And You Thought An Arabian Horse Lawyer Was Bad...
by georgia10
Thu Jan 26, 2006 at 09:23:26 PM PDT
A sub-unit of the PFIAB is the "Intelligence Oversight Board," which "advises the President on the legality of foreign intelligence activities." Non-partisan, expert, legal oversight. Sounds great! It is the FIAB that acts as one of the most objective and trusted confidants when it comes to the President ordering foreign intelligence activity.
PFIAB members get unprecedented access to our nation's most closely gaurded secrets. They have, according to Salon, "access to intelligence that is unavailable to most members of Congress. They are privy to intelligence from the Central Intelligence Agency, the National Security Agency, the military intelligence agencies and others."
Who are the members of the President's FIAB? Brace yourselves. The list of people Bush selected to give him "non-partisan," "expert," and "objective" legal advice on his foreign intelligence activities reads almost like a list of his Rangers & Pioneers, or a list of invitees at the Bush-Cheney '04 victory party. Actually, it reads a lot like that list.
While previous Presidents have made the names of their foreign intelligence advisors public, Bush has tried to keep his secret. Only after some prying by David Corn back in 2002 did some names slip out. And as of 2005, courtesy of Salon, we see how Bush's cronyism rots the very core of our national security.
Here's the list, in 2002, at the time the domestic spying program was ordered and well under way. Drum roll please....
- Brent Scowcroft: national security adviser to President Bush I. Scowcroft heads the Scowcroft Group which "sells intelligence and other services to globe-trotting corporations."
- Pete Wilson: former GOP Senator, Governor.
- Cresencio Arcos: AT&T executive and former US ambassador.
- Jim Barksdale: former head of Netscape.
- Robert Addison Day: chairman of the TWC Group, a money management firm, Bush Pioneer.
- William DeWitt: Ohio businessman, Bush Pioneer, top fund-raiser for Bush's 2004 Inaugural committee, former partner with Bush in the Texas Rangers baseball team.
- Stephen Friedman: past chairman of Goldman Sachs.
- Alfred Lerner: chief executive of MBNA.
- Ray Lee Hunt: super-rich Texas oil man, Bush Pioneer, finance chairman of the Republican National Committee, Halliburton Board of Directors.
- Rita Hauser: "a prominent lawyer and longtime advocate of Israeli-Palestinian reconciliation."
- David Jeremiah: retired admiral.
- Arnold Kanter: national security official under Bush I, founding member of the Scowcroft Group.
- James Calhoun Langdon, Jr.: "a power-lawyer in Texas," Bush Pioneer, Washington lobbyist.
- Elisabeth Pate-Cornell: head of industrial engineering and engineering management at Stanford University.
- John Harrison Streicker: a "real estate magnate."
- Philip Zelikow: National Security Council staffer during Bush I.
How many names do you count that seem qualified to analyze the most sensitive of our nation's secrets, AND to pass judgment on the constitutionality of the President's actions? Five? Four? Three? Out of sixteen?
Recently, Bush shuffled the deck a bit. After Scowcroft spoke out against the Bush administration ("Sharon just has [Bush] wrapped around his little finger...I think the president is mesmerized.") and after criticizing the President's Iraq policy, Scowcroft was swiftly replaced(along with some others). New names include Arthur Culvahouse, former U.S. congressman, and Lee Hamilton, 9/11 Commission Vice-Chairman, former Commerce Secretary Donald Evans, Admiral James O. Ellis, and Stefanie Osburn, former Chief of Staff for the Deputy Director of National Intelligence for Management at the Central Intelligence Agency. You can view the full list here. Update [2006-1-27 0:46:8 by georgia10]: Obviously, the 2005 slate is much more qualified than that which prevailed during the implementation of the domestic spying prorgam. However, Bush's Pioneers Hunt & Dewine, you'll notice, are still on the list. At last word, the President has chosen to leave 4 of the 16 seats empty.
The historical role of the PFIAB cannot be underscored enough. It has the ability to look into the most controversial aspects of our intelligence. For example, after the flurry of controversy about the 16 words in Bush's SOTU speech, it was the PFIAB that was the first government body to conclude the claim was "questionable"--though it did blame the insertion on the lack of "an organized system at the White House to vet intelligence."
As for the latest slate of PFIAB members, this is the reaction:
Ray Close, a member of Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, a group that has been critical of the Bush administration's handling of intelligence matters, doesn't mince words when discussing Bush's latest appointments to the PFIAB. "It's unbelievable," says Close, who worked for the CIA for 27 years as an Arabist. "I can't imagine anyone who has the president's interest in mind allowing him to do this. With the notable exception of Lee Hamilton, most of the choices look very weak, and several scream of cronyism."
As the Salon article notes, even Clinton appointed a couple big donors to his PFIAB. Yet Clinton's panel "had far more intelligence expertise," boasting a former Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staffs and a Secretary of Defense in its membership.
But, as we've sadly come to realize, Bush's takes "cronyism" to an unprecedented level. The President has rejected a check on his power when he ignored FISA. His view of the unitary executive essentially removes all checks from the legislative and executive branches. And as for this last iota of objectivity? The "non-partisan" and "expert" panel which is supposed to advise the President on the legality of his foreign intelligence actions? It's unclear what advice they gave the President, if they were even informed of the program at all (presumably, they should have been). But what is clear is that this is the FEMA-ization of our national security. It's not just our safety, but our civil liberties which were entrusted to a panel reeking of cronyism, incompetence, and inherent unreliability.
Any guesses as to which reporter will be the first to ask Bush about the Intelligence Oversight Board and the PFIAB? If they ask him about it at all, that is...
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