More incompetence at Homeland Security

[Tex]

Originally Posted by SoCalCoug

Glad I could amuse you.

I guess you missed the point and will never get it.

Incompetence is a running theme with the agencies within the Bush administration. I see it as a result of the way Bush sees agency appointments - as a reward for political favors. Here's a post I made about the issue a year and a half ago.

http://www.cougarboard.com/noframes/...tml?id=1425531

I'm just shocked that there has continued to be incompetence within the Bush administration.

Rewarding political favors via political appointment is the name of the game in Washington. We can dicker over whether or not Bush has been more or less a participant in this vs. other presidents, but every president does it. A lot.

And for the record, incompetence is a running them with gov't agencies, period. That's why true conservatives want gov't running as little as possible. Again, we can dicker over whether Bush is better or worse than the average, but they all suffer from bureaucratic bloat.

My guess is, very little of it has to do with Bush (or Clinton, or Bush, or Reagan, or Carter ...). In fact, most of the rank-and-file doesn't turn over with each administration change.

[SoCalCoug]

Originally Posted by Tex

Rewarding political favors via political appointment is the name of the game in Washington. We can dicker over whether or not Bush has been more or less a participant in this vs. other presidents, but every president does it. A lot.

And for the record, incompetence is a running them with gov't agencies, period. That's why true conservatives want gov't running as little as possible. Again, we can dicker over whether Bush is better or worse than the average, but they all suffer from bureaucratic bloat.

My guess is, very little of it has to do with Bush (or Clinton, or Bush, or Reagan, or Carter ...). In fact, most of the rank-and-file doesn't turn over with each administration change.

In case you didn't read:

Here's the scorecard for appointments to big donors ($100,000 plus) in the first year of their presidency:

Clinton:

5 big donors appointed as ambassadors

Bush:

At least 24 big donors or spouses appointed as ambassadors
At least 57 big donors or spouses appointed to agency positions
3 big donors became Cabinet secretaries


If every president does it a lot, and Clinton is one of the presidents, and he did it 5 times, how would you characterize the frequency with which Bush did it - which is 84 times?

Do you not see the difference? Do you not see how incompetent leaders might affect an agency? Do you really think the big donors were appointed for their competence?

[VAX77]

The more I realize how incompetent Bush is (or whoever runs the white house), and how his administration is more than willing to just ride roughshod over any opposition, the more I think about this:
http://youtube.com/watch?v=CsNgRmsx-14

"...I got a feeling your whole family is going down..."
Substitute Bush for O'Doyle