No, you're in charge of the military. Part of our nation's strength is the civilian leadership of the military.

If you have not been aware of this battle and a much larger war between CIA and Rumsfeld, then you don't have a clue how much infighting is now regular in Washington. At one point, DoD tried to take the functions in the National Security Agency (NSA) completely away from CIA (yes NSA is a DoD function whose #1 customer is CIA). The Supreme Court literally stepped in and ended that battle in favor of CIA.

The story of Potter Goss is still not told. Many players are now holding cards very close to their chest. Potter Goss was basically installed to disembowel the CIA - a least that was the White House agenda. I still don't know what Potter Goss was doing. But whatever it was, it was in opposition to what the White House wanted. I suspect Potter Goss tried to work more for the CIA than for the White House. It is pretty much known that Negroponte - Intelligence Czar - has made a bureaucratic mess of the nation's intelligence. But again, it is not clear his position in a DoD's political war on CIA.

Too many in this battle still are not talking (leaking). When one victim (Potter Goss) does talk (if he ever does), then we should have a much better idea where even General Hayden stands. Currently it is unknown if he will work to undermine CIA (which I doubt) for the benefit of DoD, or if he will stand up for CIA. But the bottom line - if you did not see it years ago - there is major infighting between CIA and DoD. Currently, CIA appears to be losing - as indicated by the number of people who actually think there was an intelligence failure before and after 11 September.

Porter Goss, if you please. :grates:

...wathced U.S. Police-State Double Feature this weekend:

John Carpenter's They Live, and Running Man

EDIT - (bonus feature: follow the TV theme to Network)

link

Lunchtime "team-building seminars" at the GAO on how to support Republican candidates in elections.

One seriously outdated thread.

Old, but unfortunately not outdated.

Really, I could have sworn Porter Goss and Rummy were gone... wait let me check on that.

There's more where they came from.

Yep, we need people to step up and do the good work that needs to be done.

First we need the bad ones to step down.

Slowly but surely they are being replaced.

I have no confidence that the replacements are better. Gonzales is certainly worse than Ashcroft.

Of course, confirmation won't be a rubber stamp anymore, so there's some good news there. A swift boat financier was just blocked as ambassador to Belgium. Not that that position is particularly important, but it might force Bush to be more reasonable in his picks.

Or maybe he'll just do more recess appointments.

B

I'm an oracle.