New CIA Director Goss

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What are people's opinions of this guy? Quite honestly, I don't think I ever heard of him before yesterday. Some people are questioning the selection as politically motivated - Goss is a current Congressman for Florida - and feel that Bush is using his appointment as a way to sway Florida voters. (Which, admittedly, is easier than going through the Supreme Court again.)

Democrats of course, are expected to jump all over this, when the senate decides whether or not to approve the selection. They don't want a politician running the CIA. However, to me, it seems as if Goss would not still be a politician if he takes this post. While it has not been directly stated, I can only assume he would not seek re-election this fall if he took the position.

 

So far, I really have no opinion. I know nothing about the guy (well, next to nothing). I don't care whether or not he's a Republican, as long as he's qualified. One positive he has going for him, in my eyes, is that he's a former CIA agent himself. He knows the culture, the inter-agency politics. Who better to bring change to an agency than one of their own?

That said...

He's also a major Bush cheerleader, and many say his appointment is merely to prevent any more embarrassing stories to come out the CIA during the election and make the Bush administration look (more) bad. He's seen as someone Bush can control. Since he'll only have control of 1/10th of the DoD budget (Rumsfeld has the other 9/10ths) he'll safely keep the CIA, and any potentially damaging snafus coming from it, safely out of the public eye until after November.

Since that's all speculation, I have no real objection to him at this point. I would prefer they select someone known for being fairly apolitical (like Richard Clark was pre-smearing), but since I don't see Bush ever selecting anyone anywhere near the center for anything, this guy's just as good as any I suppose.

(The above is subject to change in the next few months, naturally.)

 

He's been head of the Senate Intelligence Committee for a while. I don't think it's a horrbile choice. The Dems will clamour that's it's a partisan pick, but the guy's basically been doing the job in the Senate the whole time...What's the difference?

If anything, it opens up a Senate and valuable committee seat that the Dems can try to claim in the next election. Thus, balancing the universe.

 

He seems to come out of nowhere, and although it may be a political ploy i cannot make an opinion until i know more about what he has done/will do. Im sure ti will all come out before Novemeber though.

 

Somehow I doubt Goss will end up getting confirmed. Someone very close to Goss apparantly doesn't feel that he's terribly qualified.

Goss himself.

Apparantly an interview conducted by producers of Michael Moore (gasp!) during shooting for F9/11 may be what prevents his confirmation. Or, at the very least, creates enough embarrassment for the Bush administration that they'll reconsider.

http://www.cnn.com/2004/ALLPOLITICS/08/13/moore.goss.reut/index.html

While this alone doesn't prove much and just makes him look...well, not too bright at least...the following point by Moore is a pretty damn good one.

DAAAMN!!

Qualification or not...you'd think the Bush people could've chosen someone who couldn't so easily be made to look like a complete jackass by the most listened to (and, therefore, dangerous) liberal on earth. Or is it just me?

Methinks they be gettin' sloppy.

 

This is the 'most political' side of the thing. If it is so, then our friend might not be the best person to properly lead the Firm.

This is definitely positive. At least at FBI, the best leaders usually become from former agent, those "who were on the field" earlier.

Although with William Webster, the opposite was proved: a lawyer, a judge who had never been an agent could lead the Agency properly.

 

When I first posted this thread I didn't have a whole lot of background on Goss, and I've done some reading in the time since. Basically, it seems like there's really nothing that has changed. As head of the Senate Intelligence Community, his job then was pretty much the same as it is now, and he's already proven he hasn't done a particularly good job of it in the past.

You see, this is what I don't get - Bush because of his "War on Terror" platforming gets a free pass on the issue of Terror, and especially so in regards to the 9/11 attacks. Not a single person has lost their job in the intelligence community as a result of the attacks. Tenet stepped down, but from everything I've heard, there was no pressure for him to do so, and he did this of his own accord. He even said shortly after the 9/11 attacks that if Bush asked for his resignation he would give it, but Bush never asked.

I look at the poor intelligence we had for the 9/11 attacks, and I look at the poor intelligence in the Iraq war. Given these examples, there are only two possible conclusions one can draw:

1. Bush lied to us about the intelligence
2. Bush was misinformed about the intelligence.

As for the first one, I'd really like to believe that Bush, if nothing else, is a patriot and would not have lied to the American people. If he did, he does not deserve to be president.

This leads me to believe that the second statement is the correct one. If he got poor intelligence - misinformation even - shouldn't that mean someone's ass gets hung out to dry? And then, to correct the situation, you appoint someone who was part of the initial problem? How does this help?

I believe Bush is playing a dangerous game here. If someone cannot do the job they are required to do, they should not be placed in that position. Of course the scary part for Bush would be that same criteria may be applied to hiim come November.

 

It indeed was poor work. Some experts say that the CIA had been using the electronical intelligence way too much, and very little 'manpower' (agents in field). Even the agent of the Hungarian intelligence, who was in Pakistan IIRC, had some info that Bin Laden plans a terror attack (but no more precise info of the target IIRC, and of course Hungarian agency is tiny; but it still follows the old intelligence guidelines: AGENTS in field which is very dangerous of course)

The other thing CIA was blamed of that they did NOT have a plan, a counter-action in case if an aeroplane is hijacked (full of kerosin) AND drived into a building. Simply they didn't think of that, there was no model or simulation of such situation.

I don't want to go off-topic, but they indeed did poor job before 9/11, and the director should have influence on his organization.
The point here I have, is that after 9/11, new regulations were applied, such as no judge permission needed for electronical phone tapping if it is related to terrorist activity or something like this (so if they are investigating soemthing that might be terrorist-related, they don't have to wait for the permission of the judge). This would be quite good theoretically, but I ask: will this not lead back to a similar status which was present before senator Frank Church initiated the investigations? (i.e. uncontrollable CIA, or if not, then at least they don't tell the truth to the President -- Aldeth's second point -- meanwhile the President uses it for his own needs - see Watergate)
This might be too strong assumption, we are not in 1970's but in 2004, but still...

 

What always puzzles me is that Bush made the decision to go to war anyway long before the National Intelligence Estimate was made. Sure, that was inherently wrong about Iraq. But then, it had no impact on the decision to go to war. It simply cannot have had any impact because it wasn't there when Bush made his decision. So then, why blame the CIA?

Going to Iraq was entirely Bush's silly idea, and if not his idea it was still his decision. And in a republic that works the buck should stop at the responsible decisionmaker. I really wonder why the US discussion doesn't get to that point. But no.

Just look at Rumsfeld: He takes political responsibility for the prison abuse - and stays in office??! Just empty words.

As for Goss, I don't know too much about him but he's sure a better pick than Wolfowitz, originally another candidate, but luckily he was in the meanwhile discredited by his horrible performance in office over Iraq.

 

Well, it's certainly not fair to blame the CIA exclusively. In their mock attempt to get UN approval, if you recall, the administration showed "evidence" that Iraq was making WMD. Certainly the CIA had a part in that evidence gathering, but there had to be other agencies involved as well. I'm sure the military collected some evidence - especially the spy plane photographs. The NSA could very well have been involved as well. The FBI, however, was most likely NOT involved as they deal much more with domestic issues. So, while they may have dropped the ball with 9/11, they probably didn't have much say on the decision to go to war with Iraq.

I agree that Bush wanted to attack Iraq no matter what. That decision was probably made within weeks after he got in office. To this end, he ordered the intelligence agencies to find evidence that would support military action. What I do not know - and no one will likely ever know - is whether or not Bush knew the intelligence he received was as weak as it turned out to be. Or, even worse, if he knew the evidence was just flat out wrong. And that's the question I would really like answered: Did the fact that no WMD were found in Iraq come as a surprise to anyone within the administration?

 

Deja-vu all over again

....no.

My view on this is very simple. I don't think that British or US intelligence is so below average compared to other countries as they look. Yet their findings seem to have been a little bit...off. Now, other countries have themselves intelligence services. And the Americans actually never really tried to convince anyone of the stockpiles of WMD's that, according to them, would be floating around in the desert there. Why? They knew their claim is a hoax and if your product (in this case the reason for war) sucks, you don't go try to "really" sell it to someone else.

Or said otherwise, why following the line of someone else, when your own intelligence says this other guy's intelligence sucks. But then, I fancy to think that people working in strategical studies and intelligence services are likely to know eachother, the US and British intelligence services must at one point been aware that people in the same workfield in other places look funny at them...

That's pretty the damn heart of all the fuss. If Iraq really posed a clear and present danger, would have anyone not wanted to defend himself against it? I think a lot of countries would have gone to war then, but their intelligence told them that isn't so. The point is, only a small number of goverments seem to have believed that. And most of them couldn't convince a big part of their own populations of this. That "controversy" must have had caused some reflection in any intelligence service... wouldn't that be normal.

 

What? Hm, "major country", you mean the USA, Australia, UK and Honduras ? Well, I can assure you that this surely dosn't hold true for my part of the woods. And I'm pretty sure that while we two among others where arguing forth and back (You remember that, I hope), the strategical department of the ETH pretty much put the record straight, that Iraq hadn't enough WMD's to present a clear and present danger to anyone outside of it's direct neighbourhood. And I very well remember that the UN-appearance of Powell was aimed at convincing others from their findings. It turned out to be not convincing, wonder why. That is, they put it diplomatic, they were convinced that further evaluation of eventual existing WMD's and the quantity of them would be necessary, but that there's, god knows, not enough evidence for WMD's in such a quantity that would in anyway justify a war.

So and gross summary of events here

If this report became public on the 6 March, may conclude that the content was already known to the people who are paid to know already some months before ?

So, explain to me how it comes that this assertion of the immanent threat that Iraq posed never became mainstream, even been debunked constantly by officals where I live. And explain to me why it has spawned a scandal with the BBC in the UK, that was all the fault of the BBC, including suicide of one involved, if "Everyone and everybody and their cats and mice" believed that Iraq posed an clear and present danger to the Western World, not to say the mighty US of A with even more then 20 battleships.

 

Just one itsy bitsy word in sideways here on this sadly threadjacked topic.

Non-US intelligencies thought it might have been possible for Iraq to have hidden away some stuff or perhaps started up something new. It was not thought likely but the inspectors and resolutions were there to make sure that there were nothing fishy going on. Now it has been proved that there were nothing at all. Even I thought that there might be some harmless junk lying around somewhere missed in the clean outs. I would also like to give a tiny bit of respect to the Bush regime that they have not planted anything. I was actually almost convinced that it is what they would do if they did not find anything in the first few weeks. Kudos to them for not doing it.