Unfettered Authority

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson gets a lot more than $700 billion to spend in the financial bailout bill about to be passed in rejected by Congress. The bill also gives him virtually unprecedented authority to run a federal operation:

The Secretary is authorized to take such actions as the Secretary deems necessary to carry out the authorities in this Act, including, without limitation, the following:

(1) The Secretary shall have direct hiring authority with respect to the appointment of employees

5 to administer this Act.

(2) Entering into contracts, including contracts for services authorized by section 3109 of title 5,

United States Code.

Notice the "without limitation" part. And in case that's not perfectly clear with respect to contracting, the legislation further spells it out: "the Secretary may waive specific provisions of the Federal Acquisition Regulation upon a determination that urgent and compelling circumstances make compliance with such provisions contrary to the public interest."

The legislation creates an inspector general and an oversight board to oversee the new operation, but with this kind of authority, what could they possibly find that would be out of bounds?