Stateside Enemies

The Bush Administration has always had a problem with folks who gather and analyze facts. Seems like everytime someone, a scientist, an intelligence agent, sits down and takes a hard look at a problem, their conclusion flies in the face of a Bush policy.

Nowhere is this more evident than in the CIA. This agency has had its ass in a sling for the last four years. Sorry, Mr. President, I know you'd like to say Al Qaeda and Iraq are connected, but we've got no facts. Sorry, sir, I know you like talking about Iraq nuking us, but we've got no facts. Eventually, Tenet left and Bush replaced him with Republican lackey, Porter Goss, who the folks at the CIA find disengaged and ineffective. Perfect.

Now, David Brooks, a darling of those who consider themselves "thinking Republicans," has officially declared the CIA an "enemy" of the Bush Administration. Now, when I think "enemy," I think Osama Bin Laden. Maybe North Korea. Bush's stormtroopers see the enemy as the agency that is gathering intelligence about our enemies! Why? Because they have the gall to create reports stating that Bush's Iraq war is a mess with no foreseeable end. Because certain CIA officials said Bush's Iraq war would increase anti-American sentiment in the Arab world. Enemies.

Of course, if the President had honest fact-based policy objectives, he would defer to the analyses of his intelligence experts. Instead, here's what Brooks suggests:

It is time to reassert some harsh authority so C.I.A. employees know they must
defer to the people who win elections. . .

Scary.