I think this issue, Katrina and our government's response to it, should be looked at by an independent commission.

This was the week that the administration discovered the tide wouldn't come in forever on presidential powers. Partly, that is because so much time has passed without a new attack. And partly, it is because there were so many missteps.

It's pretty clear that most of this activity was not focused on major natural disasters ... and was really focused more on the problems associated with terrorist attacks.

We definitely did worry about it. We knew we should do no harm to the disaster management side. The leadership of the White House knows the political significance of disasters.

Our country is not so ready to respond to the uber-disasters as we'd like to be, four years after 9/11.

Anecdotal information of poor or nonexistent security in this sector is overwhelming.

This is going to improve the quality of our identification, which we use at every checkpoint in the country.

Anything in a paragraph marked 'secret' needs to be deemed secret, and revealing it to someone without proper security clearance or without a need to know is not authorized and is a violation.

Social Security cards right now are a problem. They're a very significant breeder-card for other types of identification. It's very easy to get a Social Security card. Many are issued over and over. There are many more Social Security cards in circulation today than there are people in the United States.