Garance Franke-Ruta

SHOCKING. I’ve got to give a hand to John Derbyshire‘s editors at the New English Review, who published the piece Matt cites. The gap in quality between this piece and the writings of someone with the same name and professional history at National Review‘s The Corner could serve as a case study on the dangers […]

GORE SHOWS HIS ROOTS. Via Mickey Kaus, Al Gore raised questions about setting a deadline for withdrawing from Iraq during his This Week appearance yesterday. Some will say that this puts Gore to the right of likely ’08 presidential contenders John Kerry, Russ Feingold, and, after his recent comments, perhaps even Evan Bayh, but I’d […]

GARBAGE IN, GARBAGE OUT. Greg Anrig has a great post over at TPMCafe about the convoluted decision making process at the Department of Homeland Security and the way its evaluation criteria led to the current controversy over the new formula for funding didfferent localities. He’s also unearthed a fact sheet (PDF), written by Department of […]

WHERE THE RISK’S AT. The inimitable Dana Milbank throws up a terrific headline — “Flash: DHS Disputes Al-Qaeda’s 5-Star Rating of Two U.S. Cities” — on his way to discussing how much different cities are at risk of terrorist attack: The new DHS plan is advertised as a “risk-based” model, but it came up with […]

THE 71,000 SEPT. 11 SURVIVORS & THEIR STUDY. The same days as news hits that New York’s homeland security budget is being reduced by 40 percent, the New York City Department of Health and Mental Hygiene announces the next phase of their study of the long-term health of the more than 71,000 survivors of the […]

EVEN LIEBERMAN WAS HINKY ON HENKE. Here’s Tracy Henke‘s official bio, with a picture that should live in infamy. Her recess appointment to DHS was controversial and opposed by Joe Lieberman, who sits on the Senate’s Homeland Security and Government Affairs Committee and issued this statement on January 5, 2006: I am deeply disturbed by […]

HENKE DHS CONTROVERSY NOT A FIRST. Tracy Henke‘s tenure at DHS has been rocky from the start. According to a Maryland paper: Baltimore Mayor Martin O’Malley Friday criticized Department of Homeland Security officials for inefficiently allocating grant money and failing to establish tangible priorities. O’Malley was presiding over a homeland security task force meeting of […]

BUSH APPOINTEE LOCATED. Well, that was easy. Who was the idiot who had to sign off on the “traitorous” decision to defund anti-terrorism efforts in New York and Washington? Says The Washington Post: Tracy A. Henke, assistant secretary for grants and training, told reporters that the new funding distribution was the result of a better […]

OUR TWILIGHT ZONE GOVERNMENT. Via Atrios, I see that ABC News is reporting that the Department of Homeland Security’s explanation for cutting anti-terrorism funds to New York is that “New York has no national monuments or icons.” Really? You can see the DHS form that asserts this here (PDF). Says ABC: That was a key […]

LOSING THE NEW YORK POST. I didn’t pay much attention to electoral politics or polls way back in 1991-92, but the day The New York Post ran the headline “10 Million Americans Out of Work/George May Be Next,” (as I recall — I’ve got the original somewhere in New York) I knew that George H.W. […]