Yesterday, the chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, Representative Bennie Thompson (D-MS), chided the White House for its overly broad homeland security strategy released the same day and implored it and the Department of Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff to tackle specific vulnerabilities in the nation's security.

Here are excerpts from Thompson's comments to the Bush Administration from his press release [1]:

The reality is that this Strategy provides little guidance for the deficiencies already taxing our homeland security capacity, while at the same time, it attempts to define successes in border security, information sharing, and biopreparedness, which have not yet been realized.

On September 5, I presented Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff with a To-Do list of 6 points critical to achieving homeland security. The list includes programs and initiatives that this White House Homeland Security Strategy seems to gloss over. I only wish the White House spent as much time addressing these known vulnerabilities as it has producing this Strategy update.

Thompson's "Chertoff To-Do List [2]" lays out six tasks needing immediate attention by DHS. They are:

• DHS must draw up a plan to fill critical vacancies once "a mass exodus" occurs when the Administration changes hands.
• DHS must draft the regulations to ensure cargo security as mandated by the SAFE Port Act of 2006 [3] and the 9-11 Bill [4].
• DHS must release the National Response Plan [5] and ensure local and state officials had sufficient input into the plan.
• DHS must issue the Transportation Worker Identification Credential [6](TWIC) as mandated by the SAFE Port Act of 2006.
• DHS must issue the strategic plan to set up explosives detection at passenger checkpoints as required by the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004 [7]and the 9-11 Bill.
• DHS must complete and implement critical border security initiatives such as the US-VISIT biometric air exit [8]by the end of 2008 and Project 28 [9].

UPDATE: In early September, Chertoff testified before the committee and defended his department's record and spoke of  its successes. Read his full prepared remarks here [10].