Porter Goss resigns
There's a roundup at Pajamas Media of blog reaction to the resignation of Porter Goss. It's been updated and reflects the latest speculation. The tea leaves are reading ambiguously, with some suggesting that:
- it was a conflict with Negroponte
- he was worn down by CIA rebels
- he was connected to the Cunningham scandal or knew someone who was
- Fox is reporting from a Democratic Intelligence Committee source that there were rumbles this was in the works for some time.
- Kristol thinks "something popped" this week, but doesn't know what.
Also, see In From the Cold where Formerspook responds to Dymphna's question at considerable length. And oh, this is an open post, so anyone with leads please chime in.
Update
Time has a long piece hinting how Goss may have resigned because he had been left to preside over a shrinking shell. According to the story, the CIA was in the process of becoming bureaucratically diminished. In particular, the role of liaising with foreign intelligence agencies was being taken from them.
In a speech in San Antonio last week, Negroponte's top deputy, Michael Hayden, declared that an office largely under Negroponte's control — the National Counterterrorism Center, or NCTC — was now in charge of dictating the role other agencies will play in terror analysis. ... In the speech, Hayden also said Negroponte's office would be in charge of "liaison" relationships with foreign intelligence services — long the treasured turf of the CIA — which have historically produced much of the most important intelligence, according to a former senior CIA official. ... CIA supporters are upset about what they see as the neutering of an agency that helped win the Cold War and worry that it will undermine its human spy responsibilities, of which the CIA is still in charge. "It's a huge thing going on. It's a huge drama and nobody's picking up on it," the former CIA official said of the DNI's realignment of CIA responsibilities. "CIA feels quite friendless right now. We're seeing more pieces of it just keep being moved to the door."
And if things weren't interesting enough, there's a Pajamas Media post linking to the National Review which says: (hat tip Doug)
Lewis Libby defense lawyer Theodore Wells told a federal judge a short time ago that the Libby defense team has located “five witnesses who will say under oath that Mr. [Joseph] Wilson told them his wife worked for the CIA.” Wells said he expects that prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald will call Wilson himself to the stand to rebut those accusations.
Left Coaster is now reporting that Fitzgerald has opposed Libby's request to call the witnesses.
Unrelated to Porter Goss or are we looking at a world where there are really no genuine coincidences?
More info. The Freerepublic is reporting a TV interview detailing the impact of the changes at CIA during Porter Goss' term. "Senator Pat Roberts being interviewed by Jim Angle said that the number of employees at CIA dropped from 100,000 to 75,000 during the Goss tenure."
More updates
A CNN interview with Former acting CIA Director John McLaughlin where he says this:
Porter Goss came in with a view that he wanted to strengthen the clandestine service, which is the part of the agency that collects secrets overseas, and strengthen other parts of the agency, but particularly the clandestine service. He came in at a difficult moment, and I think got off to a rocky start for a number of reasons. ...
As chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, his committee had published a number of studies and statements that were quite critical of the performance of CIA. And those of us who were there frequently disagreed with the characterization.
So he came in in a climate where a number of people who had worked hard on these problems would have given the agency higher marks or disagreed with the thrust of his initial thoughts as expressed in those studies. ... So that was part of it. ...
And he also, I think, had a charge ... to tighten the agency up at a time when people thought it was leaking. ...
I have always argued that it wasn't leaking to the extent that many people thought it was, but clearly, he had an agenda to tighten it up, which he has done.
Captain Ed has a long piece emphasizing the disruptive effects of intelligence reorganization and speculates on who the next CIA director could be. Hint: Frances Townsend
posted by wretchardthecat at 5/05/2006 02:09:00 PM
83 Comments:
Wonder if the new Director of the CIA will "know" Osama's location?
Wonder if the new director of the CIA will know who the leakers are.
And will do anything about it if s/he does know.
I think this CIA crisis is about the balance of power in Washington.
Watergate was a scandal about a presidential abuse of power. But it was more than that. It turned American intelligence agencies into arbiters of power in Washington. Nixon, for all of his faults (and he had many), infringed upon the power that had belonged exclusively to J. Edgar Hoover for half a century. And ever since, bureaucrats in Washington have regarded it as their prerogative to leak sensitive information whenever they disagreed with a policy or disliked the President.
This is all in the name of patriotism, of course.
In the meantime, foreign states lose faith in an American alliance because office politics in Washington and its propensity to leak sensitive information to the press.
In the 1780’s, President George Washington asserted civilian control over the military. Yet, who will assert civilian control over the FBI? The CIA? The State Department?
Presidents come and go, but the ghost of J. Edgar Hoover is alive and well.
alexis,
Agreed. Very hard for me to see how folks can argue in good faith that the State Dept has acted in our intrest on the whole for a long, long time.
I hold GWB responsible for not starting to clean up the intelligence mess starting on
Sept 12, 2001.
The lack of effective action on the matter all these years later is an immense failure.
To have one of the most corrupt admins in History to be followed by a feelgood politician that spouts platitudes instead of addressing the problems is truly tragic.
Off the topic of Mr Goss, but right on the topic of intelligence, the "Son of Shah" is coming forward, now, and beginning to make some waves.
Exclusive: Shah of Iran's Heir Plans Overthrow of Regime in Human Events, online.
Now I have oft wondered where Reza Pahlavi, son of the late Shah of Iran was keeping himself.
He says he's rockin' the boat, in Iran, this summer.
Now that, buddy, is cause for a sunny disposition, for the rest of the day, anyway.
Pessimist of the Day
EVEN with John Derbyshire in the room, this e-mailer wins:
(I guess I win also, then, this is my take too:)
It may have become clear to Goss that the W.H. will not allow the DOJ to pursue subpoenas or indictments in the WaPo/Mary McCarthy matter. If so, Goss may have reached the (reasonable) conclusion that he cannot succeed in rooting out leakers in the CIA if there's not going to be a serious effort at prosecution.
KJL
What has GWB ever done to dispel that view?
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Bulletin from the Libby Courtroom [Byron York]
Lewis Libby defense lawyer Theodore Wells told a federal judge a short time ago that the Libby defense team has located “five witnesses who will say under oath that Mr. [Joseph] Wilson told them his wife worked for the CIA.”
Wells said he expects that prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald will call Wilson himself to the stand to rebut those accusations.
Shirley just a good old Hookergate with Fogg at the centre. Maybe they are embarassed at the CIA renditions but that has been going on for years.
PG is a wealthy mand and has no need of a job. With Negroponte stealing his turf, why bother ?
Come on, doug, Mr Tenent got his "Medal of Freedom" for a job well done. No one could have done it better, whether for Mr Clinton or Mr Bush, and that's a Slam Dunk.
The Skull & Bones Policy Program proceeds apace, what's the problem?
You do not like the "New World Order"?
That news, doug is not that of a Pessimist, but of a Realist.
Not a neoPessimist or a neoRealist, nor even a neoconservative liberal.
It seems to me to be the most likely cause of Mr Goss leaving. He did what he could to "clean" the Agency, but without prosecutions, the Law has no teeth.
Whether the Law involves War, Security, Immigration or Wiretaps, this President chooses which to enforce and which he will ignore.
Gafney: (should be at radioblogger later)
Porter victim of a bait and switch:
DCI created,
made worse by choice of Negroponte and Negroponte appointments.
In sum, things are worse now than pre - 9-11.
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Best Roundup I've seen on Immigration
---
Be sure to make it down to this:
"A Costly Illegal Invasion ,"
by Mark Cromer,
He begins this way:
It is said that in war, truth is the first casualty. Perhaps that is why the hard facts of what is happening in America today as a result of unrelenting mass waves of illegal immigration are being killed in nightly news cycles and buried amid the glib eulogies from pundits who smirk at Americans who don't have nannies and who mow their own lawns.
For the last several weeks, Americans have witnessed a frenzied campaign waged by proponents of a 'guest worker' plan that has downplayed, minimized and papered over the staggering effects of illegal immigration on working- and middle-class neighborhoods.
CIA was working against current Administration for 6 years. Isn't it surprising that Administration decided that enough is enough. With agents like Plame, who needs enemies.
If all this is true about the CIA working "against" the Administration for all these years, why was Mr Tenent retained for FOUR of those years.
It seems obvious that either the CIA, where Mr Bush 41 had been Director, was not working against the Admin, or Mr Bush is dumber than a rock.
Now since I believe Mr Bush to be smarter than most, Mr Tenent's continued tenure and it's ramifications were of no surprise to the Bush Team.
His Daddy knew the Score, for sure.
The most striking point made to my mind, for the moment, at least, is that an active-duty, senior flag officer will take over NGA. That suggests to me a more active role and more control by DoD, which might imply a certain level of distrust/discomfort of CI by Mr. Rumsfeld or others.
It may be a stretch, but, the above, coupled with the massing of 250,000 Turkish troops near the Turkish-Iranian-Iraqi border, gives me pause. Hmmm.
allen,
perhaps, but just think of the General's Revolt of last month. All were "Flag" Officers, all are considered competent, patriotic and loyal.
If they are, as reported, just the "tip of the iceberg", then whether the new man is a General or not, means little, in and of itself.
Perhaps the "real story", allen, is that the Turks are just going to "pass through" Iraq, on the way to Tehran.
Would that not be sweeeeet
These commenters crediting POTUS for NOT addressing this for 5 years are beyond me!
See no evil does not reality make.
Allen,
Gafney says only hope is power that Rumsfeld has maintained, and positions he has not lost, unlike Porter.
---
---
My last immigration OT for now, from the link in my last post:
(I consider this the biggest threat to the future of our country, and the denial of it's magnitude by POTUS and DC Pols [and some here] puts France to shame.)
The estimated 1.1 million illegal immigrants currently in the nation's public school system cost taxpayers $9.6 billion every year in an attempt to educate them (despite the illegal immigrant community's epidemic-scale dropout rates)
The 2.2 million children of illegal immigrants in America, often referred to as "anchor babies" to ensure the parents can stay, add an additional $20 billion to that tab
In California, the 2004-05 state budget spent $9,811 per pupil in the classroom. An estimated 425,000 illegal immigrants in the state's classrooms during that period cost taxpayers more than $4 billion -- a figure that does not include the "anchor baby" population in the classroom
More than 40,000 illegal immigrants jammed California's prison system in 2004, costing taxpayers $1.5 billion in tax dollars not reimbursed by the federal government
In one of the cruelest jokes played on the American taxpayers, illegal immigrants are allowed to claim children living back in Mexico and qualify for the earned-income tax credit, which traditionally has helped the American poor.
---
The big lie starts by cutting in half the actual number of illegal immigrants in the nation, which serious studies by firms like Bear Stearns now place at more than 20 million men, women and children.
That $20 Billion USD, doug, plus another $20 Billion USD that is sent home by many of the guests, to support their people in Mexico. If you add it up, a $40 Billion USD aid package to Mexico, without a single dollar authorized by or remitted by the Federals.
All to prop up a rotten political culture, in Mexico.
What a deal.
Stability, that's the byword of the new millenium, doug
The New World Order
what's not to like?
Also, it may say something if the new active-duty flag officer at NGA comes from USAF-Space Command.
DR,
The Turks may be preparing for blocking/interdiction action. A conflict with Iran could produce much spillover. Additionally, the Turks may wish to take act opportunistically, wherever that may lead.
Mr Goss was in Turkey, not long ago, if I recall correctly.
If a person thinks like AJStrata at Stratra-Sphere then it's all part of a greater "Storyline".
Now, I do think like Mr Strata and his proposition makes sense.
It also makes sense that the Turkish are actively involved in both Iraq and Iran, for their own purposes. There have been Turkish SF troops working in Iraq for years, now.
Circles and cycles, scenes that we've all seen before.
In the last post you highlighted: “recent meetings between the head of Israel's Mossad, and his counterparts in Washington”
Now Porter Goss resigns, do you think the two might be related?
Bush bluntly stated his faith in British intelligence over ours in 2003 "The British Government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa."
Perhaps we have it mostly wrong on Iran and they demonstrated it to us.
Mr blank obviously does not live in So Cal or Arizona.
(nor does he mind the destruction of our hospitals, schools, illegal drugs, unlimited security threats, and filling our prisons with new arrivals)
Intentional Blindness is a security threat.
But, glad to know I'm a racist for wanting a president that tells the truth and enforces the law.
So be it, but a sad commentary on the depths of PC enabled discourse.
Easy, doug. His point was, "perspective". sure, we got probs, but we can't trade for a new president on every one of 'em.
It is just about toilets, doug.
I've read that now, multiple times.
All about toilets and their cleaning.
If you mention any of the other aspects of the situation, you're right, the very idea or it's discussion is decried as actively racist.
That is supposed to end the discussion, you are a racist that wants US to have dirty crappers. Or, here in Phoenix, mowing your own yard. To cut your own grass, here, it is like cutting off aid to Palistine, a Human Rights violation.
There is some deserving guest that needs the $8 per hour, your mower & remember, there's a three hour minimum.
The very idea of Borders, Immigration Policy and the Law, it's not worthy of debate with the likes of us.
Pass the hemlock.
The way it's goin', buddy, we'll be trading in the Congress, come November.
Mr Pederson is already beating the Security on the Border drum, as he campaigns against Mr Kyl for the Senate seat.
My wife is ready to vote for the guy, already.
Lose the House, & Impeachment Hearings will not be far behind.
Deja Vue all over again.
Precisely--that and the Mexican election--and the fighting of the big war--are all good reasons to read this fresh report from the Dallas Fed, and try to calm down a little.
Think back to the druummin' the Republicans took in Mr Nixon's last midterm election, buddy.
Mr Bush is only moderately more popular, six months out, then ole Tricky Dick, himself.
Any provocative move, on Mr Bush's part, War with Iran in particular, will spin against him, with ever more people, prior to November.
His only hope, positive action in Iraq, will now be spun as a "Wag the Dog" moment, regardless of reality. You know that MSM.
It is a debacle in the making.
Mr Rove, to cleaver by half.
The border is tightening, the congress is tightening, the wave of the future is stricter border control. Hopefully Mexico will take a hand, Things *are* happening. The problem with the issue on blogs is there's nowhere to go with the thread, the issue is already high-profiled and solutions are already in-play. Being from Austin/San Antone makes me a bad bet to get shook up, because the issue is as much a part of Texas as the land itself. Has been since 1836. Now, suddenly, everybody from everywhere is a freaking expert on solutions. Verbal solutions--like the guy in the Berlin bunker moving non-existent divisions around to keep the Red Army out.
"Oh, well, easy, ya just enforce the laws! There, I fixed it!"
buddy,
here you go, no reason to be concerned, hell it takes my breath away, to discover my anedotal life mirrors your economists reality.
" ... The reason we worry about this is that real wages have been falling for low-skilled U.S. workers over the past 25 years or so. ... "
A puzzle they cannot understand, but the cause is not the "immigrants". PC run rampent in the Scholastic Community, sounds like to me. Like Mr Churchill in CO, but less verbose.
In short, buddy, opinion wrapped in Scholastic BS.
The truth is wage stagflation in the working class.
Lack of Opportunities for the native born graduates of dysfunctional schools.
Uncontrol dumping of Mexico's Labor Force, to the tune of an over $50 Billion USD subsidy to Mexico each year.
If the Mexicans were trying to dump Steel or Lumber, man we'd stop it tomorrow.
The Federals are all over those two items, but people, come one come all.
The Skeedaddle North is on, because the word is out down there that the Wall is going up, and everyone north of it will be citizenized. So there's an apocvalytic feeling, and lots of pressure to get in. And again--no quick fix short of militarizing the border, and turning everything south of the river-to-Tierra Del Fuego into a hate-America/love Castro camp.
IOW, if ever a light hand--policy without theater--was called for it is now, on this.
Rat, you know good and well the wage problem that shows in the stats is overwhelmingly a result of globalization--low-cost producers. Skews wages down, also skews the cost-of-living down. I'm not advocating anything at all--I'm just trying to get across how ancient this illegal problem is, and decrying the sudden hysteria. You do have to admit, don't you, that this thing didn't pop yesterday, and it can't be properly--that is, without blowing our own foot off fixed by tomorrow morning?
The reason it is an issue, here, blank, is that without Republican control of the Congress, Mr Bush is quacking for two years.
In War or Peace.
This is the issue that will break the Republicans, their majority is weak enough as it is.
By ignoring the issue, by not moving decisively, but providing the Pallet Company photo op at an oportune time, Mr Bush and the Federals will lose the Congress, for the Republicans.
There is a vast, well of discontent to be drawn upon. This is the issue that will prime the pump.
Like it, or not.
It will be projected as a Security Issue and the Dems will be to the "right" of Mr Bush.
Look to Mr Dean's position as reported in an earlier thread, here at this site.
Or believe AJStrata and know it's all part of a "greater plan".
I do.
The Bush family project.
New World Order
Rat, the New World Order died in November 1992. The centerpiece was peace thru solving global poverty thru free-trade--while there was still enough time left in the cheap cost of energy to kick-start the third-world economies toward self-sustaining--before the era of high-cost energy dawned (it is here, now, so, alas the NWO). THAT was poppa Bush's "NWO". Unless you use the other definition, the Pax-Americana take, on it.
The unfortunate appellation "NWO" was a segue off the Fall of the Wall. Out of context, it is not understandable, and yes rather darkly evocative.
Did Goss Get Pushed or Did He Jump?
Why would Bush throw such delicious red meat to the Democrats in a confirmation hearing? The only way to avoid that would be a universally acceptable candidate, but even then this is an election year. The Democrats are going to have every Bush policy up for discussion and ridicule. The Republicans are going to pay dearly for this. If Goss was pushed, he will find ways to snipe at Bush as well...Is Rove on vacation?
Now if Goss quit, he must have known the predicament it would cause. If over an upcoming policy, then what is he so strongly against?
That's my take, blank--calm the rhetoric about Pub disaster. Of course blog posting is rather lifeless w/o the hyperbole!
\;-D
To a degree, buddy, it is a manufactured crisis, but manufactured by whom?
How great a conspiracy,
Iranian, Russian, Chinese, Democrats, CIA moles
Who has put the ball in play?
Why?
I wonder about that very question, myself, rat.
Who put 500,000 Mexican Flag waving immigrants on the streets of LA?
Sure was not me.
I just tell it like I see it.
Over the top, not often, just over and over, 'til I'm sure the points been made.
Re "manufactured", someone unfamiliar with the border reads about how Wild West and lawless it is, and can't help but think that it's an emergent phenomenon. But far from it--both nations have been showing their ass on the Border since the Santa Anna. I worked the Sanchez-O'Brien fields down there in the 70s, drove it from Edinburg, and never without my Colt 1911 in my lap. The bad guys were bad, and the good guys were very good indeed. Like you see in the old hollywood westerns.
Out of those 500,000 how many MS-13 members. ICE has over 5,000 names on file, but not incarcerated. How many MS-13 associates are not on the list?
Those fellas, listed or not, are Mercenaries swimming in a sea of illegals. I knew their fathers, they'll hire out to the Iranians or anyone else, with or without false flags.
To discount that part of the World Wide Comspiracy, blank, is not asymetric thinking.
That is why I beat the drum, the other reasons all make sense, but are secondary to the Security Threat the open border is, has been and will continue to be.
Let m,e ask you this, rat. Say AQ or Achmaninijad wants to do an ugly inside the USA. Does he need MS-13?
While the government is spending billion and billions on the TSA and having American businessmen remove their loafers, Hispanic looking Islamists know that the US Mexican border is open for business. It is that simple. This administration is leaving it up for chance. We are putting our security on the honor system and confiscating cigarette lighters. Talk about idiocy.
You are quite correct about the Border always having been "Wild & Wooly", buddy.
The extent of the new challenge is that it is seeping out of the Southwest.
Mr Pearce, an AZ State Represenitive states that 15% of the people in AZ are here illegally.
That means unisured motorists and other challenges to the law abiding.
In part the scale of the problem has just gotten to big to ignore, but who has lit the fire, at this point in time?
I worry more about the Mob in the NE shipping ports. they'll do it for the $$$, too. Or some Green Peta freak from Manitoba. And a border wall a hundred feet high won't stop it. Again. let's use our judgement here. The hysteria has gotten to the point that the Border is the terrorism problem. Who benefits from faulty thinking?
As I said on my own blog, I think Negroponte is the big winner here.
I can't believe that there is anything to Kristol's speculation about "something popping" on Goss. I mean, the Senate already looked for stuff like that...if something was there, they'd have found it.
I wonder if there is something to your update about Goss being disappointed about CIA's diminishing role ? All the big foreign/defense/intelligence people in the Bush administation have various kinds of baggage, except Negroponte, trusted intelligence fixer for Republican administations forever. Maybe Negroponte's bunch is going to eat CIA.
You couldn't make Castro--or Putin--happier if you tried, erecting the wall on the river. And the nuke will come in at 50' in a legit Beechcraft flown by Dr. Smith who has lived in Lincoln, Nebraska for 50 years, and was vacationing in Costa Rica.
Somebody will have his daughter, see. or maybe he's become ready for the Apocalypse.
Do we need the Kurds to disrupt Iran, buddy?
Could we do it another way?
Could we use multiple avenues?
Think back to Mohammed and Malvo, multiplied by 100 or 1,000?
Belsan, the town in Russia, how many children dead? How many T's?
If I was at War with US, I'd befriend all the enemies of the US.
Even those from the '60's that outlasted all their comtemporaries, like Mr Castro.
In the '80's he had quite an extensive network throughout Central America, bet he with the assistance of Mr Ortega and others, he still does.
It is a fact that the CIA as an agency cannot defend itself, but there sure are a lot of employees that have too much to say. Dismantling the CIA is silly on many fronts. It is part of a government that finds itself incapable of dismantling any agency. I do not have a clue on how you "clean it up". Neither does anyone else.
It's not nukes, buddy.
That is a straw man argument.
Just guys, mean uncaring mercenaries that sell drugs, transport illegals and rob banks for a living.
A little sniping on a Summer evening, no problem.
If organized correctly, no pattern to use to catch the next perp.
Simple stuff, we taught 'em how.
Can't argue that, rat. 1,000 Malvos or two or three Beslans would sure lose the war for some of them sumbitches who lack an ABM system, tho.
The latino rise up in the US, as the Socialists rise up in South America.
Nah, there couldn't be a connection.
If we were already hitting the 1,500 aim points, what difference would it make?
But I fully agree that slow demoralization thru desensitization is definitely a theoretical being applied. But, with or without marching orders--nature provides the mechanism by which organisms reach their useful end. If the American organism wants to shape mother nature, we better look to our own homegrown Left.
As soon as enough rank & file Joes and Joans understand what SCOTUS has to do with them, we'll be over the hump. As is, re your crumbling of standards, rat, that has been going on since the Earl Warren court. It didn't flare with AQ. AQ is just another--particularly vile--opportunistic virus infecting an unhealthy body.
Broadly speaking, we need to clean up our thinking, and the boogerman will evaporate.
A different challenge altogether, buddy.
One that is more difficult to navigate, but if the Public is not feeling secure, no amount of Roveness will save the Republicans.
That is the "lesson" of 9-11. The Dems learned it, the Republicans have yet to.
National Security has been tied to the Border, no amount of disclaimer will change that perception, not in six months.
If you are right, then with the Republicans goes the Republic. If they cannot meet the Challenge at home...
Pay any price, bear any burden
all over again
Give me a country that will allow a Teddy Roosevelt to direct the DoD!
I'm glad you mentioned perceptions, rat--that's been my point, that we won't do anything but hurt ourselves and help our enemies if we let emotion loose an anti-Latino perception on ourselves and the world. Border control yes, delivering ammo to the enemy, no.
With that, I'm embarrassingly over allotment, and retar fo de nite!
When the "left" runs "right" are they still "left"?
To Jack & Jill Public.
When the Dems finally have a Security Issue that flanks the Republican right, do Republicans stay the course or meet the new threat?
If the Dems get to the right of the Pubs on Nat Secuity, then won't the whole country be better off? Regardless of who wins the elections--foreign-policy-wise (domestic policy exempted from present discourse)? Wouldn't the Dems then have the hawks right where the hawks want them?
No, buddy, I think not.
Over seas we'd retreat, draw down without a good Op Order to maintain a nonSaddam in Iraq or a nonNuclear Iran.
The once and future Shah did lighten my spirits in that regard, best news of '06, to date.
We'd secure the Border and debate the fate of those already here. That is Mr Pederson's apparent position as he runs for the Senate, he is making gains with it.
Securing the Border will not win the Mohammedan Wars. The Dems are not at all interested in fighting the Mohammedan Wars.
Just as OIF was morphed into the WoT,
the Border would become the primary line of defense, that and the "Ports". Lots of money spent, then the next wave of hijacked planes will take off from Canada.
Dems will be very happy to raise the Border to the level of the Mideast--and the world stability at risk there--via precisely the sort of emotionalism that is currently in-play, so as to use the conflation to say "Pubs are only for foreign adventure, Dems are for security at HOME where it matters". Sure, I expect this.
But they'll split their minority vote in return for what? Not the Kerry/Pelosi/Kennedy/Reid bunch. If the Dems want to run to the right, they're gonna have to find some faces with credibility. And if they do, then, good! The current Dem national leadership is the USA's biggest general liability. By far, far, far.
Watching them on the tv actually raises the hairs on the back of my neck. They are a grave danger.
I beg to disagree, buddy.
On the Congressional level there appears, today, a slight Democratic edge, in November '06
On the Presidential level all that saved the Mr Bush was Security, but he will not be running in '08.
By then we will have won in Iraq or not. Or the outcome could still be percieved to be in flux.
No Republican advantage to flux.
Iran, if habu is right and we bomb this summer, the Republicans will be toast. Gasoline will spike prior to the Election,
Change would be in the air.
If the Shah Jr is right, a coup in Sepetember, during the Havana Summit, big Republican advantage.
I was disagreeing about them having to find some one new, not to their being a grave danger.
You may well be right, rat. I've been scared sh*tless about the future ever since a guy whom I would not let in thru my yard gate, came within a stadium-ful of winning the presidency.
You keep sitting at the computer, habu, and you'll soon be 5'-6", 400 lbs, and lucky to bench press yer coffee cup.
\;-D
If the Shah is well funded, really well funded, and is not all BS, instability in Iran is the least we'd obtain.
If all is as reported the Mullahs could well be hittin' the mountain trail, at best.
that's pretty inspirational, habu. would you very much mind deleting it?
Rat, USSR#2 will try to nail him before he can get it going, i'm afraid. Oh, Georgie Patton, we hardly knew ye.
Habu, I know whatcha mean, it takes me all NIGHT to do what i used to could, ALL night.
" ... According to Open Target: Where America Is Vulnerable to Attack, a new book by former Homeland Security Department Inspector General Clark Kent Ervin, the United States has 66,000 chemical plants, 2,800 power plants, 1,800 federal reservoirs, 80,000 dams, 5,000 public airports -- the list goes on and on. In a recent speech, Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff said the result of a successful attack on certain chemical plants "would be tremendous -- tremendous in terms of loss of life, tremendous in terms of property damage, and then also tremendous in terms of its impact on our national economy." ..."
HomeGuard?
Not much of a threat, aye
nite all--daughter has cooked, and my mush is ready.
To restablish the Shah, in Iran, before Jimma is dead and worm food, now I'd think that would be something you'd get behind, buddy.
The ULTIMATE rejection of a failed policy.
Better than pissin' I'd think.
Worthy of a War President, facin' down his friend, Mr Putin.
Establishing a secular Iran, without signifgant US losses.
well, I have to say, rat, that hitting a few of those targets is as far as they'll get before the vigilantes are pitchforking everyone they didn't go to high school with--and the damage to USA will be a thousand orders of magnitude less than what will be visited on any identified state perp.
It's the Flight 93 syndrome that is protecting us--not the Homeland Security Dep't. IMHO.
'kay adios por la noche--
yes, i had that Carter thought, rat--with a grim smile--
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Maybe Porter quit so that Daddy Bush CAN step in. Daddy Bush would know the agency, and I'm pretty sure Dubya can trust him not to leak. If we're getting close to dropping a hammer on Iran, Dubya might want to draw the wagons in, thinking it would be nice to have someone in the top spy-seat that he wouldn't have to be tapping their phone to see how many calls they're making to the NY Times.
Re: the question of immigration, it appears to me increasingly that American citizenry will be dealing with these issues one and one in a personal fashion -- just like we do now when someone acts up on an airplane. We have more and more militia-people volunteering to patrol the borders, snap elections are being called to throw the bums out who want to support illegals AND to pass heavy-duty penalizing laws, and I think the states involved may even get to the point of building their own fences and then billing DC after the fact ... since Mr. Bush doesn't seem to want to think there's a problem.
Speculation:
Goss is most likely a CIA zealot.
Porter Goss wants to revive the agency from within. He wants to reestablish the Agency to its former status. He has an internalized belief in the greatness of the organization - if he could just get rid of a few bad apples.
However, my guess is that Bush/Negroponte, and even Rumsfeld and Rice, now think it is unrecoverable and must be marginalized... So, the budget gets sliced and the responsabilities move to other organizations. I don't think Bush believes the CIA can have more time to reform itself in the context of the war we find ourselves in. Goss was the last chance and he had more than two years.
However, having a spook agency - which still gets classified information - on the outside and looking at buisness process 'reengineering' might not be a good situation. It must be pretty bad out there.
woof woof woof
chose your name well, dearie
do you also do "sky is falling!" chicken little imitations?
Bingo Boghie!
Having had a wealth of experience with the bureaucracy that actually runs things, I know that the only thing that is keeping them operating is the heroic efforts of the few who want to do what they get paid for.
Opposing them are the bureaucrats who operate mainly for status. They are quick to shoot down anything they can't take credit for and spend their days wondering how to derail some else's promotion.
There comes a time when the deadwood outweighs the strivers and things grind slowly to a stop. Appearance of action becomes more desirable than actual deeds because the real thing runs the risk of failure.
I think the CIA reached that point back during the Clinton Administration when they received the Executive Order directing them not to do business with people who might have "human rights" problems. Since the people in a position to provide real intelligence on things like al Qaeda and Saddam Hussein's Iraq would all have "human rights" problems the directive sent the message that actually trying to gain good intelligence could be risky to your career.
That coupled with the push for "diversity" at the agency, meaning the recruitment of more women and homosexuals regardless of whether they had needed skills was another sign.
This was read (correctly is would seem) to mean that the primary purpose of the CIA was no longer gathering intelligence.
The people who were committed to the mission saw that political loyalty was being rewarded over operational competence and headed for the door.
That left the Mary McCarthys and Valerie Plames to play their little PC games without actually providing anything useful.
I think that Porter Goss went there thinking that it was like to old days and that he could get the agency back on track. I think he was certainly willing to try but it proved to be too great a job for anyone.
I think that President Bush took advantage of the creation of the DNI position to begin marginalizing the CIA.
I have worked several places where employees that have been troublesome have been simply shunted to dead-end positions where they are unable to do anything but vegetate until they are eligible for retirement. Sometimes it's just too much trouble to go through all the rigmarole that is necessary to terminate them. Better to make them irrelevant.
I think that is what is going to happen to the CIA. Negroponte is going to raid the agency for the few remaining competent operatives and just leave the rest to rot.
I think that Gen Hayden's job at the agency will be to evaluate and recruit usable talent and identify to the DNI those who should be ignored.
CIA Director Porter Goss resigned unexpectedly Friday, leaving behind a spy agency still battling to recover from the scars of intelligence failures before America’s worst terrorist attack and faulty information that formed the U.S. march madness rationale for invading Iraq. Air Force Gen. Michael Hayden, top deputy to National Intelligence Director John Negroponte, is the leading candidate to replace Goss, a senior Bush administration official said late Friday. An announcement could come as early as Monday.
http://www.enterbet.com
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