A friend writes:
A couple interesting things: first, with Hoekstra coming out against the Hayden nomination (or at least not fully supporting it), it's clear that the administration really screwed up by not clearing the next guy with congressional leaders. Another intra-party failure, and makes you wonder who on earth is doing congressional outreach from the White House. Also, this is just speculation, but I would guess that the objection to Hayden from the Hill isn't really about him being active military, but about the likelihood of unbelievably contentious confirmation hearings. The Bushies don't have to worry about confirmation fallout, but everybody who's up for reelection in the fall will, and I think they recognize the impending carnage if the NSA wiretapping stuff comes front and center for a month.I agree. Figured it was easier just to pass along my friend's analysis.
In terms of competence, Hayden probably isn't a bad choice -- as Deputy Director of National Intelligence (DNI), one has to assume he's close to Negroponte (the director), and it would do a lot to erase friction between CIA and the DNI, which I imagine was a large part of the White House calculation. They can't pick another partisan after Goss was such a disaster, and an internal promotion might maintain tension between CIA and DNI... which probably doesn't leave a lot of options. But the confirmation hearings will be a firestorm regardless.
Also, and it seems that even the Washington press corps recognizes this, but the Goss resignation is pretty unprecedented, and I can't wait to see what the real story is, 'cause it smells like something big.
