Date: 2006-05-11
Speaker: VAN HOLLEN (democrat)
Chamber: H

Mr. Speaker. that is exactly right. Very serious consequences for the American people. And that is why it was surprising. I must say. that after George Tenet left the CIA as Director. that the administration decided to replace him with Mr. Porter Goss. Now Mr. Goss is a very decent. wellmeaning person. But the fact of the matter is he was the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee at a time when this.House failed to ask the hard questions and failed to do its oversight job. It accepted what the administration told them at face value. and it was a rubber stamp when it came to taking the administrations word on intelligence. And yet he was the one they decided to make the head of Central Intelligence. And he brought with him some of the members of his committee staff. He brought his staff director and some of the other people who were very politically close to him. including his staff director. Patrick Murry. And what was the result of that? Well. I think it is important to take us back to. this is what happened right after that appointment at the CIA. And I am reading from a Post story back from November 2004. The deputy director of the CIA resigned yesterday after a series of confrontations over the past week between senior operations officials and CIA Director Porter Gosss new chief of staff that have left the agency in turmoil. according to several current and former CIA officials. John McLaughlin. a 32year CIA veteran who was Acting Director for 2 months this summer until Goss took over. resigned after warning Goss that Gosss top aide. former Capitol Hill staffer Patrick Murry. was treating senior officials disrespectfully and risked widespread resignations. The day after this. the story says. the agency official who oversees foreign operations. Deputy Director of Operations Stephen Kappes. tendered his resignation after a confrontation with Murry. It goes on to say. it is the worst roiling I have ever heard of. said one former senior official with knowledge of the events. There is confusion throughout the ranks and an extraordinary loss of morale and incentive. That was the result of the Goss appointment at the CIA. Now. we see that Goss is being pushed out. And they are trying to bring back the guy. Kappes. in fact it looks like he will be coming back. that Gosss chief of staff essentially pushed out. He got in a confrontation and Kappes said. the person with great experience said. I am out of here. - But a recent Post article of today. looking back on this period. said. former and current intelligence officers say Goss never had a strategic plan for improving spying on terrorist networks. I think it is also important to note another recent development with respect to people who were brought in at the top of the CIA. because another one of those people was a gentleman by the name of Kyle "Dusty" Foggo. It says. and I am quoting from a very recent Washington Post story. other Goss lieutenants at the agency also appear to be on the way out following Goss. who resigned Friday. Kyle "Dusty" Foggo. brought in by Goss as the CIAs Executive Director. number 3 official. announced to agency staff in an email yesterday he plans to resign as well. The FBI said it is investigating whether Foggo steered contracts to a friend. Brent R. Wilkes. People may recognize that name. Wilkes. He is the defense contractor who got caught up in the Duke Cunningham bribery scandal that we all know about and is an example of what is wrong in this House. So these people who are at the CIA were appointed by this administration. I do not think it gives people confidence to know that the same people who appointed Michael Brown as the. head of FEMA were the people who made these appointments to the CIA. an agency the American people depend on to gather good intelligence for our security. And yet we have been a rubber stamp in that area. And the 9/11 Commission report continues to give us a D. And this Congress deserves a D because the Republican leadership has not done anything. Until we get our act together with respect to conducting serious oversight in the intelligence area. we are going to continue to get policies that are not based on fact. but instead policies that are based on the world as people would like to see them. not the world as it really is. In this dayland age. we need people who are cleareyed and can see the world as it is. because that is necessary for our national security. I yield.