The Hayden Nomination

President Bush has nominated Gen. Michael Hayden to replace outgoing CIA Director Porter Goss. Expect Democrats to try and turn this into an investigation on the NSA eavesdropping program, on which Hayden was a strong proponent and defender. The NY Times believes that Hayden may be in for a tough fight. Nothing wrong with a good fight if the facts trump the inane soundbites that will inevitably fill the airwaves about how having a general running CIA is a bad thing or that since Hayden was involved in the NSA eavesdropping program he shouldn't be running CIA.

Ann Althouse notes that this is great opportunity for the Senate to hash things out over the eavesdropping program, and if that doesn't come to pass, it would likely be because the Democrats realize that it wouldn't be a winning issue for them.

Well, really, why isn't this the perfect occasion to hash it out about the program? If it is not made a central issue in the confirmation, I think I'm going to assume that the critics believe that airing the issue will hurt them.

Hot Air has more on the Hayden pick, and possible pans by some GOPers.

Considering that the CIA has done a bad job on major issues of our generation - from knowing what was going on behind the Iron Curtain to international terrorism, the pick of a general whose expertise includes the use of new technologies to intercept and track down terrorists makes sense. However, some of the GOPers panning the pick are wondering whether it's a good idea for a military guy to run the CIA.

MacRanger is positively enthused by this selection. He's hoping for a continuation of the cleanup at CIA and that Hayden's selection will further clear out the deadwood. AJ Strata is also confident about Hayden's chances and looks forward to this encounter:

Hoekstra is just afraid to have the debate we are going to have anyway. We need to engage the conspiracy theorists and set the record straight. We need to show America the liberal fringe is only good at exposing true national security secrets, wrapped up in fantasy conspiracies, to win votes. Whoever got the idea they could expose the NSA Terrorist Surveillance Program to help Democrats put us all in serious danger. So cowering is not an option when the Democrats plan to investigate this program if they take back the house. Better lance this boil now.

No, I have not changed my mind about Hoekstra, and everytime he opens his mouth he digs his hole deeper.

Democrats and the media will obviously latch onto Hoekstra's concerns, but they truly are unpersuasive. If there's one thing that the CIA needs right now, and that's discipline among the ranks.

Meanwhile, Tom Maguire notes that Goss may have been pushed aside because he was resisting a push by the Administration to get the CIA out of analysis and to focus solely on intel gathering.

Porter J. Goss, who was forced to resign Friday, was seen as an obstacle to an effort by John D. Negroponte, the director of national intelligence, to focus the agency on its core mission of combating terrorism and stealing secrets abroad. General Hayden, who will be nominated to the post on Monday, is currently Mr. Negroponte's deputy, and he is regarded as an enthusiastic champion of the agency's adoption of that narrower role.

A senior intelligence official said that General Hayden, in a recent presentation to the President's Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board, had sharply criticized Mr. Goss for resisting that transformation. Mr. Goss was seen as trying to protect the C.I.A.'s longtime role as government's premier center for intelligence analysis, but under General Hayden, who is currently Mr. Negroponte's top deputy, much of that function is intended to move elsewhere.

Curious. Very curious. Could it be that Goss was actually trying to preserve the bureaucracy he was supposed to be reforming or that the Administration wasn't happy with the pace of that reformation?

UPDATE:
Former Spook likes the nomination but is worried about his chances in the confirmation hearing. He also debunks the so-called concerns about Hayden's uniform:

Others are "concerned" about Hayden's status as an active duty military officer, fearing that it will give the military "too much control" over the nation's intelligence community.

As we pointed out yesterday, such "concerns" are basically a red herring. The Pentagon has long controlled the bulk of the nation's intelligence budget; afterall, they provide most of our collection assets. Additionally, there is a long history of military officers leading intelligence agencies; both the NSA director's job and the Director of the Defense Intelligence Agency are, by law, military positions. And, in the early days of the CIA, the agency's first three directors were uniformed officers. Even the CIA's current deputy director is a Navy admiral, though that will apparently become a civilian billet, with Hayden coming onboard.

UPDATE:
Plenty of reaction coming in, including Flopping Aces and Confederate Yankee debunking the early leftwing attempt at scuttling this nominee - a supposed link to Rep. Duke Cunningham (R-CA), who was tossed in the clink for fraud and corruption.

Meanwhile, the Number 3 at CIA is quitting. Kyle "Dusty" Foggo, the CIA's executive director, announced his resignation today.

CIA Director Porter Goss' No. 3 man at the agency, facing investigation as part of a congressional bribe probe, quit Monday, an official said.

Kyle "Dusty" Foggo, the CIA's executive director, announced his resignation in an e-mail message to agency staff, a U.S. official told United Press International on condition of anonymity.

His departure follows Goss' hasty resignation Friday, which some reports have linked to the broadening bribe probe centered on disgraced former California GOP Congressman Randall "Duke" Cunningham.

The White House denied that Friday. "It is simply not true that (Goss') resignation is in anyway connected with the Cunningham case," White House spokeswoman Erin Healy told UPI.