A lousy report card.

Byline: The Register-Guard

The 9/11 Commission has issued its final report, and it is a deeply disturbing one for the Bush administration and Congress - and the nation they are failing to protect from terrorist attacks.

The bipartisan panel says the government has failed to accomplish an appallingly long list of needed reforms in the wake of the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. "People are not paying attention," warns Chairman Thomas Kean, a former Republican governor of New Jersey. "God help us if we have another attack."

Kean is neither a panic-monger nor a finger-pointer, so his dire warning - and those of fellow commission members - should not be dismissed as predictable Beltway politics. They should sound the same clarion warning in the White House and on Capitol Hill that real sirens did four years ago in the smoke-filled streets of New York City and Washington, D.C.

Last July, the 10-member commission issued a report on the 2001 attacks that called for 41 reforms. Most have been ignored for reasons ranging from turf battles to bureaucratic inertia to ineptitude.

The blame must be shared by the White House and Congress, although the ability to assign blame will offer scant solace when the next attack occurs - and it will occur, commission members predict.

For example, Congress is to blame for its failure to revamp the method of distributing Homeland Security money. Cities and states that have low terrorism risks routinely receive funding, while the highest-risk cities receive far too little. Many big-city police and fire departments still lack the money they need to buy the new communication systems needed to share information during major terrorist attacks.

The administration bears primary responsibility for its failure to improve information sharing among intelligence agencies, even though Congress has done its part by changing laws that hindered information sharing. Congressional oversight of intelligence gathering remains weak, in part because the administration refuses to disclose intelligence budget information.

The commission also gives the government a well-deserved "F" for failing to develop international standards for the treatment and prosecution of terror suspects. This failure has severely undermined America's effort to gain international cooperation in combating terrorism.

Americans deserve a government that gets better grades than the 12 "Ds," five "Fs" and two incompletes given by the commission. They deserve a government that recognizes protecting U.S. citizens on their own soil is a top priority - and then actually does something about it.