Welcome to the cronies ball in America

If there was ever any doubt that New Orleans was only a train derailing on a track leading to no where when it comes to inside-the-Beltway political mechanizations, then read on.

From the Washington Post:

The Bush administration is seeking to appoint a lawyer with little immigration or customs experience to head the troubled law enforcement agency that handles those issues, prompting sharp criticism from some employee groups, immigration advocates and homeland security experts.

The push to appoint Julie Myers [36] to head the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement [ICE] agency, part of the Department of Homeland Security, comes in the midst of intense debate over the qualifications of department political appointees involved in the sluggish response to Hurricane Katrina.

… After working as a federal prosecutor in Brooklyn, N.Y., for two years, Myers held a variety of jobs over the past four years at the White House and at the departments of Commerce, Justice and Treasury, though none involved managing a large bureaucracy.

So why is she in line to oversee ICE, a law enforcement agency with some 20,000 employees and a $4 billion annual budget? Here’s a possible explanation, one based on the rules of Washington cronyism: You want someone in place who is promoted beyond their ability, who is beholden to the good old boys in the bureaucracy. That makes controlling the individual easier — all the better if you have some dirt on the person — and also creates a convenient fall person in the event of a big problem. Just ask equestrian-dung master Michael Brown of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) about that little lesson.

More from the Washington Post on Myers' crony credentials:

Myers worked briefly as chief of staff to Michael Chertoff when he led the Justice Department's criminal division before he became Homeland Security secretary.

Myers also was an associate under independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr for about 16 months and has most recently served as a special assistant to President Bush handling personnel issues.

Her uncle is Air Force Gen. Richard B. Myers, the departing chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. She married Chertoff's current chief of staff, John F. Wood, on Saturday.

… Unlike most political appointments, the head of ICE is required by statute to have at least five years of experience in both law enforcement and management.

I guess being good at math is not a requirement in adding up that “law-enforcement and management” experience.

But then Myers getting the nod for the top ICE post should come as no surprise. The previous head of ICE, Michael Garcia, was actually appointed to one of the highest-profile U.S. Attorney posts in the country (in Manhattan) after running up a huge budget deficit at ICE (hundreds of millions of dollars in red ink).

From a prior Narco News story:

Narco News has interviewed multiple law enforcers in recent weeks who have stepped forward to blow the whistle on the fact that federal agents with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) are being forced to go into the field each day, into the thick of the “war on drugs,” without the benefit of bulletproof vests. One high-level ICE supervisor estimates the agency is short some 5,000 vests.

… (ICE spokesman Russel) Knocke also concedes that the agency is projecting another budget shortfall for fiscal 2005, but he declined to put a number on the red ink. One DHS source says the $150 million cited in Congressional Quarterly is on the low end and that the actual figure could be as high as $650 million.

"We will have to apply restraint to assure we end the year with financial responsibility,” Knocke says. “But that will only affect non-mission critical areas. The money for mission-critical services and national security is always there."  

… Despite Knocke’s assurance that the red ink won’t translate into red blood for agents on the street, interviews with multiple ICE and DHS field agents and supervisors tell a far different story. According to those law enforcers, ICE’s leadership is completely out of touch with what is happening on the front lines.

The budget cutbacks, they claim, have led to a rationing of resources that is affecting “mission critical” areas. Numerous field offices across the country have told their agents to park cars because they can’t afford to put gas in them or complete required maintenance. This has resulted in agents being forced to double- and triple-up in cars.

On another note of crony irony, Garcia, now a U.S. Attorney in charge of prosecuting the drug war, also is himself a defendant in a drug war case: the House of Death. Garcia was the head of ICE at the time a U.S. government informant was allowed by his ICE handlers to participate in up to a dozen murders in Ciudad Juárez, Mexico, all to make a drug case against a narco-trafficker — who, again ironically, had all murder charges against him dropped as part of a plea bargain.

The families of two of the victims – both brutally tortured, murdered and buried in the backyard of a house in the Mexican border town, are now suing Garcia, other ICE agents and a federal prosecutor in federal court in El Paso, Texas.

But why should Garcia’s career advancement be threatened by such a minor splotch of blood on his leadership record, when the U.S. Attorney overseeing the House of Death case, Johnny Sutton of San Antonio, has not been called to task for allegedly attempting to cover up the informant’s complicity in the murders?

However, a mere matter of 12 Mexicans murdered is really nothing in the grand scheme of the Washington cover-up game. Take New Orleans, where hundreds, maybe thousands, of African Americans have paid the ultimate price due to the incompetence of Homeland Security’s politically aligned leadership.

Kight Ridder reports:

WASHINGTON — The federal official with the power to mobilize a massive federal response to Hurricane Katrina was Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff, not the former FEMA chief who was relieved of his duties and resigned earlier this week, federal documents reviewed by Knight Ridder show.

Even before the storm struck the Gulf Coast, Chertoff could have ordered federal agencies into action without any request from state or local officials. Federal Emergency Management Agency chief Michael Brown had only limited authority to do so until about 36 hours after the storm hit, when Chertoff designated him as the "principal federal official" in charge of the storm.

As thousands of hurricane victims went without food, water and shelter in the days after Katrina's early morning Aug. 29 landfall, critics assailed Brown for being responsible for delays that might have cost hundreds of lives.

But Chertoff — not Brown — was in charge of managing the national response to a catastrophic disaster, according to the National Response Plan, the federal government's blueprint for how agencies will handle major natural disasters or terrorist incidents. An order issued by President Bush in 2003 also assigned that responsibility to the homeland security director.

But according to a memo obtained by Knight Ridder, Chertoff didn't shift that power to Brown until late afternoon or evening on Aug. 30, about 36 hours after Katrina hit Louisiana and Mississippi. That same memo suggests that Chertoff may have been confused about his lead role in disaster response and that of his department.

… On the day that Chertoff wrote the memo, Bush was in San Diego presiding over a ceremony marking the 60th anniversary of the end of World War II.

Yet, with all these facts on the table, Myers will likely sail through the confirmation process for the ICE post, and soon take a seat at the cronies’ table, enjoying what sycophant side dishes she can, until a seat closer to the main course becomes available.

In the mean time, those who could be great leaders because they have integrity, if they're lucky, might find a few scraps swept off the table to fight for under the glare of the media’s misdirected spotlight. ... Ahh, the irony that is America.