Monday, September 21, 2009
Michael Hayden
President Barack Obama’s willingness to follow the tradition of allowing the Senate GOP leader to appoint members to two oversight boards has government watchdogs upset. Senator Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has chosen former aide and energy lobbyist Scott O’Malia to sit on the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) and Michael V. Hayden, who headed the National Security Agency under President George W. Bush, to the Public Interest Declassification Board. In both cases, the appointees’ previous work has raised concerns because they contradict the missions of their new oversight bodies.
In addition to working for McConnell for nine years, O’Malia was an energy lobbyist for Mirant, an Atlanta-based electricity company that was a key player in the Enron-driven energy crisis in California. Mirant was found to have intentionally withheld electricity from the state in order to help drive up prices. As a commissioner for the CFTC, O’Malia will now help regulate the trading of energy futures.
As for Hayden, he will now help advise President Obama on declassification policy—even though the former four-star general oversaw the Bush administration’s unauthorized electronic surveillance program as head of the NSA. “To this day, the NSA continues to conceal virtually all information about the warrantless wiretapping program,” Jameel Jaffer, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s National Security Project, told The Washington Post. “As CIA director, General Hayden claimed that destruction of waterboarding tapes was ‘in line with the law.’”
Also, Hayden has stated publicly that he was not in favor of the Obama administration’s decision to release the Justice Department memos authorizing torture techniques against terrorism suspects.
-Noel Brinkerhoff
Trading Places: From Ex-Lobbyist to Market Watchdog (by David Corn and Daniel Schulman, Mother Jones)
Bush-Era Official's Appointment to Declassification Panel Draws Fire (By Ellen Nakashima, Washington Post)
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