Job Vacancies At DHS Said To Hurt U.S. Preparedness

[RamboLiberal]

Source: Washington Post

The Bush administration has failed to fill roughly a quarter of the top leadership posts at the Department of Homeland Security, creating a "gaping hole" in the nation's preparedness for a terrorist attack or other threat, according to a congressional report to be released today.

As of May 1, Homeland Security had 138 vacancies among its top 575 positions, with the greatest voids reported in its policy, legal and intelligence sections, as well as in immigration agencies, the Federal Emergency Management Agency and the Coast Guard. The vacant slots include presidential, senior executive and other high-level appointments, according to the report by the House Homeland Security Committee.

A DHS spokesman challenged the report's tally, saying that it is skewed by a sudden expansion this spring in the number of top management jobs. Before then, only 12 percent of positions were unfilled in a department that has always been thinly staffed at headquarters, spokesman Russ Knocke said.

The findings have stoked fresh concern among some in Congress about the four-year-old department's progress in overcoming management problems, dating to its troubled 2003 creation from 22 components.



Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/07/08/AR2007070801201.html?hpid=topnews

[DeepModem Mom]

1. They have no interest in governing whatsover. Olbermann said it: "RESIGN." nt

[tularetom]

2. What not enough grads from the pat robertson law skool

to fill the vacancies at Homeland Security?

They're missing an opportunity to inject jeezus into every facet of our daily lives by tryin to scare the shit out of us.

Faith based security measures. we don't hafta do nothin except pray a lot and shoot all swarthy lookin people.

[ixion]

3. DHS hurts our preparedness... it is anathema to freedom, and should be abolished

IMO>

[Mind_your_head]

9. Yes, DHS is anathema to freedom and should be abolished

I MOST heartily agree!

[Love Bug]

4. This article assumes the fully-staffed DHS would actually be effective

I'm sure they would be as effective as FEMA has been in New Orleans. That's the standard the Bush administration has set.

[eppur_se_muova]

5. That's OK, it was never meant to be a functioning Dept anyway.

It's just cover.

[MadMaddie]

6. Now that Rove, Cheney and the others have their hands full

trying to prevent DOJ employees from testifying, destroying evidence etc...they don't have time to handpick the ill prepared, incompetant people they would place in those postions. The Leadership of DHS hands are tied and you know they can't make any decisions unless they get approval from Rove and company.

[young_at_heart]

7. The beginning of the story says it all

"The Bush administration has failed"

[rodeodance]

12. good eye!

[lovuian]

8. who would want to work for these people

you would have to be mad

[w4rma]

10. Fatherland/Motherland/Homeland

Fascist-Communist BS. The department should be dissolved and its duties given back to the departments that formerly did them.

[rodeodance]

11. a sudden expansion in top management positions?--BIGGER government is

what it sounds like to me.

[tanyev]

13. Don't State and DOJ have serious staffing problems, too?

That's one way to downsize a government. Eff things up so royally that nobody wants to work for you. Not even fellow Republicans.

[young_at_heart]

14. I would like to know who came up with the word "Homeland"?

It's such an un-American word!

[bemildred]

15. Oh my goodness, the secret police have a staffing shortage.

How the heck did we ever get along without a DHS for over two centuries anyway?

[MountainLaurel]

16. Now there's a surprise

Although I'm not particularly concerned about upper-level positions. Anybody who has worked in the DC area for the past 6 years knows what a giant clusterfuck DHS is and probably know better than to apply there. I remember hearing two folks from the Transportation Security Agency on the train home one night, talking about the training process they were involved in (it sounded like they were training folks at airports across the country) and how screwed up the whole thing was, from the melding of agencies to the contractors' roles.