader Trent Lott of Mississippi has already said that he wants some changes to be applied to the agency next year, and has gotten a pledge from House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., to revise certain provisions in the next Congress.
One provision permits federal business with American companies that have moved their operations abroad to sidestep U.S. taxes.
Another measure legally shields drug companies already sued over ingredients used in vaccines. Democrats said this includes existing claims that mercury-based preservatives have caused autism in children.
Also re-examined will be a section that helps Texas A&M University win homeland-security research money, a priority of incoming House Majority Leader Tom DeLay of Texas.
The sheep's naiveté knows no bounds.
Sure, government bureaus are famous for their efficiency and effectiveness, and the bigger they are, more effective they are. Right?!
This boondogle will definitely cause a lot of American citizens unnecessary trouble, but the terrorists are safer now than they have ever been.
Hank
Insert canned laughter here------->>>>
Oh, puh-leeze. This bill is pretty tame compared to the Patriot Act. You want to do something productive, go back and read that mess, and then write your congresscritter and Senators to demand that the more obnoxious provisions of that bill be repealed. Or write them and demand that TIA be nuked the way the Homeland Security Act, the one you claim killed the Republic, killed off TIPS. That's a strange thing to have happen in a so-called police state, Congress listening to the concerns of citizens and voting against the desires of the Administration to kill an invasive program.
Naysayers can just sit here and whine. Who is going to actually do something about these problems? We killed TIPS, and we can kill other problematic provisions.
Well, Congress took mostly existing functions, voted to consolidate them, and the president signed it into law. That part is Constitutional, although one can argue that many of these departments were unconstitutional before and unconstitutional afterwards. So the bill in and of itself changes little.
Seriously, there has been a lot of fearmongering about this bill, but almost all of it is hype. We'd be better off trying to get provisions of the Patriot Act revoked, and TIA killed off like TIPS, instead of wailing about what is basically a lot of cosmetic changes to the federal government.
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