Security agency candidate has plenty to prove

At the top levels, law enforcement is mainly about management. That’s why we hope the Senate Government Affairs Committee confirmation hearings on Bernard Kerik closely examine whether he has the management skills to run the mammoth and labyrinthine Department of Homeland Security, the job for which he was nominated by President Bush.

There’s no doubt he has much experience in enforcing the law. According to the New York Times profile, he has served in the U.S. Army, as a private security guard in Saudi Arabia, a jail warden in New Jersey and a New York City policeman, “becoming an undercover narcotics officer who sported a ponytail and diamond earrings when he worked the streets.”

He then headed the New York City Correction Department and became the city’s police commissioner in 2000.

Overseeing “the city’s response to the Sept. 11 attacks in 2001, he left office a few months later.” In 2003, President Bush sent him to Iraq to help establish the country’s security force.

But the Village Voice, a New York City newspaper, recently criticized his “penchant for leaving jobs before accomplishing his mission, and the sad facts in Iraq say he did not make a difference, at least not a positive one.”

These are fair criticisms, Charles Pena, a security policy expert at the Cato Institute, said. “On the other hand, he brings an important attribute: He is a first responder. If there is going to be another terrorist attack on America, who better to coordinate federal response than someone who has been there and done that?”

Pena said that for this new agency, which only was established two years ago, no one person has all the attributes necessary for the job. “It will be telling whom he picks as a deputy, whether it’s someone who can maneuver around the politics and the bureaucracy,” he said.

He said a “fair question” senators could ask would be where Kerik would look to form his management team. “It would show management savvy to say he understands he’s not capable of doing everything himself and would find people who would fill those slots for him.”

We also hope senators ask him about the USA Patriot Act, which Kerik has strongly supported but which we believe allows law enforcement to abridge certain civil rights. For this post, Americans need someone who will protect not only our lives but the liberties that make America unique.