[Dryerase] AGR Homeland security

[Shawn G]

Small article on homeland security bill before congress right now


Asheville Global Report (www.agrnews.org)
New Office of Homeland Security to concentrate power, increase secrecy

By Brendan Conley

June 26 (AGR)— In what would be the most significant restructuring of the 
federal government since the 1947 creation of the Department of Defense, 
President George W. Bush is seeking to create a Department of Homeland 
Security that would bring together foreign and domestic intelligence 
agencies and would be exempt from laws requiring public disclosure and 
protecting whistleblowers. Congress is considering the Homeland Security Act 
on an accelerated schedule that could result in the creation of the 
department by the first anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks.

The department would combine 100 federal entities, including the Secret 
Service, Coast Guard, and Border Patrol, with 170,000 employees and total 
annual budgets of $37 billion into one agency.  The FBI and CIA would be 
required to turn over intelligence reports relating to potential attacks 
against the US to the new department.

“If you like the idea of a government agency that is 100 percent secret and 
0 percent accountable, you’ll love the new Homeland Security Department,” 
said Timothy Edgar, an American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) Legislative 
Counsel.  “The Administration’s plan exempts the new agency from a host of 
laws designed to keep government open and accountable and to protect 
whistleblowers.”

In perhaps the most striking bid for secrecy, a provision in the bill 
creating the new department would exempt its employees from the 
Whistleblower Protection Act, the very law that helped expose intelligence 
failures related to the Sept. 11 attacks.  FBI Agent Coleen Rowley blew the 
whistle on her bosses for mistakes in the probe of Zacarias Moussaoui, who 
has been indicted on six counts of conspiracy in last year’s attacks on the 
World Trade Center and the Pentagon.  Protections against retribution for 
whistleblowers like Rowley would not exist in the new agency.

The new department would be exempt from the Freedom of Information Act 
(FOIA), the ACLU said, “essentially eliminating the agency’s responsibility 
to answer public questions about how well it is addressing these threats.”

The FBI and CIA would be required to share intelligence reports with the 
Homeland Security Department, blurring the line dividing foreign and 
domestic spying.  This melding could endanger the rights and freedoms of US 
citizens, according to civil liberties advocates.

The creation of the new agency is expected to further propel the military 
and law enforcement buildup since Sept. 11. The Coast Guard, one of the 
agencies that would be folded into the new department, announced plans to 
improve and expand its fleet.  A joint team of Lockheed Martin and Northrop 
Grumman was awarded an $11 billion, 20-year contract that will allow the 
Coast Guard to buy 91 ships and 145 airplanes and helicopters, as well as 
upgrade 49 cutters.



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