GENERAL ACCOUNTING OFFICE
(U.S. Government Accountability Office)
Although GAO is an arm of the Congress and conducts oversight of the Executive Branch, when fault is found, it is referred to in rather genteel language. This quotation is exceptional in how badly GAO castigated the Corps of Engineers work which included The Mississippi River Basin and other federal waterways. The track record of the Corps has been terrible over the years. The problem has been incompetence and politics where members of Congress have often demanded work that made little sense and could never have been done right even with very competent staff.
The U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO) is a legislative branch government agency that provides auditing, evaluation, and investigative services for the United States Congress. It is the supreme audit institution of the federal government of the United States. It identifies its core "mission values" as: accountability, integrity, and reliability. It is also known as the "congressional watchdog".
