The fight between bureaus is over allocations of tax payer funds and the expansion of the bureaucratic/regulatory powers of the agencies concerned. Contrary to competition in the free market, where companies vie over who is best able to serve the wants of consumers, bureaucratic rivalry seems to exponentially increase the incompetence of the bureaus concerned. There are numerous examples for this (as one poster already mentioned, the entirely avoidable 9/11 tragedy is an excellent illustration of the principles at work). Interestingly, incompetence and failure are never to the disadvantage of bureaucracies. On the contrary, the bigger the *beep* they are responsible for, the more power and funding they tend to get (9/11 once again serves as an example - it has resulted in the biggest expansion of the security bureaucracy since WW2. Similarly, the 2008 crisis led to the regulatory powers of the Federal Reserve being increased). Incompetence is not punished, it is rewarded. This is obviously another way in which these bureaucracies are very different from competitors in the marketplace. The main consequence is that they become ever more expensive, while the quality of their services rapidly declines at the same time.
I had to laugh over the movie tag line "Shadowy elements in the NSA..." - the entire organization is a 'shadowy element'.
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