Barack Obama’s counter-terrorism nominees indicate serious problems within the White House – Telegraph Blogs

Barack Obama’s counter-terrorism nominees indicate serious problems within the White House – Telegraph Blogs: "On March 15 I blogged about the serious ethical and competency problems with President Obama’s nominees to head the Transportation Security administration (TSA) - the agency that provides security for America’s airlines and airports. Obama’s first nominee, Erroll Southers, was forced to withdraw when some very serious ethical problems came to light. The next nominee was retired U.S. Army Major General Robert Harding, who was also recently forced to withdraw from consideration because the consulting firm he set up to provide interrogators to the U.S. forces in Iraq overbilled the U.S. military by $1.8 million when their contract was terminated.

The good news is that someone in the US Senate staff is doing their homework and checking the records of Obama’s nominees. Neither nominee had an impressive record, but Southers was committed to Obama’s political programme of furthering public union membership and Harding was a leading advocate of race-based hiring – so it is clear that political loyalty trumped competence in countering terrorism for this job. Yet, without the ethical problems, which were serious indeed, both of these mediocrities would have sailed through the Senate confirmation process without much trouble. Whatever staff Senate staff members are vetting the nominees – God bless you for doing your job well. All air passengers are a lot safer without these two running the TSA.

But that begs the question of how such flawed nominees for a senior counter-terrorism post made it through the White House vetting process and were sent to the Senate for final confirmation. If you are looking for a competent, apolitical, senior police or intelligence official with a proven record of leadership there are actually plenty of people to choose from in the USA. A committee of senior FBI and Intelligence people could come up with a list of several good nominees in a few minutes."