GovernmentExecutive.com

Former Sen. Warren Rudman, R-N.H., Monday called the Homeland Security Department a "colossal mess" and urged that it be revamped into a leaner agency.

"It's just too big," Rudman said in an interview with CongressDaily and National Journal.

Rudman, now the interim chairman of Stonebridge International, a business advisory firm, said the department was not what he and former Sen. Gary Hart, D-Colo., had in mind when they issued their prescient February 2001 report warning of the likelihood of terrorist attacks and recommending the creation of a cabinet-level agency to defend against the threat.

Rudman said that in its current form, the department had subverted some of the agencies included in it when it was created. As one prominent casualty of the reorganization, he mentioned the Federal Emergency Management Agency, which he said "has been almost destroyed."

As perhaps the biggest failure of the department, he cited its lack of progress in shoring up port security.

It "is still the No. 1 unsolved problem," he said, adding later that a single nuclear device or other weapon of mass destruction could destroy a city and its economy "for 100 years."

While the government has spent hundreds of billions of dollars to improve aviation security since Sept. 11, 2001, "the ports are wide open," he said.

On other issues, Rudman, who is supporting Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., for president, said he agreed with his former Senate colleague that war in Iraq, had been "horribly mishandled."

Rudman predicted that although the current "surge" strategy Iraq seemed to be working, the political fallout from the war will continue to hurt Republicans.

"I think Republicans are going to have a very tough time in for some time to come in New Hampshire," said Rudman, who served as senator from the formerly Republican state from 1980 to 1993.

Regarding Iran, Rudman agreed that "we have to throw every roadblock possible" to prevent the country from becoming a nuclear power, but argued that military action would probably not be needed to achieve this goal because the Iranians know they could "be obliterated in the blink of an eye" during a confrontation with the United States.

"They may be rambunctious, but they are not stupid," he said.

COMMENTS

• I must admit that I have a longing to return to the days in which immigration laws were enforced (when they would let us) by agents/officers trained in immigration law who believed that the "who" crossing the border was just as important as the "what" that USCS guarded against. Unfortunately, we now have a situation in which the Border Patrols hands are tied to immediate border enforcement only (let's play football with only a defensive line and see where the score is at the end of the game). ICE/DRO is giving it a good college try but they are also limited in the scope of their duties. ICE/OI has largely turned its back on immigration enforcement except in certain areas in which they can make high profile arrests to put on their website (with all due respect to former USCS agents/officers who perform a difficult and important job and to the former INS agents who feel like they have been shoved into the dark recesses of ICE). This approach has left the vast majority of middle America open to illegal immigration with no recourse except to attempt creation of new State laws of questionable constitutionality. Who cares if the next President wants amnesty! DHS has already created a defacto amnesty in the majority of the country through their lack of action and blatant disregard of the voices of citizens. Given a choice between putting handcuffs on an illegal alien and putting handcuffs on the upper management of DHS, ICE and CBP, I would arrest the management teams for gross malfeasance before the illegal alien. Our DHS management is much more dangerous to our future as a free and independent nation. Scared of reprisal USBP agent Posted February 5, 2008 10:18 PM
• How about splitting it into "Customs" and "INS"? I guess not, because that would make too much sense! The expression "if it ain't broke, don't fix it", comes to mind, at least for the U.S. Customs Service, which bore no responsibility for 9/11, yet was sacrificed in the aftermath of the attacks in a knee-jerk reaction by the government to reassure the public that it was doing something to fight terrorism. Now it's over 6 years later, and DHS is a bureaucratic behemoth still trying to get it's act together, and not succeeding. We would have been far better off fixing what needed fixing at INS and the other agencies that were subsequently thrown together into this alphabet soup without rhyme or reason, while wasting billions of taxpayer dollars. The creation of DHS has done little or nothing to protect this nation from terrorism, because DHS has no authority to investigate terrorism (the FBI and CIA do, and jealously guard their turf). Way to go, gang! ICE-bound Posted January 29, 2008 11:19 AM
• DHS is beyond hope. This country is not protected any better than before DHS was created. In fact, the name "Homeland Security" is un-American. I feel like I'm working for the Gestapo. Congress needs to abolish DHS, rename and reorganize it. j smith Posted January 10, 2008 9:44 PM