This New York Times story, in which former CIA official Glen Carle says that he was told by Bush officials to gather information to help discredit Juan Cole, who had emerged as a prominent war critic at that point, is pretty astonishing.
In an interview, Mr. Carle said his supervisor at the National Intelligence Council told him in 2005 that White House officials wanted “to get” Professor Cole, and made clear that he wanted Mr. Carle to collect information about him, an effort Mr. Carle rebuffed. Months later, Mr. Carle said, he confronted a C.I.A. official after learning of another attempt to collect information about Professor Cole. Mr. Carle said he contended at the time that such actions would have been unlawful.
There are a couple of interesting questions remaining here--chief among them the question of whether or not this happened to anyone else. But this is also a reminder of how firmly the Bush administration believed that policing ideology was an appropriate use of presidential power. It's also something to keep in mind next time conservatives start howling about Obama having an "enemies list."
Greg Sargent reports that the Senate Intelligence Committee is planning to look into the matter:
“The Committee is looking into this,” Dianne Feinstein, the chair of the intel committee, said in a statement sent my way. “Depending on what we find, we may take further action.”
I want to emphasize that some kind of investigation is necessary, even if it ultimately turns out that the CIA didn't do anything illegal. Prior to the Church Committee of the 1970s, the CIA was literally opening Americans' mail in secret. At minimum, an investigation will have the deterrent effect of reminding the CIA that there are lines they aren't ever allowed to cross.
This is also a reminder of why the new FBI investigation guidelines are so disturbing. Liberals might comfort themselves with the idea that the Obama administration isn't nearly as petty or reckless, but this is silly. The fact is that it's a bad idea to give government agencies charged with the responsibility of protecting the country a free hand to gather information on anyone they want, without having to account for why doing so is necessary. It doesn't matter who is in charge.
