he brought together in the u.s. government about 17 different agencies and bureaus in a regular meeting. i remember talking to one of his senior you know, very big critics in the white house saying, i don t understand why holbrooke is just replicating the functions of government that already exist. and my response was, richard holbrooke is single handedly knocking down the bureaucratic barriers to moving forward. one of the things that s not known, i ve been trying i was actually negotiating with richard over the last couple of weeks of trying to attend a sura meeting. we have in the u.s. government a weekly sura meeting of heads of these different agencies that come together and meet with richard and talk about the area. it s going to be an interesting story to go into. not just delivering on the ground there, but getting government to operate differently, i think, was a key part of this. the afpak portfolio is the single most toxic portfolio one could be given. and richard took t