Posted on 04/24/2006 8:44:22 PM PDT by prognostigaator
Insight on the News, Oct 23, 2000 by Sean Paige
.
The Clinton administration will finally skulk out of town come January but not without leaving a termite infestation in its wake. Namely, dozens of political appointees who, rather than go back to whatever private-sector racket they ran before winning the favor of Bill Clinton or his Cabinet secretaries, instead are burrowing themselves into the body bureaucratic, feigning a metamorphosis from political hack to public servant.
Between October 1998 and June of this year, 57 people appointed to their high positions by the White House, usually because of their ideological affinity with the president, underwent sudden, seemingly miraculous, transformations into professional civil servants, according to a General Accounting Office (GAO) study. Although not unknown during other administration changeovers, the practice of "burrowing-in" is being watched closely by some on Capitol Hill who worry not only about whether it's unfair to career civil servants and violates merit-system protections but whether the lingering presence of such moles might not leave an indelible ideological stamp on the supposedly nonpartisan machinery of government.
- In 1997 GAO identified six cases in which former political appointees had burrowed into civil-servant jobs in ways that "give the appearance that the appointments had received favoritism or preference that increased these individuals' chances of getting the job." In two of the cases, GAO found that government positions seemed to have been created and designed with a political appointee's resume in mind.
So which federal departments will be the most infested with Clinton-era moles, no matter who wins the next election? According to GAO, the departments of Justice, Energy, Commerce, Defense and Labor had the most political appointees burrowing in.
I wonder if you could get a list of those identified by the GAO who "burrowed in" during the Clinton Admin. under FOIA? It would be interesting to match those names against some of the news stories about leaks, etc.
Pres. Bush's first act as President should have been to lay off the political appointees mischievously converted to civil servants. Last in, first out. Too bad about the artificially close election, and that dratted "New Tone."
Termites ......Is the Bush Administration going to tent yet?
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.