US President George W. Bush's nomination of Porter Goss as the next CIA director could lead to tense confirmation hearings, with plenty of questions about the president's national security record and goals, just weeks before the Nov. 2 election.
Even as some Democrats praised the nomination of Goss, a Florida Republican, who gave up his role on Tuesday as chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, others criticized him as inappropriately partisan for a job that requires relaying objective advice to policy makers.
"You must keep the politics out of intelligence," said House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi of California. "I'm not sure that has been done here."
"The selection of a politician -- any politician from either party -- is a mistake," said Senator Jay Rockefeller of West Virginia, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee. "Having independent, objective intelligence going to the president and the Congress is fundamental to America's national security."
The chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Pat Roberts, said he was mystified by complaints that Goss was partisan.
"You can disagree with somebody as to the issues from time to time; I don't think that makes them partisan," said Roberts, a Kansas Republican. "I don't consider him to be partisan. I've known him for 16 years; that's not a word I would use to describe Porter."
In making the announcement on Tuesday, Bush ignored advisers who had favored allowing acting director John McLaughlin to remain on the job until after the November elections.
Bush praised Goss, a former CIA officer, as someone who "knows the CIA inside and out" and said he was "the right man to lead this important agency at this critical moment in our nation's history."
Goss is one of the wealthiest members of Congress, with assets worth between US$6 million and US$24 million last year. His biggest holdings included US$1 million to US$5 million (worth of shares each in IBM, Wal-Mart Stores Inc and General Electric Co).
Goss, 65, worked as a CIA officer overseeing spies in Central America and Western Europe during the 1960s until a mysterious infection forced his retirement. He rose in local and then national politics after his recovery.
He has never disclosed details of his CIA employment except to reveal that he worked in Haiti, the Dominican Republic and Mexico -- all tumultuous countries during that decade of the Cold War.
Bush's nomination of Goss could deflect criticism from Democratic candidate John Kerry that the administration wasn't moving quickly enough to make important changes affecting America's intelligence agencies. Among the proposals being worked out is creation of a new national intelligence director -- a job Goss could ultimately inherit.
The complexities of such reforms were underscored on Tuesday when Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld suggested there are legitimate reasons against sharing too much information across US intelligence agencies. Rumsfeld opposes the creation of a new national intelligence chief, partly because the Pentagon currently controls more than 80 percent of the nation's intelligence budget.
During a visit to Oman, Rumsfeld said that if classified intelligence is shared in too many places, it runs a greater risk of being leaked, either to foreign governments or to the American public.
The CIA nomination could put Goss in line to become the US's first national intelligence director, if Congress follows the Sept. 11 commission's recommendations to create that position. The proposed director would oversee all 15 of the nation's intelligence agencies and serve as the president's chief intelligence adviser, a role now played by the CIA director.
"He could be this new person, if we go there," said Senator Mike DeWine, a Republican from Ohio, a member of the Intelligence Committee. "He'll be someone who can walk in to the president and look him in the eye and tell him what the truth is and not flinch."
White House press secretary Scott McClellan would not rule out Goss being picked for national intelligence director or say whether Goss is a leading candidate. If Bush is not re-elected, Goss' position could be short-lived, subject to the decision of the next president.
POLITICAL PRISONERS VS DEPORTEES: Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office slammed the call by El Salvador’s leader, accusing him of crimes against humanity Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Sunday proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the US his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela. In a post on X, directed at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year. “The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” he wrote to Maduro. “However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that
ECONOMIC WORRIES: The ruling PAP faces voters amid concerns that the city-state faces the possibility of a recession and job losses amid Washington’s tariffs Singapore yesterday finalized contestants for its general election on Saturday next week, with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) fielding 32 new candidates in the biggest refresh of the party that has ruled the city-state since independence in 1965. The move follows a pledge by Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財), who took office last year and assumed the PAP leadership, to “bring in new blood, new ideas and new energy” to steer the country of 6 million people. His latest shake-up beats that of predecessors Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) and Goh Chok Tong (吳作棟), who replaced 24 and 11 politicians respectively
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
RSS