What is the purpose of the CIA? Last I heard, it was the CIAs job to overthrow governments. Has a new purpose been officially stated by a spokes person on behalf of the agency or an authority over the agency?

A quick side-bar question:

How many members of Congress were formerly affiliated with the CIA?

Is that classified or public domain?

The purpose of the CIA is to make the world safe for large corporations. Always has been. Always will be.

It all started with the National Security Act of 1947, which essentially laid the groundwork for inventing enemies and making new ones...
Full Text here....
http://www.intelligence.gov/0-natsecact_1947.shtml

From Bill Moyer's fine PBS show...
http://www.wanttoknow.info/050423secretgovernment








And this has gone on and on...

The Patriot Act was frosting on the cake really.

As a footnote to the CIA sponsored overthrow of Mohammad Mossedeqh, the US operative was Kermit Roosevelt, grandson of Teddy.

Thanks Fellow Democrat. I'll read the details later.

For now, do you know if the state department determines threats for the CIA, or does the CIA determine threats internally?

I thought the CIA had lost quite a bit of power since Rumsfeld set up his own intelligence office in the Pentagon.

Plus, what is the purpose of the National Intelligence Director - the position that John Negroponte holds?

It may have lost power, but I'm curious about the goals. If the goals of the CIA is not in the best interest of the U.S., we should be reconsidering if we need a CIA.

This was just more overreaction to 9/11 and a turn for the worst. The National Intelligence Director (NID) was a move to consolidate the power of intelligence agencies. This was supposed to be the solution to lack of communication between intelligence agencies. I don't think it will help intelligence agencies do their job any better. It will give all of the agencies a combined tunnel vision. It won't stop the next 9/11, but it will make the job of using doctored intelligence to sell illegal wars easier. It will also make tyranny easier because any intelligence agencies that don't play along will have their budget cut by the NID.

Another side-bar:

"Knowledge will forever govern ignorance, a people who mean to be their own governors, must arm themselves with the power knowledge gives."
--James Madison (Fourth President of the United States)

Whatever became of the Government Information Awareness project?

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2003/gia.html

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title...ation_Awareness

http://www.foresight.gov.uk/Previous_Proje...paul_miller.pdf

Not sure what you're asking here, Bill...

Are you asking if the former Congressmen were active in classified roles or public roles?

Or are you asking if the information is classified or in the public domain?

At any rate, I guess I have an inherent problem with former intel guys functioning in Congress where they have some input and control into the funding, policy, oversight (or lack of it), as well as its masking, and also possibly in public disinformation roles, of agencies that are so clearly involved in foreign (and, yes, domestic) activities, both overt and covert.

Let's ask Cincinnatus what he thinks...

The latter.

I sorry got you mixed up with fellowDemocrat

The first link is how it officially began. The second link is what it has become. Obviously it unofficially began before the drafting of the act. The question is: did it begin with a hidden agenda, or an open agenda. I prefer to deal with the open agenda. We can speculate till eternity as to if there was a hidden agenda or what that hidden agenda was.

There's no question that there were hidden agendas throughout the history of the organization. And when I say hidden, I don't just mean classified. I mean not in the best interest of the constitutional government. Corporations are the benefactors of endless war, regardless of if it was meant to be that way or not. Corporate rule is not in the best interest of the constitutional government. So there is no question that some actions of the CIA, if not the motives have been and perhaps are still corrupt.

There has been obvious attempts to correct the motives of the CIA, mainly in 1975 as pointed out in the PBS article. I'm sure there were many times throughout it's history when the motives were questioned from within. How well questions were received is unknown.

So in dealing with the open agenda, I've listed the motives from the most to the least constitutional IMHO:

1) Early warning defense (barriers and alarms)
2) Spying (suspicion and verification)
4) Reactionary distrust (fear of actions)
5) Pre-emptive distrust (fear of motives)
6) Misinformation as counter-espionage (reaction to fear)
7) Sabotage (bigger-reaction to fear)
8) Corporate defense (protecting American corporations against foreign threats)
9) Fascist defense (protecting American against foreign and domestic threats)
10) Tyranny (Protecting private interest against all threats)

Assuming that the CIA contains a little of all these motives, each can be dealt with in the open.

You should make a distinction between the INTELLIGENCE gathering sector of the CIA and the COVERT OPS sector of the CIA.

I know COVERT OPS are used for sabotage, misinformation, and assassinations as well. But isn't gathering intelligence a covert operation as well? Wasn't that one of the complaints of the 9/11 commission, lack of human intelligence agent infiltration in the middle east?

With an emphasis on ASSASSINATIONS.

I don't think the gathering of information is a bad idea. Hell, it beats setting policy based on hearing from God.

Killing people is another matter entirely.

We need domestic and foreign policies and programs that facilitates openness in all domestic and foreign goverments. The first step is to stop being a Bully.

One of the longest running threads on





c



One of the longest running threads on CGCS, In Defense of an Open Society,
which actually was brought over from the Kerry Blog, addresses many of these issues from a different perspective. I'm in the process of moving and getting rid
of three fourths of my Books. One of the ones, I had to stop and consider as a
keeper was, a dingy paperback entitled Open Education :A Sourcebook for Parents and Teachers, Banton, 1972. This is still state of the art education technology which is struggleing to make its way into our schools and communities.
If the Educational and Political Leadership had been able to engage the general
population in this reform...we might might have a very different world right now.
Open Education and an Open Society reduces the need for police and military
protection.




c

This would reduce the need for a CIA. However, in the event of a threat, there still is that question of how vulnerable are we willing to be. How much are we willing to trust even if we are doing everything in our power to avoid giving foreign nations a reason to attack us?

The more you invest in trust, the greater the potential pay-off but also
the greater the risk. So with intense short-term risk buy extra protection.
For long-term risk, invest in building capacity.

But as long as most people think that our foreign policy should include a certain amount of distrust, we will have a need for a CIA or something similar.

I agree.

http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/Octob...6/231006CIA.htm

Interesting video.

The guy at the end suggested that political intelligence becomes a function of the State department. I'm not sure how that would work. It is obvious that the state department is more important in the changing world than the defense department. The State department needs to be more connected with the will of the general public.

I think the general public feels that the CIA is a necessary evil to serve some unknown purpose vital to the countries survival. The general public doesn't want to know the cost either. But if the general public were to just ask the simple question of who does the CIA serve, it could lead to a dissolving of the agency.

Without knowing what motive led to the creation of the agency, we could make the exact same mistakes with a new agency. If it is as simple as serving big money interest and exploitation, then the focus should be on the corrupt money structure and not so much the agencies defending it.