IN THE WAKE of the Sept. 11 attacks, it seemed like a relatively straightforward proposition to create an independent, blue-ribbon commission to investigate what went wrong and how to fix it.
But the effort has proved to be amazingly difficult, and the commission has yet to meet.
Time and again the Bush administration and many of the other politicians involved have proven more concerned about their own interests than in giving Americans an unvarnished look at how their government failed in its No. 1 responsibility: to protect them.
The latest fiasco was the resignation of the commission's two leaders, chairman Henry Kissinger and vice chairman George Mitchell, because their business associations posed potential conflicts of interest.
Mr. Kissinger, a former secretary of state and national security advisor, insisted he had no conflicts but refused to disclose his client list. The White House backed his position.
Former Senate Majority Leader Mitchell works for a law firm that represents a Saudi magnate under investigation for possible terrorist ties. He said he can't afford to quit.
The wonder is why either of these men accepted appointments to the commission in the first place if they didn't intend to make it a priority in their lives.
Former New Jersey Governor Tom Kean has agreed to step into the breach, and his appointment as chairman has generally been well received. He lacks obvious conflicts of interest, but that is offset by his limited knowledge of the federal government.
More troubling is that he has described his post as a one-day-a-week undertaking. That doesn't sound like enough time to get the job done within the 17 months remaining in the commission's mandate.
It's too bad neither the White House nor former Senate Republican leader Trent Lott named former New Hampshire GOP Sen. Warren Rudman to the commission.
Mr. Rudman is exquisitely qualified, having chaired a commission along with former Colorado Sen. Gary Hart that warned eight months before the Sept. 11 attacks that Americans were highly vulnerable to terrorism. Mr. Rudman's a blunt, independent type, the sort needed for the no-holds-barred probe the commission's advocates hope it will conduct.
But neither President Bush nor Sen. Lott wanted a loose cannon like Mr. Rudman poking around in the federal government, issuing subpoenas.
The 10-member commission -- half Republicans, half Democrats -- includes distinguished former public officials from both parties. But many of them are also believed to have potential conflicts of interest. In fact, the commission's investigative mandate is so broad that it would be hard for anyone active in government, politics or industry over the past decade or so not to have some kind of conflict.
Instead of lobbying for more changes in the commission's membership, the Sept. 11 families, who have been the principal force behind formation of the commission, plan to work with what they've got.
The families plan to highlight conflicts where they find them and hope the partisan competition can be a catalyst for productive results.
With an even party split, though, the commission also could easily get caught in gridlock, rendering it useless as a force to affect the changes needed to better protect Americans. Mr. Kean's major task will be to make sure the commission fulfills its charge.