Ned Lamont just did the smartest thing yet in his campaign for US Senate. Lamont exploded the myth that Lieberman is a competent leader on Homeland Security. In fact Lieberman's been AWOL on his signature issue.
AP: Lamont also says Lieberman, ranking member of the Senate Homeland Security Committee, mistakenly agreed to put the troubled Federal Emergency Management Agency under the control of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security.
"I think FEMA worked really well when it had professional management as an independent agency," Lamont said in an interview this week. "And sure, it was Senator Lieberman who said, 'Let's redo FEMA.' It was Senator Lieberman who said, 'Let's put Michael Brown as No. 2 at FEMA.'"
I've been waiting for so long to hear that in a major media outlet. Joe Lieberman has been the worst kind of Monday Morning Quarterback on Katrina. I'll explain why on the flip...
In 2002, against the advice of experts like
Clinton FEMA chief James Lee Witt and
Brookings Institute senior fellow Ivo Daalder Sen. Lieberman plowed ahead folding FEMA into his shiny new Department of Homeland Security. Here's a warning from Ivo Daalder against putting FEMA in a giant bureaucracy from 6/25/02:
Daalder: Take FEMA. This is one of the best run federal government agencies. It has excellent record, gained through years of responding to natural disasters, of dealing with state and local government entities and first responders. In its FY2003 budget, the Bush administration proposed that FEMA take central control of all training and grant programs for first responders, providing state and local authorities with the kind of one-stop shopping and integrated training program they have long demanded. Why, then, tear an agency with such a successful record from its roots and integrate into a much larger bureaucracy, with new command and control lines? Much of its day-to-day responsibility has nothing to do with terrorism--and whatever responsibility it does have for this area is fundamentally different from the preventive and protective counter-terrorism functions of other parts of the proposed department. No one proposes to merge the diplomatic functions of the State Department with the military functions of the Pentagon, even though both have a role in national security policy--including in countering terrorism. Might it not be better, then, to leave FEMA be, and coordinate its counter-terrorism role as part of a well-functioning interagency process?
Lieberman ignored the advice of many Democratic experts and pushed ahead with his own vision for DHS. People of good will can disagree but shouldn't the Chairman of the Senate Homeland Security Committe and later Ranking Member do some kind of operational oversight to ensure his vision was actually being fulfilled? Sen. Lieberman did no such thing. Just a week before Daalder's prescient testimony Sen. Lieberman confirmed Michael Brown as Deputy Director of FEMA in a 42-minute rubber stamp abomination of a hearing.
6/19/02: PREPARED OPENING STATEMENT OF SENATOR LIEBERMAN (PDF)
Good morning. Welcome to you, Mr. Brown, and also to your wife, Tamara. We are here this morning for the nomination hearing of Michael Brown to become Deputy Director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency--a government agency under much discussion these days, as we begin to reorganize government to better protect our citizens from terrorist attacks here at home. If, and I hope when, the Department of Homeland Security comes into existence, FEMA will be folded into the Department; we must ensure that the agency is equipped to function at the highest level today, and equipped to make the transition into the new department without losing a step tomorrow. Responding to terrorist attacks, of course, is just one piece of FEMA's mission. Re- cent floods in Minnesota and crippling forest fires in Colorado have reminded us of FEMA's critical, often life-saving role in helping Americans protect themselves from and recover from natural disasters....But because, by creating the Department of Homeland Security, we are in the throes of making such an important decision that will affect FEMA's historic and future responsibilities, I'd like to focus today on the agency's role as the lead federal agency responding to terrorist attacks.
Does Lieberman focus on terrorism at the expense of natural disaster readiness? More...
Based on a series of hearings on homeland security the Governmental Affairs Committee held last fall, it is crystal clear to me that effective coordination among and between layers of government is the crux of all quick and effective terror response. Therefore, FEMA must be an absolutely de- pendable link in that communications chain. It must ensure that the Federal Gov- ernment's entire emergency response network is a well-honed machine, and then that the Federal, state and local governments are just as well coordinated with one another. This is an immense challenge that FEMA has yet to meet. I am glad the President has nominated someone already familiar with FEMA's mission to become Deputy Director. Mr. Brown is currently General Counsel and Chief Operating Officer of the agency, a position he has held since February of 2001. Before joining the Bush Administration, I note from his resume, he served as execu- tive director of the Independent Electrical Contractors in Denver. In the early 1980s, Mr. Brown served as staff director of the Oklahoma Senate's Finance Com- mittee, while serving on the Edmund, Oklahoma, City Council. He ran for Congress in the sixth district, and, in what I think is particularly useful experience, early in his career, was assistant city manager in Edmond, with responsibility for police, fire and emergency services.
The advise and consent role of the Senate in confirming appointments is well-established. A good friend tells you when you have mustard on your chin, spinach in your teeth, or Michael Brown as a nominee. Joe Lieberman did none of these things for his friend President Bush. Instead he acted as a toady DC insider and just rubber stamped the nomination. This without making a single phone call as Chairman of the committee to verify the references of Michael Brown. Run your mouse over the hyperlinked Brown qualifications above - each link is to a lie, uncovered in the days after Katrina with simple phone calls. And I'm not even mentioning his employment at the International Arabian Horse Association, "An unmitigated, total fucking disaster." (hattip to our own Goldy at HorsesAss)
Now on to Lieberman's remarks at the Brown hearing.
Chairman LIEBERMAN . Mr. Brown, I thank you very much. I will certainly support your nomination. I will do my best to move it through the Committee as soon as possible so we can have you fully and legally at work in your new position. In the meantime, I thank you very much. I thank your family for their support of you, and at this point, we will adjourn the hearing.
You can view the hearing video at this link. Scroll down to find the appropriate Senate hearing.
Am I being too hard on Senator Lieberman and his uber bipartisan twin Sen. Susan Collins of Maine? In a word, NO. In the 2 years and 7 months from the time of Gov. Tom Ridge's confirmation hearing as first Secretary of Homeland Security in Jan '03 to the time Katrina made landfall in the Gulf of Mexico Lieberman and Collins held exactly ZERO hearings on FEMA's operational readiness. ZERO. Z-E-R-O. Lieberman and Collins as Ranking Member and Chairman did hold one hearing on FEMA cash payouts in May 2005. I'll let Sen. Lieberman's words characterize that meeting for the record.
Sen. Lieberman(PDF): FEMA's mission of responding to natural disasters and of providing financial assistance to those harmed by them is an absolutely critical one - and one I completely support. That's not what this hearing is about.
In the same 2 years and 7 months Lieberman's committee found the time to confirm David Safavian, a man since convicted of 4 felony counts of obstruction as a Bush appointee. And the Liebeman/Collins vaudeville act found time for 7 separate hearings on Postal reform and 2 separate hearings on diploma mills. How effective can Lieberman/Collins be on stopping bogus degrees when they can't be bothered to check Michael Brown's resume references the same as a junior manager at McDonald's checking a new fry cook?
I'm ranting at this point but I just wanted to reinforce Ned Lamont's criticisms of Joe Lieberman on Homeland Security and FEMA specifically. Lieberman is all talk, no action.
I encourage all readers to look into Joe Lieberman's performance in the creation of Homeland Security, the corrosion of FEMA's capabilities, the confirmation of Michael Brown, Lieberman's lack of oversight as Committee Chairman, and finally his ridiculous role as the champion of renaming FEMA, as if the name change would somehow obscure his own role in destroying an agency charged with saving lives. The US Navy didn't change it's name after Pearl Harbor. They addressed the problem because it was life and death as is FEMA's mission. Changing names is plain stupid. I'll let Paul Krugman close for me as I'm obviously an angry blogofascist and too shrill for polite company.
FEMA became a dumping ground for cronies, and many of the good people who had come in during the Clinton years left. ... In other words, the Crony Fairy is named George W. Bush. ... And bear in mind that Mr. Bush's pattern of cronyism didn't change after Katrina. ... o let's skip the name change for FEMA, O.K.? The United States will regain effective government if and when it gets a president who cares more about serving the nation than about rewarding his friends and scoring political points. That's at least a thousand days away. Meanwhile, don't count on FEMA, or on any other government agency, to do its job.
Sen. Joe Lieberman didn't do his job of advise and consent or oversight. Instead he enabled the Crony Fairy and didn't give his friend President Bush the one thing he needed - honest advice.
It's time for new leadership. It's time for Senator Ned Lamont (Democrat-CT)