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  You're at the heart of the matter Don when you say you'd favor more monitoring and correcting of malfeasance and if I might add, misfeasance. This was clearly the intent of the IG Act but it was subverted when congress hewed too close to an outdated GAO accountant/auditor model for establishing hierarchial authorities in new IG offices. At the time, GAO equated an accountant to an auditor to a program evaluator. It can't work that way as GAO was finding out with the increasing complexity of govt. programs. GAO corrected their problem by reorienting recruitment strategies toward candidates with interdisciplinary backgrounds. Unfortunately, congress had moved on leaving the new IG's with a predominence of accountants to romp independently and dysfuntionally for the next 25 years. The Act expected IG's to help ensure that government was runnning efficiently and effectively and, during that process, to ensure the integrity of operations. You don't hire a predominence of green eyeshade types for that work any more than you harness a duck to pull a plow. Accountant/auditors are appropriate for providing fiscal oversight of agency operations. But they know little of the dynamics associated with examining the efficacy of program strategies and objectives or the establishment of non-fiscal internal controls. This is proactive and preventive oversight mandated by the Act but which IG's typically choose not to address. An IG is nearly untouchable and can satisfy congress with little more than on time delivery of a required semi-annual report. Many high level OIG employees and managers spend a third or more of their time each year preparing a report that must reflect well on the IG. The report is usually delivered to a congressman's secretary who notes it's delivery and throws it on a pile of other unread documents. That's not to say it matters if semi-annuals are scrutinized - they often represent little more than reactive and hyperbolized propaganda with an essential sprinkling of recommendations for dollar recoveries stemming from predictable and recurring problems. It's perhaps best if these reports are not read on the Hill as Rep. John Conyers assurred an auditorium full of OIG staff in the early 90's. A low level congressional staffer assigned to critically review semi annual reports could make many PAS IG's look like clowns.

  Ken Huffman Posted July 12, 2007 6:42 PM
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  Good questions Ken, this is Don. I'm not against all change, nor all reform of IG idependence. However, I stress to all tax-payers that politics and emotions (none of us like being audited) should be kept completely out of such challenges to IG independence. I'd be more in favor of no changes to existing laws, but additional activity of monitoring and correcting any proven malfeasance. The IG's ( their not perfect afterall) know that their independence is always under seige...if it was not, they are pretty much not pushing hard enough. Also, I agree with you that by definition, none of the exposed incidents of waste, fraud, and abuse were prevented by IG scrutiny...if they were prevented, they would not be reportable...its kind of trick question - isn't it? Perhaps these IG's are rarely challenged, but the ARE challenged (I've been involved in challenging their findings several times). Am I the only one? This is great discussion, however, I fear politics may overshadow your and my good points. We'll see.

  Don Posted July 12, 2007 10:54 AM
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  I'd like to respond to Don's comments. The IG Act of 1978 that IG's wave with such vigor and indignity each time they sense the slightest intrusion on their independence has as it's most fundamental tenet that IG's will "prevent and detect" waste, fraud, abuse, and gross mismanagement in government. I'd like to know from Don which of the "nearly ten high-profile IG-exposed incidents" were actually prevented by these rarely challenged, often unqualified, no term limit PAS IG's who tend to orient activities of their staff to maintainence of their back patting machines. Like Don, I cringe at the headlines too. But my cringing is at the monumental failure of IG's to prevent massive, intuitively predictable, and often recurring misfeasance and malfeasance in government operations. This is yet another example of how the American taxpayer is scandalously and inexcusably mislead, irrespective of party in power, regarding their government's activities. We're approaching the anniversary of a thirty year scam - Happy Birthday to the IG Act of 1978.

  Ken Huffman Posted July 10, 2007 3:57 PM
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  Taxpayers should ensure steps are taken carefully when proposing changes to rules governing IG's. We don't need to look back very far to find a bunch of waste, fraud, and abuse that never would have been exposed except for the efforts of independently minded IG's. I will not list here the nearly ten high-profile IG-exposed incidents perpetrated by politically connected high-level agency officials. We've all cringed at the headlines.

  Don Posted July 10, 2007 12:31 PM
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  The various proposed remedies that have been floated over the years to address stakeholders' angst over the IG function, including the latest "tweak" regarding a suggested seven year term appointment "fix" all fail to deal with the core conundrum involved, i.e., IGs are expected to carry out their congressionally mandated function within the organizational structure and - most importantly - under the budgetary processes of their agencies. To say that this is a recipe for disaster, as many had predicted when the PAS IG system was established, is a proverbial understatement. Unless IGs can truly operate independently and be held strictly accountable themselves for their own operations, the sorry state depicted in the article will continue. Whether this means looking into establishing an executive branch equivalent of the GAO, or extending the scope of the GAO itself to take on a broader oversight role than they now play are among the options that need to be - but in all probability won't - considered. Inertia, as usual, wins again.

  T. Rowan Posted July 10, 2007 7:53 AM
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  Seven years should be a sufficient term for an active Inspector General to perform their oversight functions, if they are so inclined. A strong case for IG term limits can be made when reviewing the lack of substantive work from the Inspector General at the Securities and Exchange Commission, SEC. The public might be able to recoup some of that IG's annual salary ($207,380+ bonuses in 2006)if an independent audit is performed regarding the tele-work habits and accrual and use of credit hours, which should be prohibited by 5 CFR 610.408. Ironically, if Section 404 standards of the Sarbanes/Oxley Act were applied to the SEC, the SEC would not be in compliance regarding its own internal controls or Information Technology. Why? Because the same IG has been in place at the SEC since 1989 and has not been held accountable by the agency heads or by Congress. Perhaps under Senator McCaskill's proposed legislation, with IG term limits, a 'new broom' will be present every seven years?

  Thomas DeBouch Posted July 6, 2007 12:45 AM
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  This article far overstates the political insecurities to which most presidentially appointed and senate confirmed (PAS)IG's are subjected. For instance, while it's true that Pres. Reagan summarily removed all previously appointed IG's in 1981, it fails to note that all but two of those IG's were reinstated following pressure from the senate which the IG Act intimately involves in both the appointment and dismissal process.

  Please, no crocadile tears for PAS IG's. With few exceptions, they have been immune from serious oversight or accountability from congress, OMB, or anyone else for 30 years. Unlike every other public official excepting judges, they serve shamelessly with no term limits.

  PAS IG's often lack background expertise or accomplishments specific to IG responsibilities (Ms. Sciavo is a very notable exception). And, once appointed, they tend to establish imperial domains where, cognizant of their nearly untouchable status, they rule over their staff subjects using gross favoritism, intimidation, reprisal, and in my experience, outright fraud.

  The comfort zone of a PAS IG is further bolstered by agency directors who learn it works to their own advantage to let the IG preen and bask in self-importance, by a Merit System Protection Board and Office of Special Council that have been hack organizations since their creation, and by a congress that imputs an importance to a function that they rarely think about.

  The IG Act was grossly flawed from it's inception as it is strongly influenced by a GAO accountant/auditor model that even GAO abandoned 25 years ago. The waywardness of the present IG concept is very much a Gordian knot and congress is ill prepared to offer a solution that will demand non-partisanship, objectivity, and context.

  Ken Huffman Posted July 2, 2007 11:10 PM
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  Many IGs and their staffers are retirees from the Secret Service, and have been known to go easy on other former Secret Service personnel during audits or investigations. In my former agency, the IG (Retired Secret Service) covered up for his former Secret Service supervisor, also retired, in an agency investigative position.

  James E. Foster Posted June 29, 2007 9:58 PM