The abrupt "resignation" of Porter Goss is proof of Bush's failure to lead; his appointment, however, may have compromised national security.The consensus is that Goss called it quits because he failed to address the reasons he was named to the post. In mainstream media speak, Goss quit after 19 months of trying to "mend" the agency "…embattled over the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks and the faulty intelligence about Iraq's weapons of mass destruction."
That's lipstick on a pig.
Bush appointed Goss amid great ballyhoo. It was, however, a political appointment from the get go. Goss's real job was to purge the CIA of anyone daring to question Bush's bogus and various rationales for waging aggressive war against a nation that had never attacked the United States and, in fact, posed no strategic threat to the United States whatsoever. His was a partisan appointment and because it was, Bush efforts to politicize the CIA may have compromised national security.
Now —if Goss was not up to the job, the responsibility must lie with the man who made the appointment: George W. Bush. Clearly -Bush wanted a toady at Langley and sadly, for the nation, he got one. That Goss is now out after a short 19 months of making enemies is nothing short of an indictment of Bush's utterly failed regime.
What intelligence failures?
Much is made in the MSM of "intelligence failures" leading up to 911. It has since been learned that Bush had numerous warnings about 911 and did nothing. There is a growing body of evidence that there was specific information even up to the very day of the attacks. Still, the United States failed to scramble fighters until after it was too late. In view of the fact that Dick Cheney was in charge of gaming a terrorist attack that very day, serious consideration should be given to bringing criminal charges against Dick Cheney. Instead, the Bush administration sought to make the CIA the scapegoat. Most certainly, Goss -as partisan as they come -was seen to be the man to bring the CIA to heel. It would appear that another nefarious plan has failed.
Since Bush tried shift the all the blame for 911 intelligence failures, it has been learned that Bush and Blair literally conspired to "fix" the intelligence to support a decision already made. Bush and Blair, according to the famous Downing Street Memos, had decided to attack Iraq but needed a pretext. WMD was it. The timeline of events supports that view: Colin Powell's address to the United Nations was known —at the time —to have consisted of old, out of date satellite photos and at least one plagiarized student paper. There was also the case of U.S. Ambassador Joe Wilson who blew the whistle on the bogus "yellow cake" story. And who can forget the beat up old trailer that was said to have been a "chemical lab"?
It's hard not to conclude that Bush appointed a GOP partisan who took with him to the CIA not only Bush's political agenda but also his numerous justifications for carrying on a perpetual, so-called "war on terrorism". That the war itself is may be a fraud has not kept Bush from citing it as justification for his arrogant and arbitrary abrogations of due process of law and the other "freedoms" for which we are said to be waging this so-called "war". Goss was supposted to turn the CIA into a partisan outfit, an organization that would tell Bush what he wanted to hear. Does that make you feel safer?
If that is the case -and I think it is -then it should be considered among the many impeachable offenses that will be charged to George Bush. Any attempt to politicize the CIA weakens the nation, compromises national security, and, in many ways, weakens the nation militarily by compromising the very intelligence upon which defense decisions are made.
Another update, another interesting wrinkle in the story:
There is obviously more to Goss' sudden departure than his hurt feelings that Negroponte was put between Goss and Bush in the chain of command. The real reasons have to do with Bush's relationship with the CIA itself, problems that started when Bush tried to make the CIA the fall guy for the WMD lies, when Bush tried to make of the CIA a "human shield".Rumsfeld Uses Colin Powell as a Human Shield
by John NicholsChallenged by veteran CIA analyst Ray McGovern to explain why he had claimed to "know" before the invasion of Iraq that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction when that suggestion had been repeatedly called into question, Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld tried to use former Secretary of State Colin Powell as a human shield.
From the crowd at an Atlanta gathering of the Southern Center for International Studies, McGovern asked: "Why did you lie to get us into a war that caused these kind of casualties and was not necessary?"
Rumsfeld replied, "Well, first of all, I haven't lied. I did not lie then. Colin Powell didn't lie. He spent weeks and weeks with the Central Intelligence Agency people and prepared a presentation that I know he believed was accurate, and he presented that to the United Nations. The president spent weeks and weeks with the Central Intelligence people and he went to the American people and made a presentation. I'm not in the intelligence business. They gave the world their honest opinion. It appears that there were not weapons of mass destruction there."
What Rumsfeld failed to mention is the hard evidence that Powell was pressured by Vice President Dick Cheney, Rumsfeld and others to make far more aggressive statements regarding WMDs than the Secretary of State thought to be appropriate.
British scholar Philippe Sands, the author of the very fine book Lawless World and perhaps the most dogged investigator of the internal discussions involving the cabinets of President Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair prior to the war, has revealed that Powell shared his doubts with his British counterpart before speaking to the United Nations in February, 2003. ...
At an even deeper level, the CIA has most certainly been at war with itself since before Bush Sr became CIA director. But more on that later. In the meantime, it's clear that the forces of corporate wealth and privilege have combined to install an absolute fascist dictatorship in the U.S. and the CIA seems to be the last battlefield. The Pentagon was bought and paid for by big business long ago.
Edmund Burke is often misquoted. What he actually said is even more applicable than the misquote:
“When bad men combine, the good must associate; else they will fall one by one, an unpitied sacrifice in a contemptible struggle.”
Bush seemed to have presided over just such an eventuality and rode the polls to the top. That even conservatives are deserting him seems to indicate that the consolidation of Bush's absolute dictatorship has failed. We can only hope and, indeed, that would appear to be our only hope.
But ...don't let down your guard.
Bush was motivated to politicize the CIA. His entire "War on Terrorism" continues to be a fraud. Con men perpetrating frauds are always in in need of confederates.Is the Resignation of CIA Director Porter Goss Hookergate Related?
Posted by Jon Ponder | May. 5, 2006, 10:51 am
Rumors have been swirling around Washington that CIA Director Porter Goss may have been involved in the poker and prostitute parties at the Watergate Hotel hosted by the defense contractors who bribed former Rep. Duke Cunningham. Goss was chairman of the House Intelligence Committee when the parties took place, so it is possible he was involved somehow in either the bribery, the sex with prostitutes or both.
Goss’s abrupt resignation today was offered without a reason — not even the old Washington bromide of an urgent need to spend more time with his familiy. The news readers on CNN and MSNBC are pussyfooting around it but it is hard to see how Goss’s sudden departure after a little more than a year as head of the CIA is not connected to the Watergate II scandals.
Here’s some background on the scandals that posted on Alternet earlier today:
According to recent reports, federal investigators have traced the outlines of a far more extensive network of suspected corruption, involving multiple members of Congress, some of the nation’s highest-ranking intelligence officials, bribery attempts including “free limousine service, free stays at hotel suites at the Watergate and the Westin Grand, and free prostitutes,” tens of millions of dollars in federal contracts awarded under dubious circumstances, and even efforts to influence U.S. national security policy by subverting democratic oversight…CIA director Goss tied to scandal?
Last week, Harper’s magazine reported that party-goers “under intense scrutiny by the FBI are current and former lawmakers on Defense and Intelligence committees — including one person who now holds a powerful intelligence post.” CIA Director Porter Goss is perhaps the only individual who fits such a description. (”This is horribly irresponsible. He hasn’t even been to the Watergate in decades,” a CIA spokeswoman said. When asked if Goss had attended Wilkes’ parties at the Westin or other locations, she repeated the denial. “It’s horribly irresponsible. Flatly untrue.”) But the alleged links between Goss, Foggo, and Wilkes have led some to return to questions raised when Goss initially selected Foggo to be executive director in November 2004.
Update: NBC’s Tim Russert has been rushed in front of the cameras to insist that Goss’s resignation is a result of head-butting from John Negroponte, the Director of National Intelligence. In other words, “Move along, folks, move along. Nothing to see here.” ...
CIA, WMD, War on TerrorHow Bush Was Offered Bin Laden and Blew It
By ALEXANDER COCKBURN and JEFFREY ST. CLAIR
George Bush, the man whose prime campaign plank has been his ability to wage war on terror, could have had Osama bin Laden's head handed to him on a platter on his very first day in office, and the offer held good until February 2 of 2002. This is the charge leveled by an Afghan American who had been retained by the US government as an intermediary between the Taliban and both the Clinton and Bush administrations.
Kabir Mohabbat is a 48-year businessman in Houston, Texas. Born in Paktia province in southern Afghanistan, he's from the Jaji clan (from which also came Afghanistan's last king). Educated at St Louis University, he spent much of the 1980s supervising foreign relations for the Afghan mujahiddeen, where he developed extensive contacts with the US foreign policy establishment, also with senior members of the Taliban.
After the eviction of the Soviets, Mohabbat returned to the United States to develop an export business with Afghanistan and became a US citizen. Figuring in his extensive dealings with the Taliban in the late 1990s was much investment of time and effort for a contract to develop the proposed oil pipeline through northern Afghanistan.
In a lengthy interview and in a memorandum Kabir Mohabbat has given us a detailed account and documentation to buttress his charge that the Bush administration could have had Osama bin Laden and his senior staff either delivered to the US or to allies as prisoners, or killed at their Afghan base. As a search of the data base shows, portions of Mohabbat's role have been the subject of a number of news reports, including a CBS news story by Alan Pizzey aired September 25, 2001. This is the first he has made public the full story. ...
'Toons by Dante Lee; use only with permission
