The final part of the Hart-Rudman commission's three-part report was aptly titled: "Road Map for National Security: Imperative for Change" (note that "imperative" is a noun that has a similar, dual meaning in its adjective form). The document details a variety of structural and organization problems, and offers 50 concrete solutions.

Prioritized for effect in the report, the first two ? and thus, most important ? of those 50 recommendations were:

1. The president should develop a comprehensive strategy to heighten America's ability prevent and protect against all forms of attack on the homeland, and to respond to such attacks if prevention and protection fail;

2. The president should propose, and Congress should agree to create, a National Homeland Security Agency (NHSA) with responsibility for planning, coordinating and integrating various U.S. government activities involved in homeland security. The Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) should be a key building block in this effort.

In short: A call for presidential-level, comprehensive action to fundamentally restructure the intelligence bureaucracy, and specifically the creation of a new agency to coordinate and manage the various streams of intelligence-gathering, and develop terrorist assessments and response plans.

In this light, Rice's excuse-making about "structural problems" is an unwitting, inculpatory indictment of herself and her boss.

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Men like Richard Clarke do not, as a rule, write books.
For any of these bureaucrats to step in erudite anger from the wings to center stage, then, is rare. For one to do it by name?and in no less than book form?is exceptional. That the author in this case would be Richard Clarke is all the more compelling. I doubt there is a diplomatic or national security reporter who hasn?t occasionally talked with Clarke over the past two decades; even at his most forceful on-the-record or cryptic deep background, I can?t think of a time when Clarke said anything that would have seriously jeopardized his national security chamberlain?s privileges.

Yet Clarke?s broadside hasn?t prompted righteous rioting in the streets. So far?if polls are to be believed?he?s nudged both the pro- and anti-Bush numbers up a tad but produced no shift in the current myopic yin and yang that is the American polity.

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But while the experts pore over the latest tape to verify its authenticity, they will again puzzle over why there has been no video of bin Laden since a recording released on Sept 10 last year, in which he appeared gaunt and frail.There is speculation that he is now too ill to show himself.

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"Some studies have been conducted that show that there are something like 300,000 military people doing tasks that could be as easily done by civilians," Rumsfeld told troops in August of 2003.

With estimates of contracts totaling up to $18 billion, Halliburton was in some cases offered no-bid exclusive government contracts.

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The message also served to inform the world ? and possibly al-Qaida followers ? that bin Laden is alive amid a heightened military hunt for him.

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On Wednesday, Mr. Yee won his bid to have the reprimand that had been issued to him removed from his record. Yet the Army has also gone out of its way to continue smearing him, writing letters to newspapers -- including this one -- that implied that Mr. Yee was, in fact, dangerous, and argued that it was "Yee, not the Army, who sullied his reputation as a Chaplain and a military officer." And behind the scenes, it turns out, the Army has done its best to make sure that Mr. Yee doesn't respond.

Earlier this month, when Mr. Yee returned to his permanent base at Fort Lewis, Wash., he was handed a memo titled "Duties, Responsibilities, and Standards of Conduct." This document helpfully reminded him that "Like any soldier, you are permitted to exercise your First Amendment rights to free speech." But it then went on to explain: "Speech that undermines the effectiveness of loyalty, discipline, or unit morale is not constitutionally protected. Such speech includes, but is not limited to, disrespectful acts or language, however, expressed, toward military authorities or other officials. Adverse criticism of [the Defense Department] or Army policy that is disloyal or disruptive to good order and discipline is similarly limited." For good measure, the memo concludes that "compliance" with its terms "is an order."