Just when you thought bureaucracy and government incompetence could not go any lower, we get this incredible story--or really not, given the recent, well-documented history of the U.S. Immigration and Naturalization Service:

From today's New York Times:

"The letter that was received this week by a Florida flight school approving student visas for Mohamed Atta and Marwan al-Shehhi, two dead Sept. 11 hijackers, is just an example of the kind of mishaps that have angered politicians from both parties and sparked renewed demands that the agency be overhauled, if not abolished.

"'It's a given that the agency needs to be reformed, the question is how,' said Cecilia Muñoz, vice president of National Council of La Raza, a Latino rights organization.

"The Bush administration and House Republicans believe that the agency's functions must be separated to improve efficiency and accountability. But they sharply disagree about the solution.

"Mr. Bush said on Wednesday that the commissioner of immigration and naturalization, James W. Ziglar, should be given a chance to fix his agency's problems.

"'He's held accountable,' Mr. Bush said of Mr. Ziglar. "His responsibility is to reform the I.N.S. Let's give him time to do so.'"

And the Census Bureau was surprised that there were over 6 million more immigrants in this country than they'd expected???

I agree with Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner (a Republican--I'm surprised to say that) that this agency is broken beyond repair. It needs to be totally reconstituted as two separate but closely linked agencies--with one focused specifically on enforcement and border controls--that have state-of-the-art communication systems linked to those of the Justice Department, State Department, DOD, FBI, and...yes, the CIA. Enough is enough....