Quote:
Originally posted by sgtclub
Yea, sorry, should have been more specific. I have reservations regarding the whole intelligence czar proposal and the rush to adopt the 9/11 commission recommendations in general without further debate on this issue. IMHO, the commission members are acting like an uber-congress, and it some how has become taboo to challenge their recomendations. Further, seems to me that another layer of government is exactly what we don't need.
By the way, your concerns above could be alleviated in ways other than an intelligence czar, but somehow that has not entered into the debate.
|
While I think something badly needs to be done, and sooner rather than later, I agree that a tzar is probably pretty useless. That is the job the CIA (& its director) was supposed to do and obviously that didn't have the desired effect. The 9/11 co-chairs were on Meet the Press this weekend, saying "oh, the CIA director is too busy running the CIA to consolidate everything, too, so you need a new guy" and I was left scratching my head wondering "OK, so were is the HUGE AGENCY OF PEOPLE THE TZAR NEEDS TO PULL EVERYTHING TOGETHER FROM 15+ DIFFERENT SOURCES then if it's not the CIA?"
I think, to really effect the changes needed, the whole shebang would need to be dismantled and reconstructed top to bottom. I have no clue how you implement a new culture that encourages speculation, imagination and intuition about what the next shift in culture and politics that breaks with the understandings of the past is going to be, much less how you'd get a G willing to act on those. The middle of an intelligence war is not an opportune time to do any of this, but trying may be better than the alternative. Of course, it ain't gonna happen from a purely practical p.o.v., so the point is sort of moot.
That said, I think even complete and effective basic reforms would only really help us in the long-term war; I don't think it would be particularly helpful in preventing another 9/11 type attack in the mid term. (Particularly since there are big problems with intelligence agencies conducting the same sort of surveillance domestically as they do abroad or conducting preventative strikes on US soil, based on something other than clear proof, without benefit of open (public) judicial review, potentially against US citizens.) But few people want to accept that - we want to feel safe at home and don't want to be told that significant portions of the world may need to be remade in ways we probably don't really understand yet for that to happen.
