Sen. Joe Lieberman

f Tom Ridge owes George W. Bush his job, he owes Democratic Sen. Joe Lieberman his department. Within weeks of 9/11, Lieberman-along with Rep. Mac Thornberry,

R-Texas-was leading the charge for a Cabinet-level Homeland Security Department above and beyond the White House coordinating office, which Ridge then headed and which Bush long seemed reluctant to supplant. "In terms of people who got it early on, Lieberman and Mac Thornberry are two that lead my list," said retired Sen. Warren Rudman, the Republican co-chair of the Hart-Rudman Commission that first proposed a federal department for homeland security.

Yet by the end of 2002, Lieberman had become one of the chief roadblocks to creating the department, opposing what was essentially his own bill because he objected to the drastic civil service reforms that the administration had tacked on. His bitter criticism of Bush's plan certainly appealed to a key player in the Democratic presidential primaries, civil service unions. But it hardly bolstered Lieberman's ability to work across the aisle as he had done so successfully with Thornberry. As Lieberman's presidential bid absorbed ever more of his energy and became ever more partisan, the senator, in a real way, sidelined himself from many debates.

Nevertheless, Lieberman remains a major figure in homeland security, with a remarkable concentration of homeland-security expertise on his staff: Charles "Chuck" Ludlam, the architect of a comprehensive bioterror-preparedness program from which Bush borrowed the idea for "Project BioShield"; Michael Alexander and Holly Idleson, on the Governmental Affairs Committee staff; and Fred Downey, his all-purpose national security expert.

Lieberman, 61, was born in Stamford, Conn., and holds both undergraduate and law degrees from Yale University.