The President-elect seems to be having problems filling out his administration's national security team. Every candidate who he deems to be "qualified" for such a position due to their prior experience in the agency is stained by torture, and their previous support for it. A person who supported torture is not qualified. Period. Because a person who supported torture never bothered to get as far as the 5th, 6th, 7th, and 8th amendments to the United States Constitution--all of which make torture illegal. If a person is going to swear an oath to uphold the constitution, we must trust them. We cannot trust torturers. With that in mind, I suggest that the President-elect nominate former Senate Intelligence Committee Chair Bob Graham to the post.
Graham was one of the few Senators who did due diligence in the months and years after September 11th, and in the lead up to Iraq. He chaired an investigation which documented the intelligence failures that gave Al Qaeda an opening to strike on September 11, 2001. He asked pertinent questions of senior administration officials.
Three years after Graham voted on the Authorization to Use Military Force in Iraq Resolution, he explained his vote in the Washington Post:
"From my advantaged position, I had earlier concluded that a war with Iraq would be a distraction from the successful and expeditious completion of our aims in Afghanistan. Now I had come to question whether the White House was telling the truth -- or even had an interest in knowing the truth.
On Oct. 11, I voted no on the resolution to give the president authority to go to war against Iraq. I was able to apply caveat emptor. Most of my colleagues could not."
Now, senior Democrats--most of whom didn't show Graham's moral courage in the lead up to the Iraq War--are urging the President-elect to keep George W. Bush's torturers at the head of our nation's intelligence agencies. Part of this may be the typical politics of Washington blame. Some Democrats are probably afraid about the potential for a terrorist attack in Obama's first year in office. They might reason that if you keep Bush's National Security team, you can blame it on them. I reason that the public would say it's incompetent to keep incompetent staff.
But what most of this is about is the Democratic Leaderships complicity in the crime that is torture. Nancy Pelosi was briefed on torture, and did not object. The sole objector--Representative Jane Harman--was soon replaced as the senior Democrat on the Intelligence Committee.
I suspect Democrats are worried about what CIA officials who leave the agency might say about Pelosi's involvement in this national shame. And I suspect that's why they're carrying water for Bush administration officials. Bob Graham was present at the meetings, but he says he has no recollection of what was discussed. While Graham may have acted inappropriately as Senate Intelligence Committee Chair, he has, in the years since he left office, become an opponent of torture.
The next CIA Director needs to understand what went wrong. They need to understand how much torture and other illegalities by the Bush administration damaged the agency's ability to work with allies abroad. Because without understanding the tragedy of the Bush administration, the same mistakes are bound to be repeated. Bob Graham knew that the intelligence was being manipulated in the lead up to the Iraq War. Bob Graham can keep such a thing from happening again. The President-elect should appoint him CIA Director.