WP: Dissent on Intelligence Is Critical, Report Says

[Hissyspit]

Dissent if valuable. Can you say 'duhhh...'?

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A11145-2005Mar29.html
Dissent on Intelligence Is Critical, Report Says
Commission's Ideas Diverge From Planned Centralization

By Walter Pincus and Peter Baker
Washington Post Staff Writers
Wednesday, March 30, 2005; Page A01

A presidential commission assigned to look into the intelligence failures leading up to the Iraq war will recommend a series of changes intended to encourage more dissent within the nation's spy agencies and better organize the government's multi-tentacled fight against terrorism, officials said yesterday.

In a report to be made public tomorrow, the officials said, the panel will propose more competitive analysis and information-sharing by intelligence agencies, improved tradecraft training, more "devil's advocacy" in the formation of national intelligence estimates and the appointment of an intelligence ombudsman to hear from analysts who believe their work has been compromised.

The report will also suggest the creation of a new national nonproliferation center to coordinate the fight against weapons of mass destruction, according to officials who have read the 700-page classified version of the report and declined to be identified because it has not been released. But unlike the trend toward greater centralization enshrined in a new intelligence law signed by President Bush, the report envisions the center as a facilitating body and urges the government to keep its specialists dispersed in various intelligence agencies.

The net result, according to officials, would be to move away from the intelligence community's tradition of searching for consensus, in favor of opening up internal debate and including a more diverse spectrum of views. The goal is to provide policymakers a fuller understanding of the state of the government's knowledge.

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[ClintonTyree]

1. There can be dissent out the wazoo......................

and if no one listens to it, what does it matter?
The idiots in the White House have a one track mind. They've made up their minds before the fucking thing begins, so dissent is going to make a difference?
The White House "doesn't do" dissent. That is painfully obvious to anyone paying attention.

[teryang]

2. Pathetic PR posturing by oppresive despotism

Whoever thought this up is diabolically clever:

"The goal is to provide policymakers a fuller understanding of the state of the government's knowledge."

Suuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuurrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrreeeeeee it is.

[Hissyspit]

3. This shows up AFTER the purging of dissenters from the CIA...

What a joke.

[Hissyspit]

4. It's supposed to say 'Dissent IS valuable in my sardonic introduction...

typo