The Man Who "Will" Head the CIA

In Seattle, King 5 News helped boost the prospects of the president’s latest blunder;
the nomination of General Michael Hayden to run the bruised, battered and politicized CIA.
They referred to Hayden as “the man who will run the CIA”. Not a word about his illegal spy machine at the NSA and the Quakers that were targeted; only that he will run the CIA.
It’s hard not to think that they were trying to lull Americans into believing it was a reasonable choice and a done deal.

Bush nominated Hayden, God help us.
However, a nomination is a not a confirmation. Even television journalists are supposed to understand that much basic civics.

While it’s true the Senate has done little to filter out the incompetent yes men, cronies, crooks and descendents of illegal aliens that Bush fingers to run the country, it is their responsibility to decide whether or not he will serve.

There are a whole hat full of reasons why Hayden should not be confirmed. Television newscasters have a responsibility to inform their audiences, especially when nominees are this controversial.

• Hayden is on active military service. The CIA is a civilian organization. Confirming his nomination is against Senate conventions. Allowing Hayden to keep his military status would put 80% of the intelligence budget under the control of the military.
  
• He is the man who dropped the intelligence ball before 9-11. Hayden failed to translate and disseminate a key intercept before 9-11 that would have confirmed a hit on the Twin Towers. Even if the president thinks failing to identify a key component in a targeted investigation that resulted in the deaths of 3000 Americans qualifies Hayden to lead the CIA (heck of a job Mike), the Senate should respectfully disagree.


• He is the Godfather of the illegal NSA program. We should not have a man heading the CIA who thinks wholesale spying on Americans is legal or acceptable. It is neither. The program that he authored violates two telecommunications laws, FISA laws and the Fourth Amendment of the Constitution.


• No one who has violated the law and the constitution should be the head of anything. They should resign and do the time.


• Hayden is an Iran Contra alumnus Like convicted Iran Contra criminal John Poindexter, Hayden is an Iran Contra veteran. Because there was no independent investigation, most Americans don’t realize how serious this scandal was.
  It was nothing less than a secret shadow government whose actions contravened the decisions of elected representatives of Congress. They engaged in treason at
  home and insurrection abroad. The shadow government sold weapons to an enemy nation (Iran), engaged in money laundering, drug dealing, murder and mayhem.
  One of Poindexter’s more recent activities, illegal and unauthorized data net Total Information Awareness were shut down by Congress. Instead of shutting it down, Bush may have just transferred it to the NSA and Hayden. Participation in past criminal enterprises should disqualify one from high office involving the public trust.
• Hayden dodges accountability and favors secrecy. Like his brother in arms John Poindexter, he operates in secret. When his secret domestic dragnet was exposed he lied about the scope and legality. When his lies were exposed, the program became “essential to national security”. We just can’t trust him.


• Presidential yes men in intelligence agencies are a disaster. Politicization of intelligence allowed 9-11 to occur and dragged us into an unnecessary, illegal and intractable war. Politicization at the CIA has driven out senior intelligence analysts. The danger of being sucked into a disastrous conflict with Iran is very real. Hayden is a Bush loyalist who is willing to break the law rather than say no to his boss.


• Hayden isn’t concentrating on tracking down terrorists. The number one threat to our country’s security is terrorism. Concentrating on domestic spying sucks resources away from tracking down terrorists. Trolling for spies is inefficient and prone to error. The NSA records that have been released show that those targeted are peace and justice groups, political opponents and newspaper reporters. When asked if members of Congress were being spied upon, he refused to answer.

What is so disturbing about Hayden’s snooping is that there is no legal authorization for it. It is not authorized by the US Patriot Act or by any act of Congress. It was an edict written by Bush in secret, based on secret legal opinions of a highly dubious nature. The
program was planned, implemented and operated in secret.

The NSA is expressly forbidden to collect information about Americans. Its mandate is to collect foreign intelligence. Every NSA employee attends and signs off on twice yearly meetings regarding the parameters of their activities according to Michael Tice, a very credible NSA officer turned whistleblower.

Hayden is a Bush loyalist not an American loyalist. He works to secure the Bush presidency rather than the nation. He works to protect Bush not the American way of life.

He has shown himself to have poor judgment and low moral and ethical standards.
He takes no responsibility for his failures and defends them against all reason.

He is a person who should never be given extraordinary power.
Contact your Senators ASAP and tell them thumbs down on General Michael Hayden.

Carol DW

Update:

The TPM muckraker is characterizing this nomination as a turf war between the Rumsfeld and Negroponte. They believe that Hayden could be good news because it would thwart Rumsfeld's ambitions to have the military control all the intelligence agencies. Negroponte is the Intelligence Czar and naturally opposes Rumsfled's stealing agencies out from under his nose.

Two rotten choices with no chance of a good outcome is not "good news".

It probably is a bad idea for the military to dominate intelligence gathering and analysis.
They certainly flopped big time on Iraq. It was military intelligence and not the CIA, that stove piped and cherry picked us into an intractible war crime.
Putting Donald Rumsfeld in charge of anything is wishing it dead. This man breaks everything he touches and doesn't have the sense "God gave a donut".

However, I don't see that an Iran Contra criminal who owes his get out jail free card to the Bush family is any better. Isn't the CIA falling apart because of the personal political trumping the professional? Who the hell decided that a man who funded death squads in Central America and was convicted of lying to Congress is a good choice for Intelligence Czar? A Czar, perhaps.
Can you believe that both of these losers were confirmed by the United States Senate. Disgusting!

CDW