A VICTORY FOR AL QAEDA

Here is how stupidly this is being reported by the AP:

President-elect Barack Obama's decision to fill the top U.S. intelligence jobs with two men short on direct experience in intelligence- gathering surprised the spy community and signaled the Democrat's intention for a clean break from Bush administration policies.

Huh? Doesn't this imply that picking men without any experience in order to show his intention for a break from Bush's policies that Bush's policies were to appoint people with experience? 

Hugh - Paneta may have a hard time getting through the process, even the democrats are not on board with this. A lot depends upon how many currently in power in the CIA are asked to stay and how many get the axe. Does he keep some experience or make a clean sweep. Remember, Bush kept Tenet as a hold over from the Clinton administration and that wasn't the best of moves. But, overall, I am not impressed with that pick.

Perhaps the mentality is - if the president doesn't need to have any experience on anything other than how to be political, that a clean(?) sheet of paper is just what we need right now, then why do we need someone in charge of our intelligence that has experience?  He might bring a whole new mindset of systems that can be re worked to fit the new job?  Yeah like bringing a city traffic engineer over to run Microsoft.  Its a 'bold step' by the president elect - at least thats pretty much what Rachel Madcow said yesterday when NBC had her fill in for the bumped/cancelled whatevered Ann Coulter yesterday.  Lets all PRAY that this doesn't hurt any of us!

Thanks for bringing this subject up. I and many of my peers were discussing the Penata appointment this morning and the general consensus is it is a very poor idea. The intelligence community needs a warrior mentality that can make decissions and act quickly.

Surely we don't need anyone with experience to head up the C.I.A. There is so little turmoil in the world at large right now, I can't think of a single reason we should be concerned with national security.

Yeah. We all know that if we play real nice, Mr. Bin Laden and his team will be OK with us.

Hugh,

I had hoped that perhaps Obama would pick someone with intelligence experience.

Hugh - He must have forgotten to answer all of that 7 page Obama employment questionnaire.

Hi Hugh,

Maybe that elected official for the CIA doesn't have experience, but maybe, with an "outsider" they will get a fresh perspective.  At least, that's the logic I see in the nomination.  In the state of the economy, a different perspective wouldn't hurt anything...  It might help get us out of our rut!!

                                        ;>)

Hugh, I think they started dance back in November. It is coming and we will be reactive to a situation instead of today's proactive state of alert.