The Heritage Foundation held a discussion about the post-Bush transition period in response to Senator and Vice Presidential nominee Joe Biden’s remarks expecting a crisis to occur within the first six months of an Obama administration. Giving their expert opinions were Dr. James Carafano and Lisa Curtis of the Heritage Foundation, and Clark Ervin of the Aspen Institute who was also the first Inspector General of the Department of Homeland Security.

Carafano began the discussion by expressing that he “[doesn't] actually think the government is particularly vulnerable in this transition period.” The only continuity problems that may occur, he said, will be in the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) if an Obama administration comes to power. He continued with the thought that DHS would be a difficultly for the Democrats because it was created since they were last in power, so “they haven’t been there” before.

Lisa Curtis is a Senior Research Fellow of the Asian Studies Center and contextualized the discussion by focusing on recent Afghan-Pakistan relations. She believes that lately the Taliban has been “emboldened” in the tribal areas of Pakistan where they have become de facto rulers and they are spreading into Afghanistan. The United States’ response to this, she said, must be an increase in troops to the region because America must gain support of the local populations there to have any sway over the Taliban.

Clark Ervin concluded the discussion with a direct dismissal of Carafano’s belief that the transition period is not a time of vulnerability. He called the transition a “heightened threat period” that needed to “close security gaps” that have been created since Sept. 11. Ervin said that another attack on American soil, particularly in regards to the current economic crisis, “would be even greater with a new attack”, especially since America is already burdened by two wars.

Despite their differences, all three panelists agreed that the Bush administration was preparing to turnover their work of the past eight years and Ervin expected “joint table topics of the outgoing Bush team and the new incoming team.”

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice discusses steps that the Bush administration has taken to provide foreign assistance (0:36).

 

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Rep. Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) explains about upcoming congressional hearings into the recent government bailouts of large financial companies. (0:39)

 

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Democrats criticized the Republicans for being weak on national security at the Progressive Policy Institute (PPI) forum. Sen. Evan Bayh (D-Ind.) said the Democrats need to develop more allies than the Bush administration has done. Bayh said that the U.S. needs “other people standing by our side in our national security interests.”

Rep. Ellen Tauscher (D-Calif.) said Afghanistan was “strategically, the most important place in the world.” She said that because of its lack of resources and structure, many terrorists have gone there to congregate and regroup. Retired Marine Corps Col. T.X. Hammes said the current U.S. mission in Afghanistan will never be successful until we develop a national security strategy. He also said that an influx of troops will not change the situation there if national security options continue to be “knee-jerk decisions.”

The Bush administration “has failed to lead non-proliferation,” Tauscher continued. There will soon be 500 nuclear power plants, and 40 will be able to make nuclear weapons on short notice, the congresswoman warned.

Reza Aslan, author of the book “No God but God: the Origins, Evolution, and Future of Islam,” said that the U.S. is asking “Why do they hate us,” when it should ask, “Who the hell are they?” A feeling has developed in the Middle East that the “war on terror” is a “war on Islam.” He said that U.S. efforts in that region have radicalized the terrorist groups there.

Democrats voiced their concern for the U.S. economic slump and its main victim: The middle class. At a press conference, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) and Rep Rahm Emmanuelle (D-Ill.) blamed the declining economic situation on the Bush Administration. (more…)

Rep. Rahm Emmanuelle (D-Ill.) talks about cost of living and median household income under the Bush Administration.(0:34)

 

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Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas) says that a previous Judiciary hearing was a “book-of-the-month club” and that a hearing examining the Bush administration is “an anger management class.” (0:36)

 

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Jeremy Rabkin from the U.S. Institute of Peace says that if people believe that the president “knowingly, deliberately” got the country into war for reasons completely unrelated to national security, then “of course the action would be impeachable.” However, Rabkin says that nobody has tried to explain the “conspiracy theories,” and says that how anyone can even find it “plausible” that “such a charge” is worth investigating is “so demented.” (1:56)

 

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Vincent Bugliosi, the author of “Prosecution of George W. Bush for Murder,” says that the “terrible reality” is that the Bush Administration has gotten away with thousands upon thousands of murders. Bugliosi says that the evidence for the impeachment charges put on former President Bill Clinton were “infinitely less significant” than those found under the Bush Administration. He says that based on the evidence written in his book, Congress should not have “any difficulty making a criminal referral to the Department of Justice” in order to commence a criminal investigation of the Bush Administration. Bugliosi says that every American should be outraged by what the Bush Administration has done. (1:29)

 

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Bruce Fein, Deputy Attorney General under President Reagan, says that the executive branch of the U.S. government under the Bush Administration has destroyed the time-honored checks-and-balances and taken the country “perilly close to executive despotism.” He says that the executive branch does not accept that the U.S. was “conceived in liberty” and “dedicated to the proposition that sovereignty in a republican form of government lies with the people.” (2:02)

 

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