This is a good piece of reportage on how the career intelligence experts in the government recaptured some degree of autonomy and insulation in recent years and used that freedom of movement to produce the National Intelligence Estimate on Iran. Interesting stuff, not least for the glimpses into how politicized intelligence was in the run-up to Iraq, and how frustrated various Bush administration luminaries have been with their recent inability to exert iron-fisted control over our agencies.
