Is it a consolation that Gen. Hayden is an improvement over the former C.I.A. Director George Tenet? There is little doubt that he is. Mr. Tenet was always politically expedient, following the pack at the top of the administration, a group thinker. Gen. Hayden is an improvement despite this column's continued concern that a military man is heading our most high profile, civilian intelligence agency. This interview should have taken the entire hour - that' what the producers should have pushed for; it is the man's first interview as C.I.A. Director and you do not take an entire hour, hopefully there is an explanation.
For lack of a better description, the entire interview left this writer uneasy. Several points contribute to this feeling. First, Mr. Russert was asking Gen. Hayden about the surge in Iraq. Again, the 'surge' is an escalation - make no mistake. However, this is traditionally not within the realm of expertise for the C.I.A. director. Is it because he is wearing the uniform? It just seemed that this line of questioning would have been better suited for Gen. Petraus and not the Director of the C.I.A.
However, when the subject turned to Basra and the Iraqi government going in into the city to route militants, Gen. Hayden said he didn't know anymore about it beforehand then Gen. Petraus did. This is a problem. Isn't the point of the C.I.A. to know things before they happen? What's called advanced intelligence. We don't seem to have much of that in Iraq, if any. Again, it leaves this writer uneasy.
And this seeming lack of advance [or you can read: current] intelligence also relates back to the National Intelligence Estimate following September 11th with regard to Iraq's WMD program. Though Gen. Hayden was not the C.I.A. Director at the time, he stated that he was in the room and blamed the lack of an honest assessment of Saddam Hussein's current WMD program on momentum. What?! He said that the momentum gained by the past intelligence trumped current information. This insight into the discussion that was happening in that meeting leaves us frightened. Nowhere in his answer can you point to one thing intelligent. Gen. Hayden said that they have learned vital lessons because of it, but the cost has been devastating to this country.
Also, this column wonders why Gen. Hayden, on today's program, could weigh in with his personal opinion with regard Iran's nuclear program (whether it is active or not) and not give his personal opinion on water boarding as torture. He defers to the Justice Department to decide whether it is torture or not. He would not give his opinion, he said it doesn't matter what he thinks, but it does. He is the Director of the C.I.A. Does this mean that he condones it? And deferring to the Justice Dept. for anything right now is a joke. The justice department under the Bush Administration has shredded the Constitution. We wish this was an overstatement, but unfortunately, it is not critical enough.
Lastly, Gen. Hayden spoke about giving his operatives liability insurance so that they don't have to think about the legality or morality of their actions that they take on behalf of the U.S. Government. We understand that this is designed to relieve the external (political) pressure on the operative, but giving them liability insurance implies that they need it and that they are engaging in illegal activity. The program cut to the clip of V.P. Cheney talking about working on the dark side, in the shadows. Intelligence is all about working in the shadows - to see where the rest of us can not. But going to the dark side, that leaves us no better than the people determined to do us harm though atrocious means.
For the second half of the program, which again there shouldn't have been, the guests were David Brooks, NY Times columnist and editor-at-large Peter Beinart to discuss whether Sen. Hillary Clinton should drop out of the race and what the repercussions are if she stays in.
Without the continual back and forth, here are the answers to these specific questions.
Should Hillary Clinton drop out of the race? No, she has the right to continue on since she has won some major primaries. She shouldn't drop out despite the mathematic improbability of her winning.
Is her campaign's current strategy hurting the Democratic Party? Yes, as long as Mrs. Clinton and her surrogates bitterly discuss race and gender, the Democratic Party will become more divided by the day. There is a real lack of leadership in the Democratic Party - Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and Howard Dean (to just name a few) have done nothing. They are ineffective and frankly, should be removed. Who can lead this party - Senators Obama and Clinton. However, their collective discourse is becoming more and more poisonous and that poison is trickling down throughout the party collective. And as a side note, Bill Clinton should just shut up. We used to love to see him at the forefront, but now we cringe every time we see him on the television. Talk about deflating the Party. From a distance, doesn't it just seem childish?
What should be their campaign strategy? We would have to agree with David Brooks - a rarity we realize, but he suggested that Mrs. Clinton just run a dignified campaign about ideas and policy, not using baiting tactics centered around race and gender. Wow, What a novel idea!
1 comment:
Good words.
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