On 9/10/01, Donald Rumsfeld called a news conference to discuss his number one priority as defense secretary: he declared “war on the Pentagon bureaucracy.” A few excerpts from that speech:

“Our challenge is to transform not just the way we deter and defend, but the way we conduct our daily business. Let’s make no mistake: The modernization of the Department of Defense is a matter of some urgency. In fact, it could be said that it’s a matter of life and death, ultimately, every American’s….

“Waste drains resources from training and tanks, from infrastructure and intelligence, from helicopters and housing. Outdated systems crush ideas that could save a life. Redundant processes prevent us from adapting to evolving threats with the speed and agility that today’s world demands…The men and women of this department…know the taxpayers deserve better….

“Let me conclude with this note. Some may ask, defensively so, will this war on bureaucracy succeed where others have failed?…this effort will succeed because it must.”

A new GAO report shows that Rumsfeld’s effort has not succeeded. The report indicates that, three years after Rumsfeld’s speech, the Pentagon is the U.S. department most prone to fraud, waste, abuse and mismanagement, “raising concerns about the effectiveness of many of its programs.” The Department of Defense accounts for eight of the 25 federal programs, functions or offices that appear on the GAO’s 2005 “high-risk” list.

Areas of concern include financial and contract management, the personnel security clearance program, management of military bases and other infrastructure, and modernization of computer systems, the report found.

Society has a selective memory when it comes to history. Or perhaps some events just have more eye-popping names. For example, the influenza pandemic that ripped around the globe in just one year (1918-1919) killed more people than four years of the infamous Bubonic Plague. Responsible for the deaths of between 20 million and 40 million people, “La Grippe” took more lives than World War I. And while it may not have yet received much mainstream notice, the candidate most likely to cause the next global flu pandemic is waiting in the wings, so to speak.

The warnings about avian flu have been building, but little attention has been paid by the mass media. Back in January 2004, the World Health Organization threw its weight behind fears of avian flu. Though WHO pointed towards the Southeast Asia region as potentially under a “serious threat,” it was only a few months later that Ottawa “ordered the slaughter of 80 per cent of the farm poultry in B.C. in an attempt to contain an outbreak of avian flu.”

Though “experts agree that another influenza pandemic is inevitable,” President Bush has yet to address the issue. Considering his handling of this past year’s flu shot shortage, citizens are understandably wary about how he will handle this growing threat, for which we have no vaccine, even though it could potentially kill 70 million people. When the new secretary of Health and Human Services comes into his position, it is imperative that bio-preparedness be on the list of priorities, just as the outgoing secretary realized in hindsight that it should have been on his own.