ProgressiveDem: Ethically Challenged Porter Goss To Co-Chair Office of Congressional Ethics
Ethically Challenged Porter Goss To Co-Chair Office of Congressional Ethics
When I read the list of names of those appointed to the new Office of Congressional Ethics (more about that in a minute) and saw the former member of Congress and former head of the CIA, Porter Goss, as co-chairman, I wondered whether Nancy Pelosi had lost her mind or appointed him as a joke. What could she have been thinking?
As for the Office of Congressional Ethics, that's an oxymoron, since some of those who voted for the unconstitutional FISA bill received contributions from the telecoms that got immunity, which does rather make the office a laughingstock.
For more about it check out The Hill'sarticle, which included this about Goss: "The appointment of Goss, a prickly personality who left the CIA after a short, turbulent tenure, surprised even some Republican members of Congress. Several shook their heads in disbelief when told he was named to the board.
"While he was chairman of the House intelligence committee, Goss opposed launching an investigation into the Valerie Plame CIA leak case."
And he's the co-chairman of this new office. What a hoot and what a terrible apointment.
From TPM comes this: "For those who may not recall, Goss' disastrous run as CIA chief ended with his abrupt resignation in 2006, shortly after the FBI raided the home and office of the then-No. 3 at CIA, Dusty Foggo, who was later indicted as part of the Brent Wilkes/Duke Cunningham corruption scandal."
And from a prior TPM Muckraker: "Over the weekend, the media had a field day speculating about Friday's sudden, unannounced, unexplained resignation of former CIA Director Porter Goss. Was it because of a turf battle? Was his ouster somehow connected to Hookergate? Was Goss wrapped up in the FBI's investigation of the Wilkes-Foggo-Cunningham poker/prostitute/bribe saga?
"Goss promoted to Executive Director Kyle "Dusty" Foggo, the CIA man directly implicated in the scandal, now under investigation by the FBI and the CIA's own inspector general. Did Goss's flat refusal to fire Dusty make his position atop the CIA unsustainable? It could well have been the straw that broke the camel's back, for Negroponte, or Goss -- or both.
"At worst, folks suspect he went to a couple of Wilkes' card games, mainly to show his face.
"But his involvement appears to have been enough to help drag him out of the director's seat. And when you add the details up -- hiring Foggo despite his past; refusing to take action when Foggo was clearly crossing boundaries; Cunningham carrying out misdeeds from Goss' intelligence committee; and now a key committee staffer tied into the Wilkes' party circuit -- it's clearly enough to warrant at least curiosity from the FBI. How could so much be going on around him -- right underneath his nose -- without his doing anything about it?"
And this is the person Pelosi acquiesced to as co-chair of the ethics office: the ethically challenged, unqualified as a CIA director who resigned under a cloud, Porter Goss? Is she daft? In addition to arrogantly dismissing the will of the American people by taking impeachment off the table, with this terrible appointment she shows that she is clearly not fit to be Speaker of the House.
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