Homeland Boss: We Erred in $tiffing N.Y. (Chertoff)

[sabra]

http://www.nypost.com/seven/11292006/news/regionalnews/homeland_boss__we_erred_in_tiffing_n_y__regionalnews_geoff_earle.htm

HOMELAND BOSS: WE ERRED IN $TIFFING N.Y.

November 29, 2006 -- WASHINGTON - Six months after slashing New York's anti-terror funds, Homeland Security Director Michael Chertoff yesterday admitted the feds were guilty of "bean counting" - a stunning acknowledgement from the man behind the cuts.

Chertoff - who emphatically defended the funding squeeze last summer - yesterday all but said the Department of Homeland Security goofed by stiffing the nation's top terror target.

"We've come to the conclusion that perhaps there was a little too much bean counting and a little less standing back and applying common sense to look at the total picture," Chertoff told a grant-writing conference.

"And I've heard the complaints about it, looking like we're playing kind of a pop-quiz type of game with local communities," he said.

"They have to try to guess what we're looking for - and if they guess wrong, they don't get the money that they think they're entitled to, and that they may be entitled to."

[napi21]

1. Common sense???? Does anyone in this admin. even know

whhat common sense is? Nobody EVER uses any, so why is Chertoff insinuating they probably should have thought of it inside Homeland Security?

[Sherman A1]

2. Agreed

They have gotten along "swimmingly" for the last 6 years without any common sense so just why should they start now? Hmmm....... Avoid Democratic Congress investigations by attempt to fill the airwaves with useless rhetoric?

[wakeme2008]

3. Dems took over the House and Senate and NOW Chertoff thinks

they fucked up with NYC...

IMHO Chertoff knows he will be under oath over this and other things.

[pansypoo53219]

4. ok, 'homeland security', you fucked up

NOW WHAT ARE YOU GONNA DO TO FIX THAT?!?

[RaleighNCDUer]

5. He's lying.

It wasn't bean counting - it was pork counting. The reich wing was using HS as pork, and distributing the funds to supporters, not to where they were needed. NY got cut because the cuts had to come somewhere in order to pay for the pork going to Wyoming and Indiana.

[AndyTiedye]

9. New York Got Cut Because The City is Full of Democrats!

They WANT places like New York to get hit.

[Guaranteed]

15. I don't think it's so much that they want NY to get hit, as it is that

the DHS is simply an instrument for handing out taxpayer dollars to corporate interests, and the Repuke's buddies just aren't in NY....

They're in Wyoming, Utah, etc.

[Guaranteed]

16. Yup. I should have read your post first.

But you got it.

[driver8]

6. No shit, Chertoff...you incompetent dickhead.

We all know that you screwed up.

That's ok...you apologized and now everything is fine again.

You better pray to God that NY doesn't get attacked.

Idiot.

[musiclawyer]

7. I don't understand this guy

Obviously he has some brains and courage. He was one of the first federal prosecutors to really take on the mob. But when he donned his GOP suit he become a mealy mouthed sychophant. What gives?

[frylock]

14. who can $ay with any certainty why he changed hi$ $tripe$

[marmar]

8. Makes you almost miss Brownie....

The Bush Administration's attempts to make government look completely incompetent, and thus irrelevant, are rather obvious at this point.

[Cass]

10. His budgetary formulation led to a petting zoo in some little town being considered more of a target

than the Empire State Building. I'd say that its a bit more than bean counting. Its incompetence at best and malicious politicing at the worst. So very reassuring that nothing will be done to correct the outrage this year and that "common sense" will be factored in next time.

:banghead:

[0rganism]

11. the problem was never "too much bean counting"...

the problem is that the beans were completely misallocated.

If anything, there was too little bean counting and too much pandering by way of prejudicial bean distribution. Bean bias, as it were.

In conclusion, Mr. Chertoff is a lying ass spelunker.

[DinahMoeHum]

12. Nice try, Chertoff. But it doesn't get you off the hook

for guys like "Brownie" or disasters like Katrina.

:evilfrown:

[xxqqqzme]

13. rethugs are crtainly good @

flip-flopping. It only took 6 months and a Democratic majority to get him to change his mind!

[Guaranteed]

17. That didn't occur to me, but I bet you're right. The Dems can cut down

the Dept's funding...

We're seeing results already. :)

[TheCowsCameHome]

18. Cadaverhoff is a little late with this, don't you think?

C'mon, Mike. Go out a buy yourself a good meal and you'll start thinking straight again.