It is my understanding when during the Senate hearings on Hayden's appointment to head the CIA Senator Feinstein asked of Hayden: Is waterboarding an acceptable interrogation technique? (Waterboarding is a torture designed to make victims believe they will die by drowning if they do not provide correct answers to their interrogators.)

General Hayden's response: Let me defer that to closed session, and I would be happy to discuss it in some detail.

The general want to DISCUSS torture? The only possible answer by a human being to the senator's question is a flat NO. And he has been appointed to head the organization responsible for interrogation in secret prisons all around the world.

Mike Hayden is a Criminal.
Hayden was and is in charge of the Illegal NSA wire taps and Illegal Domestic Surveillance Program of the Nazi President George Walker Bush and his Nazi Gang of Criminals.
It does not make any sense to put him in charge of the CIA also.
Sp4MP Army Veteran
Jackson Michigan

Mike Hayden is a Criminal.
Hayden was and is in charge of the Illegal NSA wire taps and Illegal Domestic Surveillance Program of the Nazi President George Walker Bush and his Nazi Gang of Criminals.
It does not make any sense to put him in charge of the CIA also.
Sp4MP Army Veteran
Jackson Michigan

Truth, is all that we ever needed!

We don't need Democrats, Republicans or Independents who are simply going to fall into the old patterns and ways of doing things. What we need are people, who regardless of party affiliation (read Jeremiah 5:1 in your bibles), will execute judgment and seek (and hopefully tell) the truth.

It is not good when one's foreign or domestic policy is based upon covert action(s), misdirection, subterfuge, plausible deniability, duplicity, spin and outright lies, for then the American people, if not the world, can never know what to believe.

And even though I do not care for all of this intelligence and surveillance nonsense (I know, they had spies in the Bible too), however, it is so refreshing to have someone in Washington, who will tell the truth for a change, even if doing so might impair their ambitions.

This man might turn out to be be a winner like Tony Snow, the new Press Secretary. Perhaps change is a comin' after all. God knows that we cannot continue in the same direction for two more years, or our kids will probably be dug into the sands of Iran at some future date.

Some won't like this, but I would recommend that Mr. Bush follow the direction of a man who was once a CIA Director, Vice President and President of this country. Given his vast knowledge and experience, he concluded that America needed to become a kinder and gentler nation. And can you believe that an attitude like that, telling the truth, prevented Mr. Bush 41 from serving a second term in office? Eek! God knows that we don't want kinder and gentler people and policies in America do we(-:

I would also encourage Mr. Bush 41, our Commander-in-Chief, who spoke so eloquently at Coretta Scott King's Funeral, to remember the oaths that he took before he stepped into office, and not look to the Right or the Left, as the scriptures teach, just do the proper thing. The Bible says that leaders are servants of the Lord.

I have never been in the military, and I do not know military language, so all I can say is, Here, here for General Hayden, if he will tell the truth that is good enough for me! And General, if you are confirmed, please continue to improve, but do not never change from being honest and forthright. And finally, remember that your oath, i.e., is to serve the American people and God!

The Rev,

I would really rather have a DCI who could accurately quote the Fourth Amendment than one who is willing to criticize one goner and one going-er.

And I think it's more than faintly ridiculous for a journalist to be cheering a nominee.

Charles of MercuryRising
http://www.phoenixwoman.blogspot.com

Redcat,

Good points and I'll address them in order of their importance.

The importance of foreign fighters isn't great. Time magazine did an excellent piece on foreign fighters. They go to Iraq for Allah, but they are handled by Baathists. Zarqawi might be the exception, but I doubt it. When he's no longer useful to the Baathists or poses too great a threat, he'll be found in a ditch with a bullet to the head.

The administration has overblown the number and the impact of foreign fighters. Of the insurgents captured less than 1 percent are foreigners. You have to remember Iraq attracted foreign workers as it offered a better standard of living. How many of the foreign born insurgents are actually long term residents of Iraq is something we're never told, but I bet it's huge.

Regarding public opinion being opposed to an increase in troop levels. I'd argue there is a larger number of Americans who want us to finish what we started; they would endorse a significant troop build up provided its goal is to take the fight to the Sunnis, secure their cities, and turn the occupation over to Iraqi military units having good numbers of Sunnis.

Most Americans fear what is going to happen is we are posturing to pull out and let the Iraqis duke it out. That might be inevitable but I think premature at this point to let their country deteriorate into civil war which will be a real bloodbath.

Increasing our force level plays into the hands of the insurgents. Maybe, but I doubt it. The insurgents would rather we leave because they really believe they can whip up on the Shiites and Kurds. The Shiites would like us to leave because we are keeping them from committing wide scale genocide.

Controlling Sunni population centers will be tough and it will cause animosity, but when people can freely move about and not worry about working at jobs funded by the coalition they will learn to appreciate their liberation. We also have to make sure the Iraqi military who occupy the cities after we move on behave professionally.

There are those who are so opposed to the administration and to the war they refuse to wish anything good to happen. I despair at the prospect of the 20,000 plus American casualties being robbed of victory just because politicians don't have the stomach to make hard choices. To me that is a crime.

One comment. I don't care how persuasive Gen. Hayden was about the NSA domestic collection program, and I don't care how much he may have obliquely questioned the Bush Administration policy. There is no, repeat NO, excuse for domestic information collection, or telephone eavesdropping, without first obtaining a warrant from a regular, not a secret, court. When did this stop being the land of the free and the home of the brave, and start being the land of the insecure and the home of the coward?

Confessions Of An Iraqi War Veteran

Jessie Macbeth - Former Army Ranger and Iraq War Veteran, Tell it like it is
"She was begging me, begging me to save her and to save her kids, but, I didn't you know. I wanted to be , ah, I killed them. You know?

This 20 minute video will change your life.. A PepperSpray Production

http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article13140.htm

"What we are doing over there is wrong"

I beg you as media and the rest to expose this video to max if we realy want to have peace in this wolrd , other wise we will be part of crime, please please please watch and disterbute and cover to max.

:o

Robert,

Thank you for the link to the article. The idea of simultaneously clearing and holding cities in Iraq is interesting, but the proposition assumes that Iraqi insurgents in affected areas will go home, join the Iraqi military or LE forces, and/or discontinue support for local and foreign insurgents/fighters. While all three scenarios are possible, I suspect that insurgents (local or otherwise) may simply abandon fighting temporarily and reengage in battle at a later time, such as they are they are doing in Afghanistan. An important question is can foreign fighters continue to wreak havoc in Iraq without local support and would they be interested in doing so? A second important question concerns the attitudes of local Iraqis toward coalition forces after their cities have been bombed and further destroyed. Even if they 'understand' why actions were taken, they will still likely be highly resentful and hence, subject to wanting to support an insurgency, despite the actual sponsor thereof, again.

A second consideration would be American public opinion regarding additional troops and the possibility of increased casualties as troops are assuming positions, attempting to hold them, and eventually moving out. A prolonged engagement by US/coalition forces, even if dedicated to ending the conflict, is not likely to go over well in the court of public opinion due to the statements that have already been made by the administration concerning the removal of US/coalition forces from Iraq as soon as Iraqi forces are 'ready to stand up.' The reality of taking four cities and holding them is that fighting and casualties would increase, thereby negating the administration's position that the 'situation in Iraq is improving.' Increased conflict would also negate the idea that the formation of a new government in Iraq will somehow improve the overall situation (another administration 'promise.') The administration will once again be perceived as having manipulated the truth about Iraq and rightfully so.

A third consideration is that maintaining conflict in Iraq and thereby keeping US/coalition forces in the country is to the distinct advantage of the insurgents (foreign or otherwise) in that extending the US/coalition's presence there serves to anger the Iraqi population and maintain anti-US/west sentiment in the region. I could envision insurgents attacking US/coalition forces within/around/away from the aforementioned cities simply to keep the conflict active. IMHO, unless all insurgents decide that fighting in Iraq is useless to them, the conflict is likely to continue for some time to come.

Folks, remember what I have told you here. If in January, 2008, a democrat takes over at the Oval Office, just watch how quickly the roles will reverse. Just watch as the heavy breathers on the right who support any action against Iraq or Al Quaeda--irrespective of whether those actions are within the law and the Constitution--completely reverse themsleves and beging to call for a more restricvtive view of the power of the Executive. Just watch--assuming republicans manage to hold on to both Houses--as Congress finds a renewed interest in checking the power of the Executive. Just watch as suddenly this obsequeious, accommodating Congress suddenly devlops a spine and starts up investigations of Executive Branch actions. And just watch as some of the Bush sycophants on this very forum suddenly start wringing their hands and fretting over too much Executive power.

The one thing we do not have a shortage of in Washington is a monumental excess of hypocrisy.

www.onlinejournal.com
www.wsws.org
otherside123.blogspot.com

US covert operations underway in Somalia; resource conflict escalates over Horn of Africa

By Larry Chin

According to a May 16 report in the Washington Post, US analysts of Africa policy and officials of Somalia's interim government say that the Bush administration is secretly supporting secular Somali warlords, whose groups are battling Islamic groups for control of Mogadishu.

While the Bush administration has continued to dodge questions about what appear to be "classic" covert operations (similar to those taking place in Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Colombia, etc.), Somali government spokesman Abdirahman Dinari has unequivocally declared "the US government funded the warlords in the recent battle in Mogadishu, there is no doubt about that. This cooperation . . . only fuels further civil war."

Somalia is considered a "terrorist haven," as well as a potential "hotbed of al Qaeda activity." It is no surprise that in recent press conferences, new White House spokesman and propaganda mouthpiece (former Fox News pundit) Tony Snow repeatedly referred to "al Qaeda terrorists."

A senior US intelligence official quoted in the Washington Post article (who asked not to be named) says that Somalia presents "a classic 'enemy of our enemy' situation" (but "not an al Qaeda safe haven yet"), while former Clinton administration Africa specialist John Prendergast (now a senior advisor for the George Soros-funded International Crisis Group think tank) notes that "the US relies on buying intelligence from warlords and other participants in the Somali conflict, and hoping that the strongest of the warlords can snatch a live suspect or two" [for interrogation or rendition-LC]."

Competing Geostrategic and Energy Interests in Somalia

Somalia is of geostrategic interest to the Bush administration, and the focus of operations and policy since 2001. This focus is a continuation of long-term policies of both the Clinton administration and the George H.W. Bush administrations. Somalia's resources have been eyed by Western powers since the days of the British Empire.

According to the US Energy Information Administration, Somalia currently has no proven oil reserves, and only 200 billion cubic feet of proven natural gas reserves, and no hydrocarbon production. But this has not dimmed continuing interest in Somalia's untapped and unexplored potential, and the possibility of an energy bonanza following any resolution of the country's "internal security problems." The Somalian regime currently welcomes oil interests. Conoco, Agip, Amoco, Chevron, and Phillips held concessions in the area. Of more immediate logistical and military interest, Somalia is situated on a key corridor between the Middle East and Africa, strategically located on the coast of the Arabian Sea, a short distance from Yemen.

As laid bare in the January 1993 report by Mark Fineman of the Los Angeles Times, "The Oil Factor in Somalia," US oil companies, including Conoco, Amoco, Chevron and Phillips were positioned to exploit Somalia's rich oil reserves during the reign of pro-US President Mohammed Siad Barre. These companies had secured billion-dollar concessions to explore and drill in large portions of the Somali countryside prior to the coup led by warlord Mohammed Farah Aidid that toppled Barre. The US Somalia envoy at the time was CIA operative Robert Oakley, a chief "counter-terrorism" officer during the George H.W. Bush presidency, and veteran of the Afghanistan and Iran-Contra operations of the 1980s. Conoco's Mogadishu office housed the US embassy and military headquarters.

The infamous Somalia military operation of 1993, popularly depicted in the Philadelphia Inquirer series (and subsequent Hollywood film) "Blackhawk Down," was not a humanitarian mission, but an undeclared UN/US war launched by the George H.W. Bush adminstration, and inherited by the Clinton presidency. The operation was spearheaded by Deputy National Security Adviser Jonathan Howe (who remained in charge of the UN operation after Clinton took office), and approved by Colin Powell, then head of the Joint Chiefs.

The current Bush administration's escalation in Somalia is a trip "back to the future." As noted by William Engdahl, "Yemen fits nicely as an 'emerging target' with the other target nearby, Somalia," both of which are important geostrategic "choke points":

"Washington's choice of Somalia and Yemen is a matched pair, as a look at a Middle East/Horn of Africa map will confirm. Yemen sits at the oil transit chokepoint of Bab el-Mandap, the narrow point controlling oil flow connecting the Red Sea with the Indian Ocean. Yemen also has oil, although no one yet knows just how much. It could be huge. A US firm, Hunt Oil Co. is pumping 200, 000 barrels a day from there but that is likely only the tip of the find.

"A new US cleansing of Somalian 'tyranny' would open the door for these US oil companies to map and develop the possibly huge oil potential in Somalia. Yemen and Somalia are two flanks of the same geological configuration, which holds large potential petroleum deposits, as well as being the flanks of the oil chokepoint from the Red Sea."

The US, and US-affiliated oil interests, must, at the very least, find ways to head off the aggressive oil and gas-related operations on the part of China and its oil companies throughout the Horn of Africa region, Kenya, and Ethiopia, and West Africa.

The intense uproar over genocide in Darfur, and shrill calls for military intervention, masks intense geostrategic resource conflict being waged between competing superpowers.

As Engdahl notes, "Sudan, as noted, has become a major oil supplier to China whose national oil company has invested more than $3 billion since 1999, building oil pipelines from the south to the Red Sea port. The coincidence of this fact with the escalating concern in Washington about genocide and humanitarian disaster in oil-rich Darfur in southern Sudan, is not lost on Beijing. China threatened a UN veto against any intervention against Sudan. The first act of a re-elected [sic] Dick Cheney late last year was to fill his vice presidential jet with UN Security Council members to fly to Nairobi to discuss the humanitarian crisis in Darfur, an eerie reminder of Defense Secretary Cheney's 'humanitarian' concern over Somalia in 1991."

Recently, exploration teams from Australia have been hunting for oil in Somalia's Puntland. Canadian lawyer Jay Park, "one of the world's top oil and gas lawyers," is working with the Somalian government to create a "credible petroleum regime". According to Park, "(Somalia) is one of the poorest countries in the world, but it may be sitting on some of the greatest oil and gas treasures."
With the world facing Peak Oil and Gas, the world's superpowers are racing to secure every last drop of oil and natural gas from every remaining inch of the planet, with the African continent quickly becoming the stage for new violence and warfare. It is no surprise that Anglo-American oil interests, and the Bush administration's covert operatives, are working Somalia, and the region, for all it is worth.

Bless you, William Arkin.

Redkat,

No one is saying to discount Al Qaeda, but we need to keep the threat they pose in perspective.

For Secretary Rumsfeld to opine we'll be fighting them on the streets here is ludicrous; his words hit us emotionally and are meant to evoke fear.

Disproportionate fear is what has brought us here today, giving the administration carte blanche to invade a country that wasn't an immediate threat, torturing prisoners, spying on Americans.

We heard the same crap during Vietnam and guess what, it turned out to not be true.

As for the power of Al Qaeda in Iraq, it's minimal. The ones pulling the strings, to include the jihadists, are former Baathists.

If you think it's not too late to win this war, read the following at 'The Weekly Standard.' It's a strategy on how to defeat the Sunnis who are the insurgency.
Here's the link http://www.weeklystandard.com/Content/Public/Articles/000/000/012/241kdhyv.asp

The article is entitled 'A Plan for Victory in Iraq. The author is Frederik Kagan.

Jaxas wrote: "I believe in your post today we are finally approaching the profound truth about the war on terror. Bush and his circle of neoconservative advisors have tried to orchestrate what amounts to another protracted Cold War. Alas it seems, they never seem to tire of reminding us that we are in a "war unlike any other" in our history."

Regarding the war on terror, how would Americans recognize "victory" when we got there? What markers might be evident? In the Cold War, once the Soviet Union broke up even a child could tell it was over. Here, I can't picture what victory would look like---all Muslims recanting their faith or something? I simply don't know.

We American citizens should be asking what is it going to take for the Bush Administration, on its own accord, to call off the dogs? I dont believe they have ever articulated that answer.

1 - The administration's most ardent supporters are claiming that 6,000 troops and a partial fence are not enough. POTUS seems to agree. Hence:

Bush Turns to Big Military Contractors for Border Control/May 17, 2006 (Two Billion Dollar+ Initiative)

"The quick fix may involve sending in the National Guard. But to really patch up the broken border, President Bush is preparing to turn to a familiar administration partner: the nation's giant military contractors. ... Lockheed Martin, Raytheon and Northrop Grumman, three of the largest, are among the companies that said they would submit bids within two weeks for a multibillion-dollar federal contract to build what the administration calls a "virtual fence" along the nation's land borders. ... Through its Secure Border Initiative, the Bush administration intends to not simply buy an amalgam of high-tech equipment to help it patrol the borders -- a tactic it has also already tried, at a cost of hundreds of millions of dollars, with extremely limited success. It is also asking the contractors to devise and build a whole new border strategy that ties together the personnel, technology and physical barriers. ... "This is an unusual invitation," the deputy secretary of homeland security, Michael Jackson, told contractors this year at an industry briefing, just before the bidding period for this new contract started. "We're asking you to come back and tell us how to do our business.""

(http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/18/washington/18border.html?_r=2&oref=slogin&pagewanted=print)

Mr. Rumsfeld's statements, as excerpted from Robert's post, now make more sense:

" ... RUMSFELD: There are going to be Border Patrol doing that and there will be many more of them doing it because of the support we'll be providing."

2 - Pete,

I, too, would be interested in knowing/understanding Mr. Arkin's viewpoint regarding why AQ should be perceived as a quasi-minimal threat to the US/west. From statements that he has already made (and providing that my ability to recall same is decent), I surmised that he does recognize AQ as a threat, but one that has been overblown by the administration and the media (fear-mongering) and one that will not cause the US itself to cease to exist. I note that I could be mistaken.

3 - Robert,

" ... if we pull out tomorrow we won't be fighting them on the streets of New York tomorrow, etc."

We can pull all troops out of Iraq today, but the consequences of having provided AQ with a free training field for years will only become apparent with the passage of time. There is some concern that AQ fighters/insurgents are learning new techniques in Iraq and after fighting there, are returning to their home countries or to other countries with the intent to use (and teach) those newly-acquired techniques in future attacks. 'New' techniques (specifically, more deadly IEDs) are already appearing in Afghanistan alongside the new 'spring offensive' sponsored by the Taliban.

Currently, all eyes are on Iraq, Mr. Al-Zarqawi has stated that it is an important arena, and the country is serving as a training ground for AQ fighters. However, it is unlikely that all AQ fighters are in Iraq. Where are the other AQ fighters/members, and while everyone is watching the events in Iraq, what might AQ be developing with regard to plans for attacks? The war in Iraq was an unexpected gift to AQ in too many ways. It may have served/may be serving as a diversion of sorts for the administration, but I suspect that AQ is using it in exactly the same way.

Mr. Atta and company used the US' own resources against the country in planning and executing 9/11; the war in Iraq is providing the same opportunity for AQ, undoubtedly to AQ's glee. I fully expect to see another hit in the US/west and elsewhere - as promised by AQ. I further expect them to 'thank' us in a future statement for our assistance in enabling them to execute that attack, whether by virtue of having trained the attackers in Iraq itself or by virtue of having permitted Iraq to be used as a source of diverted funds and resources. I sincerely hope that I am wrong - on all counts.

Finally, AQ stated that causing Americans to distrust/lose faith in their government and its ability to protect them was an important goal for the group. Without taking any action whatsoever on US soil beyond the 9/11 attack, AQ's goal is being accomplished, thanks to the current administration's handling of the aftermath of 9/11, the initiation of the war in Iraq, and their handling of the Katrina catastrophe. Mr. Rumsfeld can claim whatever he pleases. IMHO, we are not better off after having invaded Iraq - we have undoubtedly helped to motivate, recruit, and train future fighters for AQ and like-minded organizations - worldwide.

http://www.theinternationalforecaster.com/trainwreck.php?Id=124
www.wsws.org

Former NSA staffer Russell Tice will testify to the Senate Armed Services Committee this week that not only do employees at the agency believe the activities they are being asked to perform are unlawful, but that what has been disclosed so far is only the tip of the iceberg. He says former NSA head Gen. Michael Hayden, Bush's nominee to be the next CIA Director, oversaw more illegal activity that has yet to be disclosed. Tice will tell the NSA conducted illegal and unconstitutional surveillance of US citizens while he was there with the knowledge of Hayden. We suspect he'll go into the Echelon program, which is a massive system designed to intercept virtually all electronic communications throughout the world. Phone calls, fax traffic and e-mails are analyzed despite laws in every country banning such activity, including the US. The system was developed in 1947, and was taken over by the NSA in 1953. The operations at Fort Meade worked from Menwith Hill in England. It was used during the Cold War era to keep an eye on the Soviet Union. We also had stations for all kinds of electronic intercepts throughout the world, we know we were there and we were involved in it. We can only remember of two instances in which we were aware of spying on others than the Soviet Union and its satellites - once on our own field units and other times on British and French aircraft.

Echelon was designed primarily for non-military targets: governments, organizations, and business in every country. It can also be considered industrial espionage. The analysis was based on key works like money, stocks, drugs, etc. We did not work on Echelon but we knew all about it. Echelon concentrated on foreign nations up until 1985 and it then started monitoring Americans.

As we all now know, tens of millions of phone calls by US citizens and others in the US have been monitored by the government since 2001. The phone companies now must answer for this invasion of privacy and explain their willingness to violate the Constitutional protections of the Fourth Amendment, in addition to violating provisions of the 1978 law governing spying on US citizens. The bottom line is our government is at war with its citizens and we have our own government as our enemy. The corporate fascist interests that run our country want to establish unilateral control over everyone and everything, and if you expose the truth about what they are doing you are the enemy. We are the victims of state terrorism.

Anyone who refuses to answer publicly whether he supports waterboarding or not does not deserve to be confirmed. Toss aside his resume; if he cannot publicly condemn the use of waterboarding by our military, throw him overboard.

Let's hope that the Bush administration comes to rue the day it nominated Hayden to be CIA director.

Constant ambiguous statements within this administration. What next?

Was 9/11 inside or outside? Why ask? Terror was not a part of everyday American life before 9/11. Now terror has become the platform of random hate.

Americans are now encouraged to treat our neighbors as "suspect". We cannot speak with individuals who are from the Middle East without a realistic fear of having our conversations linked to some terrorist plot. And our leader says: "Axis of Evil."
The Christian Bible quotes, "Ye who is without sin cast the first stone."

Our founding fathers fought and died to create a nation built on diversity. We
are "One nation under G-d, Indivisible, With Liberty and Justice FOR ALL."
Who is it that needs "time-out" until he can learn to treat people with
respect?

the 6,000 Guards men is for show,

there's no substance to this presidency.

phony, photo op...

that's his whole game...

show up after katrina 10 times, but don't worry about accomplishing anything...

"Mission Accomplished"

as 250,000 TONS OF explosives are left unguarded and Saddam escapes in broad daylight with 1 Billion in PAYOLA....

even having O'Reilley talk like there was any credibility is the same thing as giving credibility....

the action is simply

ineffective.

you want to stop the _illegal_ invasion?

arrest the employers, make it a felony, first time offense,

and pedro will go home, or ask for political asylum, that still exists if there's a real need for it....

arrest the bushes that employ _illegals_ and the congress people in Florida/Gainsville, Georgia, New Mexico, Nevada, Colorado, Arizona, and most of all TEXAS....

texas toast your outlaw....government employeesss....

they make the laws, they need to be responsible enough to obey them...or fry 'em up nice and crispy heeey haw

triple sec and _the end_

.

Here's why we won't win in Iraq. You can change all the generals you want but if the overall strategy is flawed you're going to fail.

Rumsfeld likes to do business on the cheap when it comes to manpower. His answers for the 6,000 Guardsmen are most illuminating. Interesting to note Michael Chertoff says a 2 week rotation of Guardsmen would be prohibitely expensive. As to technical advise they will give the Border Patrol I want to know what they will bring to the fight. The Border Patrol needs people to apprehend illegals, not advice on how to catch them.

Here's an excerpt from a Bill O'Reilly interview of Donald Rumsfeld. The people at the top are oblivious to the obvious or they are flat out lying to us, Hussein and Al Qaeda aren't connected, if we pull out tomorrow we won't be fighting them on the streets of New York tomorrow, etc.

RUMSFELD: I'm not being defensive at all.

O'REILLY: I think they want the National Guard down there under the president's control and your control, arm to the teeth and saying, we're not going to have any drug smuggling and illegal aliens coming across. That's it. And if we see you, we'll stop and you call the border patrol and they'll take care of you.

RUMSFELD: There are going to be Border Patrol doing that and there will be many more of them doing it because of the support we'll be providing.

O'REILLY: Why not put 30,000? If you have 445,000 guards, put 30,000 down. Why not there?

RUMSFELD: The Border Patrol has that responsibility.

O'REILLY: Not enough of them.

RUMSFELD: Well, then the task is to go to Congress, get the money and train up more of them and they're now going to double their output of Border Patrol people.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

O'REILLY: In the next segment we will talk about the issue that will make or break the Bush administration in the history books. Iraq. Right back with it.

(COMMERCIAL BREAK)

O'REILLY: Continuing now "The Factor" exclusive. A conversation with Donald Rumsfeld. Of course, Iraq remains the elephant in the room.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

O'REILLY: Let's shift to Iraq. Foreign minister, the new one of Italy, said it was a terrible mistake to go there today. The authorities in Iraq say that about 1,000 a month civilians or bodies are being found because of the militia warfare between the Sunnis and the Shias. And the American polls say most Americans have lost confident that we can win the Iraq conflict.

What can you say to the people to the people watching right now and listening now who feel we're not going to win this? What can you say?

RUMSFELD: Well, I can say that I can understand how some people could feel that way, given what they hear on the television and what they see in the press. And on the other hand, if you put yourself in the position of Zarqawi and the terrorists and the insurgents, they tried to stop the election last year in January, and they failed. They tried to stop the drafting of a constitution and they failed. They tried to stop the referendum on the constitution and they failed. They tried to stop the election December 15 and they failed.

They're now trying to stop the formation of a new government and they're going to fail in the next few days. It's going to be completed and announced.

Now it's always good to put yourself in the other fella's position. They know they can't win that war over there. The only place they can win it is in Washington, DC. It's a test of wills, as most wars are. And my impression is that if people stopped and thought a little bit about the fact that we can't lose a battle over there, the only place we can lose it is at the test of wills here at home, and the circumstance of those people, we see their intelligence and they're saying to each other. They're not happy. The major portion of their senior leadership has been captured or killed. They are having troubles. Now are they on the ropes? No. Are they still killing a lot of innocent men, women and children? Yes. Does it take a genius to do that? No. Anyone can kill innocent people who are just standing around with a suicide bomb.

O'REILLY: How can the U.S. and Britain stop the Shia from killing the Sunni and vice versa? In that civil war there, how can we stop it?

RUMSFELD: First of all there isn't a civil war by anyone that I talk to's assessment. There's sectarian violence, you're right. Now, how do you stop that? You don't stop it militarily. The only way this is going to stop is if the government engages in a unity government that represents all the people in that country, which they're very close to having, and they then engage in a reconciliation process where they reach out to the elements that are still dissidents and have a process where people can legitimately reengage and they intend to do it, the prime minister designate has announced he was going to do it. The Sunnis and the Shias and the Kurds agreed to it.

And now, what else did they do? They said that one of the problems, the militias are a problem.

O'REILLY: Sadr's militia. This is a vicious guy.

RUMSFELD: The first thing that he did, the new prime minister designate, Prime Minister Maliki, he went down and saw Sistani, the senior cleric in the country, and said I'm worried about these militias and Sistani said he's worried about them. And they both announced that one of the new tasks of the new government would be to deal with the militias. And they're making progress.

O'REILLY: I hope so.

RUMSFELD: And there've always been people who have looked at the problems and they're real problems, don't get me wrong. I'm not saying it's a pretty picture. It isn't a pretty picture. It's a tough business, and our guys over there are doing an absolutely superb job and they're proud of what they're doing and they know that they're making progress and they know they can't lose over there.

O'REILLY: No, they can't lose militarily, but it's cost the United States taxpayer about $400 billion up this point.

RUMSFELD: Think of what 9/11 cost us. Wouldn't you rather fight those people over there instead of fighting them here?

O'REILLY: Yes.

RUMSFELD: Think of what happened to our economy, think what happened to the stock market.

O'REILLY: Absolutely.

RUMSFELD: Think of what happened to the airlines here after 9/11.

O'REILLY: If the stability of Iraq, if it happens, means that Al Qaeda is weakened, I think it's worth it.

RUMSFELD: Well, there's no question of that.

O'REILLY: But there is a question. You're challenged all the time on that.

RUMSFELD: By people who don't know what they're talking about. The reality is that anyone that you talk to will tell you that -- Zarqawi says that the central front on the war on terror is in Iraq.

O'REILLY: All right.

RUMSFELD: It isn't debatable.

O'REILLY: Come on you know if there's a Democratic president elected in 2008, he's going to very likely change your policies or President Bush's policies. But, look, I support the Iraq war because I believe that if we pulled out of there.

RUMSFELD: Oh.

O'REILLY: Iran would move in and then Iran would be the dominant player in the gulf, allying with Syria and it's just going to be a nightmare.

RUMSFELD: That's right. The moderate regimes in that part of the world would be gone.

O'REILLY: Right.

RUMSFELD: If people are worried about Iran and they ought to be given the statements that we are hearing from the leadership there, the best thing in the world that could happen to Iran would be for us to fail in Iraq.

O'REILLY: Then they would move in.

Considering the track record of this administration, isn't it entirely possible he's just paying us lip service to make us like him? We already know that this administration will do anything, legal or not, to get what they want. Is it really that much of a stretch to say that he's lying about what he thinks of the bush administration?

Another thought on the failures of the FBI and CIA to prevent tragedy.

Notice how no one flatly states the obvious at any of these hearings or press conferences which is individual agents and analysts didn't fail, it was the upper echelons of their organizations that failed.

Field agents in the FBI knew they had terrorists up to no good, but they were denied by their superiors up the chain to get warrants.

Analysts in the CIA knew the mobile bio labs were mobile weather balloon machines. They also knew their most trusted source inside Hussein's inner circle was telling the truth, Iraq had destroyed its WMDs after the 91 war. Their facts were either suppressed or turned into footnotes in the data forwarded to the American people.

I want the Democrats to win huge in November and I want the first order of business to be impeachment or criminal trials for the architects of the Iraq invasion.

Something tells me that the more we peel the Hayden onion the sooner we'll see that he was another one who distorted the truth.

We still don't know why. Was it to get a fourth star, to make up for NSA's huge misstep when they didn't interpret the intercept tipping off the 9-11 attack until after the fact, because he believed in the Neocon vision of regime change to foster democracy in the Arab world ultimately enhancing Israel's and the U.S.'s security, to help big oil get access to Iraqi oil, or to avenge the attempted assassination of GW 1?

What would really restore my faith in government is if both sides of the aisle acted as one, demanded oversight, rejected the Hayden nomination, and rejected the supplemental bills used to finance the Iraqi war until the president satisfactorily explains why we went to war and how he aims to win it.

The solutin I like best is one by actor James Ganolfini. Bring back the draft. Send 500,000 soldiers to Iraq and get the job done.

Since I'm against torture and rendition I'm against General Hayden's nomination. His thoughts on torture,

''The general tapped by President Bush to head the CIA told a Senate committee today he'll only answer questions about the interrogation of terror suspects behind closed doors.
Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., wanted to know whether it's acceptable to strap prisoners to a plank and dunk them in water until they nearly drown. Gen. Michael Hayden wouldn't answer it publicly.

If a man won't publicly condemn torture it means he's in favor of it.

General Hayden won't get my vote until he publicly states he will not support the torturing of prisoners or their rendition to countries who will torture them for us.

I don't have a problem with trying those held at Guantanamo and if guilty hanging them, but I do have a problem with torturing them to extract confessions and then convicting, imprisoning, or even executing them on the basis of information extracted under duress.

If we can't connect the individuals at Guantanamo to terrorist activity via physical evidence there is a real possibility more than a few of the detainees aren't jihadists but common folk living their own Gulag archipelago; the location however isn't Siberia but 98 miles off shore.

redcat

I agree with your attitude to AQ and said much the same this on this string in less developed form on May 19, 2006 10:20 AM when saying to Arkin.

"Do you purport to have greater knowledge of current threats than the FBI and other bodies? Perhaps the passage of time since 9/11 has made you a bit complacent."

If you'd like to touch base and have a website would you be willing to publish it here or send it as a comment on my site and I'll find it?

Regards

Pete
http://spyingbadthings.blogspot.com

The CIA has been politicized since its beginning. They exaggerated the number of Soviet bombers, loved the soothing words of Cuban exiles who said that Cubans would welcome those coming ashore at the Bay of Pigs instead of fighting, and slanted the news from Vietnam. They didn't necessarily love Chalabi who fed the same kind of lies to the naive NYT & WaPo. They exaggerate the size and power of Al Qaeda, who are killers no doubt.

Hayden was the McNamara whiz kid who gobbled up the budget for the Star Wars project. That money could have been used to nail bin Laden. Look at the map- to which country would a jihadi flee if things got too hot In Afghanistan? Not Iran, not Turkmenistan or other 'stans to the north. Pakistan is the obvious answer. Do you think that the same wizards who disbanded the Iraqi army were too dumb to block the exit to Pakistan? Or were there other reasons? In any case, shifting money to NSA rather than putting boots on the ground exemplified a certain attitude closely associated with Donald Rumsfeld.
Now, how can Congress oversee agencies about which they have only partial knowledge with a President who keeps nullifying parts of many (>700 so far) laws? They can't. Congressional oversight is a charade and will continue to be as long as signing statements are allowed. Bush nullified the torture prohibition- it applies to the federal government only so long as he deems it safe. As soon as he declares an emergency, it doesn't apply.
And you think that we should smile at Hayden's sports analogies?

" ... IF he is interested in reporting he should watch FOX NEWS. Everyone else is."

Good to know the 32%ers still have a place to go to convince themselves that invading Iraq was a good idea. But, some of us deduced, over time, that FOX News consistently carries the WH's line about every policy issue and is highly capable of distorting the truth.

The administration has recently lost the American people's respect and trust - and if FOX News hasn't already suffered the same fate - I suspect that they will. Unless ... they pull a 360 and begin promoting the next likely candidate for the Presidency, regardless of said candidate's party affiliation, in order to retain their position in the ratings. My guess is that they will do just that - without providing any explanation whatsoever - to their viewers.

Mr. Hayden's public comments are indeed interesting. But, then again, they are comments delivered in a public arena by a prospective appointee. No one knows whether he can be trusted to 'do the right thing.' Only time/performance will tell.

Dr. Leeds,

The threat to the US from AQ and other groups is quite real, IMHO, and yet has indeed been 'used' by the administration for its own purposes. I would suggest that you may benefit from reading every statement ever produced by Mr. Bin Laden, Dr. Al-Zawahri, and other AQ notables before you conclude that AQ does not pose a serious threat to this nation (some articles/statements are not able to be accessed by laypersons.) If you have not taken the time to read the statements that are available via open sources, at a minimum, you are essentially uneducated about the threat. In addition, please note that AQ has produced materials outlining their plans for this conflict up to the year 2020.

The articles to follow indicate that the threat posed by AQ and other organizations has been highly politicized, to the detriment of the nation. While intel/LE agencies struggle to order and reorder themselves into functioning entities and define methods by which to communicate with each other with regard to on-going turf wars, the number of individuals apparently willing to fight for AQ's cause is increasing. Estimates differ, but there may be upwards of 20,000-60,000+ individuals, worldwide, who are dedicated to AQ's cause, and recruitment efforts continue.

The administration can claim and has claimed false 'victories' in the WOT/LW. It can hide/manipulate statistics on actual incidents, claim that invading Iraq is 'helping to win' the war on terrorism, and continue to play the American people for fools. But, from what I have read, two words best describe why AQ will present a clear and consistent threat to the US and other countries for the foreseeable future: patience and underestimation. They are an extremely patient group of individuals whose capabilities are still being underestimated in certain circles. Another hit on USA soil (and elsewhere) is required for AQ to maintain their credibility. I'd rather know about that prospect, in advance, versus believe that all is well/better in some way because the US invaded Iraq.

The US isn't winning anything, IMHO, with regard to the WOT/LW and I'd stand by that statement even if another attack did not take place on US soil. The US' overall response to 9/11 has served only to strengthen AQ and like-minded organizations - let's give credit where credit is due.

1) US Figures Show Sharp Global Rise in Terrorism (April 27, 2005)

"The number of serious international terrorist incidents more than tripled last year, according to U.S. government figures..."/ " ... The State Department announced last week that it was breaking with tradition in withholding the statistics on terrorist attacks from its congressionally mandated annual report. Critics said the move was designed to shield the government from questions about the success of its effort to combat terrorism by eliminating what amounted to the only year-to-year benchmark of progress."

(http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-
dyn/content/article/2005/04/26/AR2005042601623.html)

2) Terror Statistics Flawed (April 12, 2006)

"It has become a truism that any attempt to define or quantify terrorism is informed by political trends, and thus subject to fluctuations based not on hard facts but on political fashion. Yet the State Department's now defunct annual publication, Patterns of Global Terrorism, was the closest approximation of any government effort to provide information in an objective and consistent manner. As a successor to Patterns, the report produced by the U.S. National Counterterrorism Center (NCTC) -- called A Chronology of Significant International Terrorism for 2004 -- effectively ends over 20 years of analytical consistency in the U.S. government's terrorism accounting practices."

(http://www.cdi.org/friendlyversion
/printversion.cfm?documentID=3391)

by former "Bay of Pigs" operatives,

linked to the CIA and George H.W. Bush, Negroponte was his key man in Honduras/he's a bushie...the cabal is fifty years old...

you can smell old moldy money all over this administration/westindies sugar...cuba..unca walker

cuba/mafia/cia/florida/cia/texas/bush/lbj/kennedy/watergate/rumsfeld/cheyney/Nixon/bush/cia/congress

by former "Bay of Pigs" operatives,

linked to the CIA and George H.W. Bush, Negroponte was his key man in Honduras/he's a bushie...the cabal is fifty years old...

you can smell old moldy money all over this administration/westindies sugar...cuba..unca walker

cuba/mafia/cia/florida/cia/texas/bush/lbj/kennedy/watergate/rumsfeld/cheyney/Nixon/bush/cia/congress

mako wrote:
"[...]and no matter whose side you are on, you've got to understand that intelligence and politics indeed do not mix, and it's an oxymoron anyways."

My guess is mako that you are under 40 years old, otherwise you might have remembered a little piece of history called Watergate where the intelligence apparatus of the US was used for political purposes to attack and spy on political opponents of the president. The problem is the two HAVE mixed in unlawful and unconstitutional ways and news laws were put in place to ensure it never happened again. One of those laws was FISA which this president has ignored. Its still to be determined whether NSA databases are another violation of FISA or the constitution. Those of us who lived through Watergate see the potential for abuse using these new tools Hayden created and Bush says are legal even though he gives no basis for their legality, just talk.

So mako, you may not understand the political ranting about intelligence, but for those of us who were adults in the mid-70s, using intelligence services against Americans is a very real possibility, one we do not want to see happen again. The frustration as I see it is we thought we put that part of history behind us and made the constitution stronger and better protected with FISA and other laws. And now Bush simply says its all legal and congress seems to care less. And Hayden seems to not only be proud of his NSA creations, this man who may have gladly built an unconstitutional system at NSA is about to head CIA. If Hayden again works with Bush there to flout the constitution and the laws of our nation both NSA and CIA could be harmed.

I'm pretty sad that most Washington Post readers don't really look at the balanced side of the confirmation of Mr. Hayden as something that could help the Intelligence Community reacquire the sources from political misinformation on both sides of the aisle. But all I read were partisan rants over some items about 90% of the commentary fails to address in a standard, more intelligent manner. Perhaps I'm too wrapped up in this, but people who comment should comment with an understanding of the issue rather than parrot their favorite pundits and take a hard, long look at the issues at hand, that the political movement has soured the practice of intelligence, and no matter whose side you are on, you've got to understand that intelligence and politics indeed do not mix, and it's an oxymoron anyways. mako out.

Hayden...........Now I know what ass smells like.

OK, Ok,....look, it's about time for people to stand up and see what is happening here. The threats to humanity are constant and unrelenting. And when I say humanity, of course I mean the American Way of Life. No punches should be spared in fullfilling our pre-ordained right to be the beacon of hope and freedom (limited as it needs to be) for the rest of the world. Can't you softies see that America is the only true path for the good people of this planet. It's the bad people (you know, those who want to decide for themselves, whom to marry, or whether to abort fetuses or not) who don't want to come here and be like us. That's why they stay in their God-forsaken places like Europe or Asia. The pride I feel everyday, knowing that only the self-righteous American far right can make the world a better place to live, well, is often overwhelming. I rue the day when people will have any rights to decide anything for themselves. People need to be told what to do and how to live. Can't you pansies see this? We need to just nuke the rest of the world, 'cause the rest of the world is getting in our way! I thank God (my God, the only true God) each and every day for the likes of Cheney, and the other guy.....what's his name. These guys are the true face of humanity!

Highly interesting article -- I wish I had time to watch to all the Hayden hearings.

But I wish to make two points:

Point 1. the phenomenon of Feith's shadow CIA is not a new one. In 1976 a group of kooks calling themselves Team B managed to get Gerry Ford to OK their project of digging thru the CIA wastebasket (N.B.: Poppy Bush was DCI at the time), with the purpose of re-analyzing data rejected by the A team, in order to reinforce the idea that the Soviet Union was a far bigger threat than imagined, and was fed by a robust and growing economic base. My source for this story is an article published by The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, called "Team B: The trillion-dollar experiment"
[ http://www.thebulletin.org/article.php?art_ofn=apr93cahn ].

It is superfluous for me to retell what Ms. Cahn has put so well, so just let me mention that when Ronald Reagan entered the White House, the US was the premier creditor nation in the world. When he left, the #1 debtor, as we have remained. Thanks a lot! As Jesse Jackson once asked "Where did the money go?" You guessed it. Here're Cahn's two closing paragraphs:

"For more than a third of a century, perceptions about U.S. national security were colored by the view that the Soviet Union was on the road to military superiority over the United States. Neither Team B nor the multibillion dollar intelligence agencies could see that the Soviet Union was dissolving from within.

"For more than a third of a century, assertions of Soviet superiority created calls for the United States to "rearm." In the 1980s, the call was heeded so thoroughly that the United States embarked on a trillion-dollar defense buildup. As a result, the country neglected its schools, cities, roads and bridges, and health care system. From the world's greatest creditor nation, the United States became the world's greatest debtor--in order to pay for arms to counter the threat of a nation that was collapsing."

Point 2:

Mr. Arkin says:

"The Bush insiders have lapped up every piece of intelligence affirming a conclusion that terrorists threaten the American way of life, that they are only a hair away from obtaining WMD."

This neglects the fact that the administration is complicit in 9-11 to a moderate to massive degree.

viewpoint,

we have a NEED FOR OVERSIGHT...

and conclusions that have teeth, up to and including arresting this administration and placing them

in containment centers for a couple of years while we think about things....

use the patriot act for what it was designed for.

protecting you from traitorous, treaonsonous, terrorists

pull the switch, and send him to TEXAS to have him toasted Texas style....

roast 'em roast 'em roast 'em

no clemency for comity, toast a ROYAL, burn 'em....

yeah yea yea.................hooo rah!!!!!

.

they were putting bush administration supplied news briefs on the air unedited during the

Kerry candidacy....

not that I don't think that Kerry cut a deal with Rove to have his cousin helped out....but that's another story,

thing of it is,

the media buried any chance of another candidate getting any front page time in 2004........

that is a friggin fact, the press/media have been complicit in pushing this administrations slant

on things, other wise known as agenda to invalidate the true citizens of the United States and pool all of the resources of the Americas...

in a few hands,

who then create a government of the rich for the rich....

finally...

arrest them for treason, and send them home...

.

if you arrested the president, his Joint Cheif of Staff, cronies, vicepresident and a couple of members of congress

charged them with treason, sold their properties....

over friggin night...

make congress people pass the same entrance level employment evaluation that anyone applying for secret level clearance had to...

why should anyone that passes laws,

be allowed to flout them?

what does that say about our justice and slant towards the haves away from the haves not....

we're talking full fledged royal attitudes in power....the saudi royals the bushes(stuarts of england), Tony Blair...

get some education.

.

These past two administrations have utterly ruined this country. They have done nothing but lie,cheat and steal from the American people and the people of the world. Thanks to them and congress doing nothing, the middle class are nearly extinct because of the horrible policies that have been put in place. i just pray that once these fools are out,, that maybe we can get back to some level of descency and respectability.

"IF he is interested in reporting he should watch FOX NEWS. Everyone else is."

Oh yea, did they ever find that girl in Aruba? You know, the one that Fox reported on 24/7 with "Breaking News" headlines every 15 minutes while Iraq was sinking in the quagmire, unreported?

And I don't understand why you miss Reagan when Bush is running much higher deficits and debt than Reagan ever tried to do. Bush is exceeding anything Reagan ever achieved, including Star Wars spending with his Halliburtin spending and spending on NSA's database for spying. And now Bush's NSA spying architect is planning to run the CIA. But domestic spying by CIA could never occur, right? Trust Bush, its all you can do under the new presidential authority congress has implicitly allowed him to have.

Every country has different standards of behavior, and I, of course, do not believe America is going to change any culture that has developed over centuries. There are no quick fixes there. However the Constitution and the various civil rights admendments that have followed over the centuries represent our political values. It is not because we are a world power that we have been respected. Power without values are not respected because they are based on fear. Over time, fear produces anger and resistance. Therefore the use of force as a based on power alone may produce tactical victories, but relying on values, back by force can give you strategic victories. Force is always a last resort, but certainly one must always be ready to use it.
While Hayden maybe the best we can get out of the Bush Administration, I do not think it is an arguement for his leading the CIA.
We have seen how the Bush Administration has created a mess in Iraq and Afghanistan, in part, because it has no values. It has used naked power to create fear along with anger, and not respect. No, I don't want Hayden, values along with power is the only road to victory. He can't give us a strategic victory

Please bookmark the following sites:

www.wsws.org
www.onlinejournal.com
www.takingaim.info
otherside123.blogspot.com

Senate hearing on CIA nominee: Democrats rubberstamp Bush police-state spying

By Patrick Martin
19 May 2006

Use this version to print | Send this link by email | Email the author

The Senate hearing Thursday on the nomination of General Michael Hayden to head the Central Intelligence Agency demonstrates the bipartisan congressional support for the Bush administration's assault on the democratic rights of the American people.

While there were scattered criticisms of the methods of the Bush administration, particularly its failure to consult with Congress, every senator on the Intelligence Committee accepted the premise that the United States is engaged in a "war on terror" and that the Bush administration's escalation of domestic surveillance and wiretapping is a product of that war.

There was no challenge to the Orwellian label, "terrorist surveillance program," which the Bush administration has chosen to apply to a program which actually involves the surveillance of the telephone calls and Internet messaging of nearly the entire American population--an estimated 225 million people. It would be far more accurate to describe the electronic monitoring and data-mining by the National Security Agency (NSA) as the "universal surveillance program"--or as the Pentagon once labeled its own version of the program, "Total Information Awareness."

Not one senator, on the Intelligence Committee or off it, will acknowledge the basic truth that the Bush administration is a far greater threat to the democratic rights of the American people than all the terrorists in the world. Osama bin Laden and Al Qaeda may be capable of terrible crimes, but they cannot impose a totalitarian dictatorship in the United States. That threat comes solely from the American ruling elite and its military-intelligence apparatus.

General Michael Hayden is a sworn enemy of the democratic rights of the American people. In his six years as head of the NSA, from 1999 to 2005, he was responsible for both the program of interception and eavesdropping on international phone calls, revealed by the New York Times in December, and the creation of an enormous database of the telephone calling records of 225 million Americans, made public by USA Today May 11.

While some press reports in the past week have suggested that the domestic telephone monitoring was less sweeping than reported by USA Today, perhaps limited to long distance phone calls, about 20 percent of the total, the New York Times quoted an unnamed "senior government official, granted anonymity to speak for publication about the classified program" confirming that "the security agency had access to records of most telephone calls in the United States."

A lawsuit brought by the Electronic Freedom Foundation (EFF), a group opposed to Internet censorship and spying, has produced evidence of widespread interception of traffic on the web by the same telecommunications companies that turned over phone records to the NSA. EFF legal director Cindy Cohn told Bloomberg News Wednesday that AT&T had carried out "real-time diversion of customer Internet data" as part of its collaboration with the NSA.

In his appearance before the Senate committee, Hayden adamantly defended both the legality and the necessity of telecommunications spying, while refusing to discuss any aspect of the program except in a closed session, where members of the Senate panel were sworn to secrecy. This was combined with a denunciation of leaks to the press which exposed both the illegal domestic surveillance and the CIA's network of secret prisons overseas, where selected prisoners are interrogated and tortured outside of any legal process. CIA officers "deserve not to have every action analyzed, second-guessed, and criticized on the front pages of the newspapers," he said.

Intelligence Committee Chairman Pat Roberts, a Kansas Republican, sounded the same note in his opening remarks, when he rejected

FOR THE REST GO TO:

http://www.wsws.org/articles/2006/may2006/hayd-m19.shtml

BREAKING NEWS

http://www.waynemadsenreport.com/

May 19, 2006 -- Tony Snow's "tar baby" comment was not his most egregious utterance. Tony Snow defended his use of the term "tar baby" in his Tuesday press conference, his first after succeeding Scott McClellan. Snow correctly states that the term is used as a reference to Uncle Remus hugging a tar baby, which means he was in a sticky situation. The term has also been used in a racist context.

However, when Snow began to cry while talking about his bout with cancer, he apologized for his "Ed Muskie moment." While Snow can, perhaps, be given a pass for the tar baby comment, his reference to a situation involving Ed Muskie's presidential primary campaign in New Hampshire in 1972 was nothing less than appalling. Muskie, who was the clear frontrunner in the New Hampshire primary, was responding to a couple of nasty articles in the conservative Manchester Union Leader. The paper had published a story suggesting that Muskie's wife Jane used an ethnic slur to describe Americans of French-Canadian descent. Muskie, standing on the steps of the Union Leader and denouncing the false reporting of the paper, broke down in tears. The media picked up on the event and, in suggesting that Muskie demonstrated weakness, helped erode Muskie's support. He barely eked out a victory in New Hampshire over Sen. George McGovern and went on to lose the national primary race. It turned out that the Union Leader's story about Jane Muskie was based on a forged letter prepared by Richard Nixon's campaign. The perpetrator of the forgery was one Donald Segretti, later jailed in the Watergate scandal for, among other things, planting forged documents and criminal conspiracy. During the 1972 campaign, Segretti became aware of a young Republican political activist in Texas who showed much promise in the dirty tricks department. His name -- Karl Rove.

Now Rove faces his "Segretti moment" in the CIA Leakgate affair. Washington, DC has been abuzz with rumors and story planting for years in this case. Rove learned well from his mentor Segretti. This morning, DC anxiously awaits a press advisory from the Office of Special Counsel (OSC) regarding a major development in the Rove case. If past is prologue, a press advisory will be issued mid morning about an afternoon press conference. We are standing by.

Note on U.S. Attorney John Briggs vs. US Attorney Patrick J. Fitzgerald. Archibald Cox, the Watergate Independent Counsel, was appointed in May 1973. Briggs indicted Segretti the same month after a Justice Department investigation that took about a half a year. Rove has been under investigation by Fitzgerald since the Special Counsel's appointment on Dec. 30, 2003, a period of two and a half years. Briggs coordinated his investigation with Independent Counsel Cox and Attorney General Elliott Richardson while Fitzgerald, as a Special Counsel, is only protected from pressure from the White House by an administrative firewall. This clearly demonstrates the problems that can be encountered in not having an Independent Counsel Statute to avoid the political pressure that can be applied to a less independent Special Counsel.

David:

Thank You, thank you, thank you. It seemed completely wierd to me that a former MI troop would advocate for an opening up of the intelligence system. Arkin should know better. You comments regarding what the public is good at were right on the money.

I think the best way to sum it up is this: A person is smart, people are stupid. The public doesn't react to the pseudo-knowledge and factoids parroted by the MSM or the bloggers with reason and logical thought so why would they rationally consider the things they are told about the intelligence agencies? The reaction would be the same as it has been to the USA Today story about the NSA. Instead of thinking logically about how a database of phone logs would or could be used the general public simply jerks its collective knee and makes assumptions about things they know nothing about. Both MSM and bloggers, who are equally clueless, feed this idiocy with more yellow journalism and mindless parroting regardless of nuance or context. How very sad.

Trust always in reason.

Archimedes

I understand this Gen. Michael V. Hayden, at current has a clean track record, very well may become an excellent CIA director out doing those before him. Gen. Michael V. Hayden's commander and chiefs, (George W. Bush), actions should have no reflection upon past assigned posts of leadership. We should all turn the page, focus on tightening up boarders, accelerate alternative fuel productions, terminate the terrorist threat, high tech strengthening national and international security and place more focus on American Education, Families, and health Care.

Wow
I thought WAPO was mainstream. Only the looney left hangs out here.
The current Administration are traitors, fools, nazis,...... maybe even the great satan.
I didn't realize there were so many belligerant patriots on the left. I'm sure we'll all be more safe with the next Democratic administration.

My,my. Everyone has an opinion about this aspect or that tidbit. Whether or not you like Bush is immaterial in this situation. Either this man, AS A WHOLE, is acceptable is what's at issue. I guess I can conclude that some of us decide not to go to a particular grocery store, once we find spoiled fruit... Quite a varied array of chest thumping.

Some of you are amazingly naive about the "civil war" in Iraq. Call it what you will, but please (and this goes for the Post editors and columnists as well); Form your opinion on the WHOLE truth. I guess genocide wasn't committed on a grand enough scale for a few of you... and I guess the Crips and the Bloods in L.A. are freedom fighters as well...

Just one more question (and I mean this in the best possible way) What color is the sky in your world?!?!

Political obsession is hiding a more important long term issue: it is imperative and not "anti-military" to insist that confirmation of Hayden be contingent upon his not being an active duty general. Yet no Senator seems to have the guts to make this insistence for fear of seeming unpatriotic (as was the case in compliance with the invasion of Iraq). Stand up!
There's nothing wrong with someone with a career of military experience in intelligence running the CIA, but it is a horrible precedent to allow it to be treated as an acceptable norm that a serving military general can be the head of a civilian agency. There is a balance of civilian power for which the military fights (usually in history against military fascist regimes), and it would be patriotic to INSIST that Hayden not be an acive duty general when running the CIA. Hayden's going to be confirmed on merits -- a Senator needs to insist that he not be confirmed unless he remove his uniform, ON PATRIOTIC PRINCIPLE! Why can't Hayden do the right thing in defense of real American military values, and change his status to "inactive reserve" or such?

"...if he can open up the intelligence agencies just a little to the public, if he can avoid the corrosive effect of responding to every immediate fear and rumor..."

Stupid.

The public does a great job of respondiing to fear and rumor. The press does an even better job stoking fears and rumors. Our clandestine operations should remain clandestine. Not subject to public/international scrutiny.

Wow, the cooks on the left are really coming out here. I hope Bill Arkin was writing an editorial, because that isn't reporting. IF he is interested in reporting he should watch FOX NEWS. Everyone else is. CNN who?

Yeah Bush isn't my kind of conservative but he is better than Billary.

I miss Reagan

The nomination of Hayden is the first time (since Clinton left) that I have felt like someone in Washington wasn't trying to play smoke and mirrors.
It will fascinating to see what his contribution to this fiasco in the middle east will be. I hope it's better than what we see now!
I too say, Go Mike, Go!!!

Everyone loses sight rapidly of why we do things the way we do.

The millitary is an instrument of policy directed by the commander-in-chief. They can offer advice, can refuse illegal orders, and can resign. Beyond that, they do what they are told or the system itself fails.
The CIA is a civilian agency specifically because they are providing intelligence to help determine policy. That isn't possible if they are politicized or 'commanded'. The promotion based on political affiliation and punishment of integrity that goes against politically-motivated spin is what is driving the CIA into the ground and the principle reason for failures of transition in early 2001, when political allies were sought over seasoned professionals for key positions.
Hayden will happily take shots at the administration if it smoothes over his confirmation because he is a soldier following his commander-in-chief. It is regrettable so many put party before country who 'serve' our country these days. But he is a soldier and is accustomed to following orders to a fault. The head of the CIA needs to be someone accustomed to reporting fact above all else. Hayden is right about politicisation being the problem, but is also an instrument of that politicisation himself. He was chosen because he believes in the party before the nation, and the President before the Constitution, and he has demonstrated that in his prior roles.

I agree with the many comments that suggest that Arkin seems to have read a lot into Hayden's testimony that Hayden did not actually say.

The fact is that candidates testifying before Congress will spin their description of their actions in the most positive way. The fact is also that Hayden stood by and allowed the government to violate the Fourth Amendment. The fact is also that the military has too much influence in directing intelligence towards current targets in the "War on Terror"; the CIA is the only possible counterweight, and a sitting four-star general is not going to stand apart from military groupthink, no matter what he says to Congress.

I am amused at the conservative revisionists who are trying to blame the Clinton administration for Al-Qaeda. The truth is that Clinton took Al-Qaeda very seriously; it was only in early 2001 that the administration's focus moved away from Al-Qaeda to planning for war against Iraq.

We need a CIA leader who isn't in the chain of command of de facto commander-in-chief Cheney.

bush is a fascist....then newest franco...he looked like a complete and utter ass riding in that dune buggy....idiotic embarrassment from the head fool again....he should have had cheney taking pot shots as he drove by

"The nation is confused and highly polarized over these matters and over the real threat of terrorism and what to do about it because the Bush administration itself has been lost since 9/11."

The nation is confused because the press is inconsistant at best. Rumors are broadcast all over the world with lightning speed and the truth is religated to a one inch correction on page eight. Case in point; a RECORD of my phone conversation is not, in any way, the same as a RECORDING of my phone conversation.

As far as Bush being lost since 9/11, I thank God every day that Al Gore wasn't sitting in the big chair in 2001. Remember, Bush was only in charge of national security for eight months when 9/11 happened. Clinton had eight YEARS to stick his head in the sand and ignore the real world.

well its about time...kudos for at least admitting that everyone in the world sees the reality except bush.....please please please get that man out of the white house...but get cheney out first! thats all we need....

" It overreacted to 9/11 itself, imagining that al Qaeda was more of a threat to AMERICA than it really is."

you know better.

it was an excuse.

there was no overreaction...

knock off the lying.

okee dokee?

PNAC does exist, and actions of yours and bushes don't match the words...

this was a foisted operation,

there is no war, you want credibility?

then how about earning it?

mix and match? why bother? this is your country too

you have to own what you create....

this government, this congress, these actions are

VIOLENTLY UNAMERICAN....

nothing about liberty, honesty, citizenship,

even the _illegal_ immigration spin...

sink the effing ship of nazism....

Appearently Mr. Arkin you weren't around yesterday when senator Ron Wyden was questioning the general. I don't think (refreshing) is the correct characterization of general Hyden's lack of response to the straight forward questions which senator Wyden posed. Maybe this is the best we have...too bad.

Lavvy wrote:
The fact is Al Queda cannot compete with some of the other threats to the lives of Americans."

Comparing deaths from a foreign attack on our country to accidental deaths is a strange comparison. It also should not be an either/or discussion. Do you put all your monitary resources into educating your smartest kid because that kid will do best in life and give nothing to your other kids? If Al Qaida killed just one American, a response was needed. An attack by a foreign power, even though it is not a nation, is different than deaths by crime or accidents. Stop mixing apples and oranges.

A heavily armed Iran is about the best thing decent people can hope for. Sure, it scares the bejesus out of us. Fear can be a good thing. It might make us think twice before pushing everyone around and might send a message to Israel to contain its' decrepit Holy War.
The "bad old days" of the USSR / USA cold war seem pretty good now after five years near fascism.

Arkin's view regarding a "balanced asessment" of terrorism seems to reflect a 'Vermont Valley' view of things, usually espoused by those sequestered in small northern valley communities removed from the responsibility of running a country. This "balanced assessment" that Islamist radicals are placatable and even that they can ultimately be swayed from their views shows a poor understanding of religious radicals in general and especially Islamist ones. It also seems to discount their proven ability to carry out large-scale, deadly attacks by taking advantage of the free countries whose citizens they kill. Their numbers may very well be overblown, although that depends on how you define Islamist radical. The threat they pose to this country is certainly overstated, but no more so than that posed by global warming.

This "balanced assessment" also demonstrates a poor understanding of the goals in both Iraq and Afghanistan, which were not as simple as they have been stated. Arkin is absolutely correct when he says that both conflicts are serving as rallying points for Bin Laden and his cause. This is precisely what was inteded however and it is entirely necessary if Islamist radicalism is to be defeated, not simply placated. The wrong-headed notion that Al Qaeda members and sympathizers can be placated at all is based on some rather faulty premises. The first of these lies in the typical Western assumption that terrorism is a tactic of the weak used to achieve a particular political goal. In the case of Al Qaeda this is completely false, as Ahmadinejad's letter to Bush should have demonstrated. What drives Al Qaeda is not secular political aims but religious revolution, or more accurately, religious devolution. Their stated aim, is to return the broader ME as well as the Ummah in general to the way it was at the time of the Prophet Muhammad. While a change in the political atmosphere in the ME is incorporated in this goal it is not at all its lynchpin. The second false premise of the placation argument is that it stands a chance of working, which flies directly in the face of historical evidence to the counter. Bin Laden is not the first genocidal maniac we as a society have encountered. Attempts to placate and reason with the last one failed miserably and did nothing to stave off war. Other attempts to talk with and possibly placate other megalomaniacs have also failed, for the same reasons: leaders with messianic dreams and grandiose plans for global revolutions have thrown reason out the window and are thus beyond its saving graces. For them there is only total and complete victory on their terms, there is no thought or quarter given to compromise.

Trust always in reason.

Archimedes

Al Queda *is* a threat to the US and the world. In addition, each year approximately 42,000 people are killed in this country due to traffic accidents. Many more than that are injured. Tell the families of those victims that our highways are not a threat. The fact is Al Queda cannot compete with some of the other threats to the lives of Americans.

Where are the massive government resources to make us safe on our roads?

Al Queda has been used by this administration for both an excuse to start a war of choice, depleting us of troops and treasure, and also to great political advantage by declaring anyone not on board with all their policies to be unpatriotic and soft on terrorism. Equating someone who is "soft on terrorism" with "They want you to die!"

Hey John Marshfield,

It's the Central Intelligence Agency, not the Civilian Intelligence Agency. Maybe before you throw darts you should know what you're talking about...

Jeremy writes: "America, for all our sakes, you must get off your couches and off your knees and out from behind those terminals and put a stop to this now before we slide into a unipolar world led by a military intelligence backed theocratic super-sized state with no limits on executive power, no need for checks and balances and a clearly stated ambition (intention and form) to dominate by what ever means available."

I think you are correct, but getting Americans to shake off their apathy and to see without ideological blinders is easier said than done. Those that ring the alarm are summarily dissmissed as conspiracy nuts. Endless war against a purposely ill-defined and ever-changing enemy to further our supposedly god-given right to rule the world is here, folks. Wake-up and smell the coffee - it is called neoconservative foriegn policy. The neocons may be in slight remission because of their obvious failures, but don't sell them short - empire is very appealling to the right and to the right we are lurching.

As noted in your own paper today, by Howard Kurtz in his blog, the Chicago Tribune reported this...

"Hayden told the Senate Intelligence Committee, which is considering his CIA nomination, he at first told then-CIA Director George Tenet that the NSA was doing all that the law allowed on surveillance.

"'Director Tenet came back to me and said, 'Is there anything more you can do?'" Hayden said. 'And I said, 'Not within my current authorities.' And he invited me to come down and talk to the administration about what more could be done.'

"After that talk, Hayden said, he was convinced the NSA could go further. Then-Atty. Gen. John Ashcroft provided the NSA with a memo giving a basis for that eavesdropping authority, he said.

"Hayden said he did not read the memo, but on Oct. 6, 2001, the NSA launched what the Bush administration has called a terrorist surveillance program."

This does not impress me as the behavior of someone who is characterized as "straightforward" or indicative of "refreshing candor."

""Let's hope that the Bush administration comes to rue the day it nominated Hayden to be CIA director."

Rue the day?
How about hoping instead that we all praise the day..."

Not instead, but also....

Before I read your thoughts, I wasn't seeing things that way; but now I am. Hayden does present himself as a credible guy. And,can it be, someone who will be in the Administration who can be trusted???

You have to wonder what's going on with the online news at google when the McOpEd is mistaken for McNews. This article assumes the readers are idiots.
We should okay this totally suspicious, involved up-to-his-waist in most of today's intelligence problems, discredible MILITARY GENERAL FOR THE NSA in the CIA's top spot because he diss's Bush.
You think about the CIA director who has no respect for the president that recommends him. The CIA director who says he has no respect for the president because the president said it was okay to say whatever just to get this dubious job posting. Which will be the better CIA director...and by any chance...might there be a better choice?

History will judge harshly those many Americans who went along willingly the with the Bush administration's power grab.

This is not that complicated. Hayden has obviously authorized sweeping violations of American's constitutional rights. The administration will try any tactic to avoid revealing the details, and to keep it out of court.

He should be indicted, not confirmed.

"Let's hope that the Bush administration comes to rue the day it nominated Hayden to be CIA director."

Rue the day?
How about hoping instead that we all praise the day Hayden became Director if he does a good job of protecting America and finding intelligence that helps us. That is what Liberals um want...right?
Uh...right?

bottom line is that "BUSH" nominated him.

enough said.

Sure, 9/11 happened. So did Katrina. The response of our government to both was abysmal. Where's Bin Laden? How are the area and people doing who were devastated by the hurricanes of last year?

9/11 killed under 4,000 people. In 2003, we had over 17,000 homicides in this country; that's Americans killing Americans. And we have that every year, whereas 9/11 was a singular event. Try to come up with any terrorist attack with near that number of fatalities. And almost 12,000 of those homicides were done with guns; but who needs to worry about gun control when we have the phantom menace floating around somewhere in the world, right?

We've now lost almost as many soldiers in Iraq as we lost civilians on 9/11, and are responsible for the death of ten times as many Iraqi civilians. And what's the result? Civil war, more and more insurgents and terrorists who are pissed off at our occupation, and a life for the Iraqis that's objectively worse than before. If you think Iraq and the world are better off without Saddam, you're wrong. They *could* have been better off *if* he had been removed sensibly, but instead we've pushed them from the frying pan into the fire.

Source for homicide deaths:
http://webapp.cdc.gov/sasweb/ncipc/leadcaus10.html

This, all, send a wrong signal to our troops!? Right!

Wasn't it Hayden that could have stopped 911 by responding to an intercept on 9/10 that stated "The game is on." This guy is the "poster boy" for bush's illegal wire tap program and has undermined the NSA's effectiveness during the Clinton years. He is only 6 months away from a bush declaration, "Mike yur doin a hecuva job."

Hayden and the NSA- the most ignored "9/11 connection"
http://www.team8plus.org/e107_plugins/forum/forum_viewtopic.php?2890

Unfortunately the most powerful country of the world is being ruled by bunch of headless chickens, so no matter who is appointed for the CIA job, we will see the mud slingling and blame game, the problem lies somewhere else. It's a shame that the citizens of US have re-elected them, the reason we are told is that the voters thought that he(Bush) is a religious person - still nobody in the world could understand that. The whole world is a mess now and I think it will take decades to clean this. Unfortunately the rest of the world(where I belong to) will have to suffer for somebody else's mistake, sometimes we think that it's not a good idea to have only one superpower.
Shantanu

Possibility 1: Hayden does not criticize Bush, thus Washington Post editor does not like Hayden.

Possibility 2: Hayden criticizes Bush administration, thus Washington Post editor likes Hayden and praises his OPINIONS about the war.

How did this get listed under the news section on news.google.com? Because this is not news, its opinions, and opinions are what give people false views of what really goes on in the world because we all unknowingly mold our opinioins into how we think something happened or why somebody chose to do something. Dont read this blog post and take it as fact as you shouldnt with any other blog, or even any so-called "news." Its all opinions and its all one sided (left or right).

Arkin must be naive. I didn't hear Hayden criticize the government very much. After the media has been so soft on Bush for so long they see and hear criticism when all that is being offered is c.y.a hypocrisy.

Arkin writes:
"But a more balanced view is that these extremists can be contained and ultimately undermined through a more low key effort, through less rhetoric and more strategy, through less war and more clandestine work, through a quieter, slower, less bombastic effort that doesn't itself serve as the stimuli for recruitment and expansion of the enemy."

This approach has been tried already. Bill Clinton and Richard Clarke (the Michael Brown of national security) used this approach and the end result was the first WTC attack, the Kobar Towers attack, the attacks on the U.S. embassies in Africa, the U.S.S. Cole attack and 9/11.

Arkin writes:

"A more balanced assessment might be to conclude that there are only a few thousand terrorists out there, angry, motivated, evil, but not an army worthy of overstatement."

Again, it was a repeated understatement of Al Queda's abilities and determination by the Clintonistas that lead to the above-mentioned attacks and our false sense of complacency. The reason Bill Arkin has the luxury of believing Al Queda to be an overstated threat is because he no longer has any heightened sense of a threat from that terroist organization. And why is that? It is because the U.S. mainland has not been attacked by Al Queda in almost five years. This is a result of the direct approach that the Bush administration has taken with this terrorist organization. It is this same approach that Arkin condemns, but which, ironically, has given him enough sense of security to claim (erroneously) that Al Queda is an overstated threat.

Furthermore, if one is to claim that Al Queda's lack of an attack on the U.S. mainland has nothing to do with Bush's efforts (as I'm sure Arkin would claim), then such a critic undermines their original argument that Al Queda is an overstated threat since that organization would then still be able to strike at the U.S. mainland.

Dr. Leeds,
Like most doctors, your marginalize your patient's concerns. If your patient appears to be the rea