You Can't Beat a Dead Horse Too Often In an Election Season

That's Quarters No. 1 at Fort Myer, which is almost certainty not where SecState Pompeo resides, but it's one of a series of General Officer's quarters there and probably gives you an idea of what his place is like.

I looked up that photo because yesterday Politico re-did a NYT story from 2018 that insinuated there was some kind of scandal surrounding Pompeo's lease of a house on Ft. Myer, although it couldn't quite say what that scandal was, exactly. I commented on that story back then and thought it failed to score any points.

Politico revisits that old matter today based on a barely-smoking gun that consists of a memo from a Navy lawyer, written two weeks after Pompeo was confirmed, and taking a poor view of options for housing him in the Navy Hill annex which is located across the street from the State Department.  The possibility of a residence on Ft. Myer had not yet been broached at that time.    

The warmed-over story still strains to achieve scandal status. Here's my favorite part:

Pompeo personally pays “fair market value” for the residence, State officials said, without giving a dollar amount. At present, according to department officials, providing housing-related security for the Pompeos costs taxpayers $1.6 million a year, roughly $413,000 less than what it cost at his previous residence, the rental house in Virginia. Pompeo’s security costs also are around $1.5 million a year lower than the more than $3 million it cost to secure the homes of former secretaries Rex Tillerson and John Kerry, officials said.

Just to clarify, this is a story that Politico thinks makes Pompeo look bad, not Kerry or Tillerson or Hillary. As a taxpayer, I don't see it that way. In fact, I hope every SecState in the future will be offered a Ft. Myer residence, and if they choose to live elsewhere, we'll send them a bill for the $1.5-ish million in residential security measures that will be needed to make their private property secure enough for them to do the job that they sought.

The distinguished former Permanent Undersecretary for Management, Patrick Kennedy, now retired but still sharp as ever, was quoted: 

Patrick Kennedy, a former undersecretary of State for management, wasn’t privy to the specific details of the Pompeos’ arrangement, but he said there is merit to the idea that the government — the military if necessary — should provide housing for a secretary of State.

The key reason? “It’s getting harder to protect the secretary of State,” he said, noting that in today’s politically charged atmosphere, even top U.S. health officials are receiving threats.

A military base not only offers more built-in security, but it’s probably easier to arrange for such needs as the construction of secure facilities where the secretary can read classified documents, Kennedy said.

He should know these practical matters better than anyone else. I'll count that as an endorsement for Swaggerin' Mike's housing arrangement.