Feinstein: Bad Choice for Intelligence

[babylonsister]

http://www.commondreams.org/view/2008/12/27-4

Feinstein: Bad Choice for Intelligence

by Stephen Zunes

snip//

Feinstein's supporters insist that her false claims about Iraqi WMDs were an honest mistake. But Ritter and other critics argue that it wasn't just ignorance and stupidity that led Feinstein to make these false statements about Iraq's military capabilities. She may very well have lied about the WMDs in order to frighten the public into supporting a U.S. takeover of that oil-rich country. Whether out of deceit or unawareness, however, Feinstein is clearly not suited to chair the committee.

Consequences of the Vote

I was also among a number of scholars specializing in the Middle East who warned Senator Feinstein that a U.S. invasion of Iraq would likely spark a disastrous armed insurgency, sectarian violence, and an increase in anti-American extremism in the Middle East and beyond. Despite this awareness of the likely consequences, however, she insisted that the United States should invade Iraq anyway. Such a decision raises serious questions as to whether she has the ability to rationally assess the costs and benefits of national security policies, which someone chairing the Intelligence Committee presumably should possess.

If her real goal was to protect our country from Iraq's alleged "weapons of mass destruction," however, she would have presumably called for the immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops once they invaded and occupied Iraq and discovered that there really weren't such weapons after all. It should have also been obvious that the longer U.S. troops stayed in that country, with its long tradition of resistance to foreign invaders, the more likely it would provoke a major armed insurgency and the rise of extremists groups. Despite this, Feinstein called on American troops to remain in Iraq for more than four years after the invasion. She voted to send hundreds of billions of dollars worth of taxpayers' money to support Bush's war effort even as California sank deeper and deeper into fiscal crisis.

During this occupation, U.S. authorities helped to rewrite the country's economic laws to allow American corporations to take over Iraqi industries and repatriate 100% of profits. Under U.S. tutelage, the new Iraqi government slashed corporate taxes and provided generous oil concessions to American conglomerates. In this way, the war has been extremely profitable for some giant corporations. Among these were the firms URS and Perini, both of which Feinstein's husband served as the majority owner. The Military Construction Appropriations subcommittee, under her leadership, steered government contracts to these very companies.

The Democratic Party's decision to appoint as head of the Senate Intelligence Committee someone with such a history of dubious judgment on intelligence matters is hardly new. The party chose Jay Rockefeller (WV) ­ who is leaving his post to chair the Commerce Committee ­ to chair the Intelligence Committee in January 2007, although he also made false claims about Iraq's WMD programs similar to those of Feinstein in order to justify his vote in favor of the invasion.

In the world of Senate Democrats, therefore, it appears that the quickest path to leadership in Intelligence comes from getting things wrong.

[Joanne98]

1. Oh no!

[acmavm]

2. Check out hubby's finances and see why she was so in favor of war with

Iraq.

[mike_c]

3. just when you think the dems couldn't screw things up any worse...

...an idea like this comes along. DiFi is a war profiteer at best, and more likely a complicit war criminal. And she wants to excuse her behavior as simple ineptitude? THAT'S what gets you the chair of one of the most powerful, and consequential committees in the U.S. Senate? "Whoops, my bad! I could have sworn there were weapons of mass destruction all over the place!"

[ixion]

4. Feinstein has been part of the problem

and should more appropriately be facing a war crimes tribunal, rather than a cabinet post.

[Canuckistanian]

5. Yup, my thoughts exactly

I don't care what political stripe they are, if they voted for war and CONTINUE to support it despite OBVIOUS manipulations of the truth and massive war profiteering, then they should go.

[Just-plain-Kathy]

6. Mrs. Paul Pelosi should be investigated along with Feinstein....

...we have to stick together and form a grassroots movement to get rid of all these treasonous war profiteers.

[Jim Lane]

7. Slight correction -- it's not a Cabinet post or any other Obama appointment

Feinstein was selected to chair the Senate Intelligence Committee by the Democrats in the Senate. Obama had resigned his seat before the vote.

Obama gets dumped on for so many of his appointees (sometimes justifiably) that I wanted to clarify Feinstein's status.

[tomp]

8. why would obama resign his seat before inauguration? nt

[Jim Lane]

9. It's often done, to give the successor a seniority advantage

If Blagojevich hadn't messed up so royally, he could've appointed someone who would take office this month, thus being senior to new Senators like Mark Warner who'll take office in early January.

Furthermore, I'm sure Obama didn't want to have deal with the responsibilities of a Senate seat. It would just be a distraction from his transition work.

My speculation about his reasons may be wrong but the fact is that he resigned his Senate seat less than two weeks after the election.