As usual, Mr. O'Harrow raises an important point...but does not adequately delineate the issues involved. The use of contractors to provide analytical, technical and other support for government activities, even including policy development, is not only appropriate, it is a necessity, particularly where those skills are in short supply within the government.

It is true that legitimate questions arise when those roles go beyond support and into actual policymaking or other clearly inherently governmental functions. However, often lost in this discussion is an important reality check: if we don't have contractors performing these critical and often highly sophisticated support and analytical functions, how else would the government fill the gap?

Here, the issue of federal personnel policy looms large--yet remains unaddressed. Every objective survey of the last decade has documented that the government is simply not an employer of choice. Just today, Government Executive magazine reported that some 70% of federal managers are dissatisfied in their current jobs--companies with such high negative employee engagement and satisfaction levels typically don't succeed. Workers today seek real rewards for performance, real professional development opportunities, a work/life balance and more. In each of these areas, the government lags behind high performing companies and other institutions. Further, they are more mobile than ever before and have no intention of staying with one employer for a career, and are thus disinclined to take positions where advancement, professional development and financial reward is almost entirely tied to tenure. Thus, the role of contractors at DHS has not evolved because of some political agenda or deliberate "privatization;" it has evolved as a result of these broader human capital dynamics. In fact, DHS (like other agencies) today has hundreds of billets it simply cannot fill because it cannot get the right people with the right skills in a timely manner. And DHS is doing what it has to do to get the job done.

Unfortunately, the political will has not existed to meaningfully address those dynamics. And therein lies the government's real challenge. There is little question that the government's reliance on contractors will continue long into the future. At the same time, there is no question that the government must perform truly inherently governmental functions. But as the GAO has repeatedly reminded us, the real question is whether the government has adequate capabilities to fill those inherently governmental responsibilities and to manage cost, schedule and performance in this new environment. Unless and until real progress is made on the personnel policy front, these challenges will continue.

Just so everybody knows, Mr. Soloway is President of the Professional Services Council, essentially a special interest group of service contractors like Booz Allen and the many others performing these types of services. He raises some important and valid points (especially that Mr. O'Harrow doesn't delineate the issues), but everyone needs to consider the source and motivations of his statements.

Professional politicians are not trained or equipped to be good governors or managers or workers. They are trained to raise funds, dress properly, and recite party-line scripts until the day they cash out their office to take the lobbyist job they were promised, quid pro quo.

These people work for corporations like Booz Allen, they do not work for America's citizens. They do not bother to know, nor do they care whether the work we pay so much for is being done well or efficiently.

Quite simply, the conversion of America from a democracy to a corpocracy is nearly complete, don't you think?

Stan S says "Every objective survey of the last decade has documented that the government is simply not an employer of choice." Ah, but the government IS the employer of choice, for contractors such as Booz Allen, which pay their folks so well. Congress/WH simply need to pay people commensurately to get them to actually work FOR the government, not to leach OFF of it.

It doesn't surprise me that government workers may need help from the private sector to write documents describing what the private sector can do. I am assuming tho that if the workers couldn't get the information, Congress would have to step in and make sure the government had enough money to hire and keep the expertise it needs.

Too bad O'Harrow leaves off where the influence for the perpetuation of this comes from: money from Blackwater and other Iraq profiteers. From Dana Millbank's article:

"Republicans... proved content to shill for a major donor. Prince's father helped to bankroll the religious-conservative movement, and his sister, Betsy DeVos, is a big Republican fundraiser who married into the Amway fortune. Prince himself has given $236,000 to GOP candidates and conservative causes -- typical of a defense contracting industry that, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, gave nearly $1 million to members of the oversight committee since 2003 -- 83 percent of it to Republicans.

"Blackwater will be held accountable today!" vowed Chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.), who has received only $6,300 from defense contractors over the past 17 years.

"Blackwater appears to have fostered a culture of shoot first . . . and then ask the questions," trumpeted Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), whose career contributions from defense interests tally a mere $1,200.

Republicans took a more favorable view of their benefactor.

"We should take care not to prejudge," said Tom Davis of Virginia ($717,829).

"We should not be holding this hearing," protested John Mica of Florida ($145,454). "Therefore, I move that the committee do now adjourn."

The Federal Acquisition Regulation provides for Advisory and Assistance Services. The line is drawn at the point that decisions are made for the government; this is when the work becomes 'inherently governmental.'
Yes, the issues which other posters raise are valid, but like so many other times, the media latch on to a report or a tidbit of news and paint it into something it is not, simply because the information is out-of-context.
I work in the government contracting profession, and I can say from experience that it is challenging to ensure contractors are not crossing the 'inherently governmental' line. But it can be done, and it is done well in many organizations.
Those who are going to criticize government procurment might do well to familiarize themselves with the regulations that govern the work they are criticizing. By the way, the Federal Acquisition Regulation is law, and is written an updated as other statutory documents are. Critics of government procurement need to get the facts first. ALL of the facts, not just a few of them.

With the current system in place, can the problem be fix. I am 50 years of age in those 50 years, and although the system has been a mess. This is the most corrupt and arrogant group I have ever seen. You name it dishonest, rotten I can go on and on. But it is the peoples fault they have allowed this mess. What is that old line people get the goverment they deserve.GOD BLESS THE REPUBLIC./