hayden, goss, eavesdropping, hookers

Sounds like the White House is ready to fight for General Michael Hayden, de facto President Bush's expected choice to succeed the ousted Porter Goss as the director of the CIA. Hayden of course oversaw the warrantless domestic spying program that most sane Americans agreed was an unnecessary, gratuitous overreach by the regime.

The White House looks like it is picking a fight, and hopes to make the nomination hearings into a forum for "proving" the Democrats are Soft on Terrorism. But Arlen Specter and other GOP senators have their own questions about the legality and constitutionality of the domestic eavesdropping program.

As for why Porter Goss left, it seems obvious from the suddenness and the timing that it is related to the participation of CIA #3 (Dusty Foggo) in lobbyist-funded booze, poker, and prostitute parties at the Watergate. Ex-CIA guy Larry Johnson doesn't think Goss himself was involved, but it's getting awful close to him. The Duke Cunningham scandal is slowly oozing farther and farther, implicating more Republicans every week.