Nightline: Homeland Security Official Pressured Tone Down b/f 04 election

[RamboLiberal]

http://www.rawstory.com/news/2006/ABC_Homeland_Inspector_General_says_we_0501.html

The former inspector general for the Department of Homeland Security says he was pressured to tone down criticism of security failures in the months before the 2004 Presidential election, ABC NEWS is reporting.

The following came as a release. The report is available only as a PDF presently.

FROM ABC NEWS:

Clark Kent Ervin says he was confronted personally by then Secretary Tom Ridge “to intimidate me, to stare me down, to force me to back off, to not look into these areas that would be controversial, not to issue critical reports.”

Ervin will appear this evening on ABC News’ Nightline in advance of the publication of his memoirs, “Open Target: Where America is Vulnerable to Attack.”

http://abcnews.go.com/images/Nightline/ntl_ervin_pdf.pdf

From Amazon.com
From Publishers Weekly
Appointed acting inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security in January 2003, Ervin left after 18 months when Congress refused to confirm him. The reason, he writes, is that he did his job too well, pointing out so much mismanagement and so many security lapses that the bureaucracy turned against him. Ervin sounds the alarm and attempts to settle scores in this book, a detailed warning that America remains frighteningly vulnerable to terrorism. Ervin explores the homeland's weaknesses, describes what the DHS should be doing and how it falls short. Ports, airlines, "soft targets" such as stadiums and critical infrastructure like the water supply must be further secured, as must mass transit (which receives a fraction the funding aviation does). Fragmented intelligence allowed the 9/11 plotters to succeed, but the DHS has not yet achieved coordination of intelligence. Finally, the massive DHS budget requires the establishment of strict accounting and antifraud policies. Though the author notes progress in some areas, he thinks the department has made woefully inadequate headway, is incompetently administered and starved for funds. Ervin's criticisms ring true, and they were well covered in the media, but readers may prefer an account less colored by personal feeling.
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

[henslee]

1. One more dickhead opporutnist coming clean too late. Fuck you Ervin.

Hope your book tanks.

[Botany]

2. But al Qaeda did attack Warren County, OH 11/2/04 didn't they?

Because the BOE, with help of the Sheriff's Dept., and other operatives closed
the vote count to the press saying that they had received a terrorist warning.

We are safer because we are fighting them over there then over here. :sarcasm:

[prole_for_peace]

3. the guy's name is CLARK KENT Ervin???

wtf?

back on message, i am sick and fucking tired of these people coming out WAY after the fact and telling on the administration. maybe if they weren't such chicken assed babies they would have SAID SOMETHING AT THE TIME. they are all assholes.

[RamboLiberal]

4. Yeah that is his name for real - btw he's African-American

not that it matters. Seems to me every time I saw him in the past on TV he was nothing but an apologist for this misadministration.