Parts to Wholes: the Socionomic Systems Nexus

Key Postings on Crash Corner

• Rational Voters, Public Choice, Economics and Futures
• Inside the Sausage Factory: the 4P's of Political Reality

Intelligence and National Security

• National Security(Readings): Let the Debate Begin

INTELLIGENCE: Who Doesn't Dare, Loses British special operations operatives have a motto; "who dares, wins." An example of how this doesn't work can be found in the American CIA (Central Intelligence Agency). Over the last three decades, the  CIA has come under a lot of criticism for not being able to do their job. They have done that by not taking chances. The most spectacular recent example was the failure to spot the terrorist operation that led to the September 11, 2001 attacks. While much blame was justifiably heaped on the FBI, it was the CIA that had first detected the plotters, and was already under orders to stop al Qaeda attempts to make more attacks on the United States. All this began a decade earlier, when al Qaeda damaged New York City's World Trade Center in 1993 bombing. The 2001 attacks did not come out of nowhere. But the CIA had problems at the top (where decisions about what leads to pursue, how, and to what extent all this is shared with the FBI), and at the bottom (and the inability to infiltrate al Qaeda.) At the same time, other intelligence agencies, like Britain's MI-6 and the Israeli Mossad are much better at gathering information at ground level. They, like most nations, recognize that intelligence operations can get dirty. It's all a matter of how important the intelligence is. The British attitude is that, if you need to do this, do it right. So Britain does have agents with a "license to kill" and, more importantly, laws protecting these men and women from any later prosecution for dirty deeds they were asked to do for Queen and Country. But in the United States, the CIA was held to a higher moral standard, and still expected to get the job done. This approach did not work. The CIA lost its soul, it's heart, and most of its guts, in the late 1970s. Lots of brains are left, with big budgets to buy all manner of neat technology. But the bosses live fear of grandstanding politicians and headline hungry journalists. While the British, the Israelis, and most other nations, have managed to capture and retain the ability to do street level intelligence, the CIA has not. It now serves mainly to draw fire, while other organizations get the job done.

• Kennedy School Discussion of post-911 Failures and Breakdowns 
• The 9/11 Report: A Graphic Adaptation by Sid Jacobson and Ernie Colón

Church Committee on Intelligence Activities The Church Committee is the common term referring to the United States Senate Select Committee to Study Governmental Operations with Respect to Intelligence Activities, a U.S. Senate committee chaired by Senator Frank Church (D-ID) in 1975. A precursor to the U.S. Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, the committee investigated intelligence gathering for illegality by the CIA and FBI after certain activities had been revealed by the Watergate affair.  Early on, critics such as Bing Crosby and Paul Harvey accused the committee of treasonous activity. The 1975 assassination of Richard Welch, a CIA station chief in Greece, intensified the public backlash against its mission. The Committee's work has more recently been criticized after the September 11th attacks, for leading to legislation reducing the ability of the CIA to gather human intelligence. In response to such criticism, the chief counsel of the committee, Frederick A.O. Schwarz Jr., retorted with a book co-authored by Aziz Z. Huq, denouncing the Bush administration's use of 9/11 to make "monarchist claims" that are "unprecedented on this side of the North Atlantic". In September 2006, the University of Kentucky hosted a forum called "Who's Watching the Spies? Intelligence Activities and the Rights of Americans," bringing together two Democratic committee members, former presidential candidate Walter F. Mondale and former U.S. Senator Walter "Dee" Huddleston of Kentucky, and Schwarz to discuss the committee's work, its historical impact, and how it pertains to today's society.

Congressional Oversight and the Crippling of the CIA One utterly predictable response to the terrorist attacks on New York and Washington were calls by members of the House and Senate Intelligence Committees to “shake-up” the Central Intelligence Agency. Some committee members want to see CIA Director George Tenet replaced, others are demanding radical changes in both the analytical and operational divisions of the agency. It would be shortsighted for the intelligence committees to place the blame for this latest intelligence failure exclusively on the CIA’s management. If the committees are interested in genuine reform, they would do well to begin by acknowledging their own culpability in crippling the agency. Under both Democratic and Republican chairmen, the intelligence committees have transformed the CIA into the functional equivalent of the Department of Agriculture, preventing the agency from acting in a shrewd and, as is sometimes necessary, ruthless manner. Any “reform” is doomed to fail if Congress continues to play its role as a partner, if not outright “owner,” in the management of the CIA. The story of how the executive branch lost its control over the CIA is well known, but deserves a retelling, since it is often presented incompletely. In the aftermath of Vietnam, Watergate, and revelations of CIA assassination plots and domestic spying, Congress moved in the mid-1970s to “reassert” its role in shaping American foreign policy, including the most controversial tool of that policy, covert action. Secrecy was seen as antithetical to the American way, and there was widespread agreement that “rogue” agencies such as the CIA were a threat to liberty. Proponents of congressional intelligence oversight argued that openness and accountability were the cornerstone of a legitimate foreign policy, and it was believed that Congress, due to its diversity of opinion, possessed greater wisdom than the executive branch. Spurred on by the sensational revelations of the Church Committee hearings in the Senate and the Pike Committee in the House, both bodies established permanent intelligence committees. The damage done to the CIA by this congressional oversight regime is quite extensive. The committees increased the number of CIA officials subject to Senate confirmation, condemned the agency for its contacts with unscrupulous characters, prohibited any further contact with these bad characters, insisted that the United States not engage or assist in any coup which may harm a foreign leader, and overwhelmed the agency with interminable requests for briefings (some 600 alone in 1996). The committees exercised line by line authority over the CIA’s budget and established an Inspector General’s office within the agency, requiring this official to share his information with them, causing the agency to refrain from operations with the slightest potential for controversy. The CIA was also a victim of the renowned congressional practice of pork barrel politics. The intelligence committees forced the agency to accept high priced technology that just happened to be manufactured in a committee member’s district. On some occasions, members of Congress threatened to leak information in order to derail covert operations they found personally repugnant. Leaks are a recurring problem, as some member of Congress, or some staff member, demonstrated in the aftermath of the September 11th attack. President Bush’s criticism of members of Congress was fully justified, despite the protests from Capitol Hill. Leaks have occurred repeatedly since the mid-1970s, and in very few cases has the offending party been disciplined. One of the Founding Fathers of the new oversight regime, former Representative Leo Ryan, held that leaks were an important tool in checking the “secret government.” In the wake of the September 11th terror attack, some legislators are now proclaiming their commitment to unleashing the CIA and rebuilding its human “assets.” Just a short while ago these same legislators were leading the charge to curtail the agency. One such convert is the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Joseph Biden.

Frannie, Markets and Rackulation Breakdowns

• The End is Nigh ? (Update2): Frannie, Leh, WamU, AIG and Wild, Wild Markets
• Continuing Confusions & Crisis: Teetering Giants to Credit to Housing

Beyond the Fannie, Freddie rescue The rescue of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, after more than a decade of using the two mortgage lenders as political footballs, shows just how broke Washington is and how hard it will be to fix. The rescue itself was not a mistake -- it was programmed from the day Congress wrote a blank check for the implicit guarantee of the government-sponsored enterprises and then proceeded to ignore the unconscionable buildup of risk in these thinly capitalized institutions. Now that check has been presented for payment and we still don't know the final cost. Republicans and Democrats have been battling over Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac for more than a decade. Fannie Mae, in particular, was a lightning rod after it became a Democratic sinecure under Franklin Raines, director of the Office of Management and Budget in the Clinton administration. Raines was eventually forced out of Fannie Mae in 2004 amid charges that he manipulated Fannie's books to increase his bonus. Before and after Raines, Republicans tried to torpedo Fannie Mae. But even the dedicated efforts of former Louisiana congressman Richard Baker, who headed the House Capital Markets subcommittee for the 12 years the Republicans controlled Congress, could not counter the massive lobbying effort from Fannie and Freddie to preserve their privileged position. The inability of either Congress or the administration to get any traction on GSE reform absent an earthshaking crisis shows the power of vested interests in determining policy. And despite the emphasis now from both candidates on change and reform, it's hard to see how that's going to change. While some reform of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac is now inevitable after the government takeover, it will remain difficult to achieve any sort of meaningful reform of the financial regulatory system as a whole. Even such an obvious measure as merging the SEC and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission - so that oversight of securities and futures are under the same roof as in every other major financial market - has been blocked by powerful congressional committees who jealously guard their prerogatives. So the gridlock that brought you the Fannie-Freddie debacle is set to produce other crises. Whichever candidate wins in this close presidential race is not likely to have the sweeping mandate that will enable him to overcome these obstacles to genuine reform in the financial sphere.

Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac Takeover Costs Congressmen Who Were Invested, Update: Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac Invest in Lawmakers

Negative Energy = Negenergy Policy

• In Search of a Nat'l Energy Policy: Check the Mirror Pogo

Energy bill: Drowning in Washington An energy summit is taking place Friday on Capitol Hill and all 100 senators - including the presidential candidates - are invited to attend. But with all the partisan sniping on The Hill, it's hard to tell if a comprehensive energy bill will be signed into law anytime soon. There have been numerous attempts to get a bill passed to change America's energy policy in the face of high gas prices and an over-reliance on overseas energy sources - and all have succumbed to partisan politics. Democrats and Republicans are still working on multiple bills, but none of them are close to being signed into law. Now, with an adjournment goal of Sept. 26, the Senate is facing crunch time.The purpose of Friday's summit, according to the Senate Committee on Energy & Natural Resources, is to be a forum for discussion to "facilitate the development of comprehensive legislation to address America's many energy challenges." But it's not a workshop for cranking out an energy bill.

‘Technology is the ticket’ for energy, Bush says (MSNBC 2005 !!!) Confronting growing concerns over high energy prices, President Bush on Wednesday unveiled controversial plans to spur construction of new nuclear power plants, provide incentives to buy diesel vehicles and most novel of all: use some old military bases for oil refineries. "A secure energy future for America must include nuclear power ... and expanding oil refineries," Bush added, saying that technology is making the nuclear and oil industries safer and cleaner. "Technology is the ticket, is this nation's ticket to greater energy independence," he told the audience, citing as an example the smaller rigs needed today to drill in a place like the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, a federal area that Congress is considering opening. The president spelled out the plans in a speech at a small business conference, saying he ordered federal agencies to "simplify the permitting process for such construction" at retired bases.