An interesting note by Big Lizards which I did not think about:

I think the point folks are missing here is… so who cares if Hayden can be confirmed? Bush has only two and a half years left in office… and he retains (and knows how to use) the power of the recess appointment.

Look at John Bolton; I think President Bush knew that Bolton had a high chance of being filibustered by an increasingly beligerent and power-drunk Senate Democratic caucus.

But he also knew that he could recess-appoint Bolton to be ambassador to the U.N…. and that he would be taken just as seriously as if he had been confirmed, because everybody knows that Bush intends to keep him there for the duration. (Recall also, for a bad but still illustrative example, the odd case of Bill Lann Lee.)

By the same reasoning, it makes no difference whether Hayden is confirmed or not: if he isn’t, Bush will call a huge press conference to give him a recess appointment — saying that even if the Democrats take national security and intelligence gathering lightly, George W. Bush does not… and we cannot allow a deadly gap to exist at the highest level of the CIA. Bush would make plain that he will keep reappointing Hayden to the job so long as he remains unconfirmed, except in the case that the Senate actually takes up the nomination and formally votes to reject it (which won’t happen).

Hayden gets the job; he has full power, because everybody knows he’s going to be there until January, 2009, just as if he were confirmed; and the Democrats look like feckless jerks, all at the same time. A triple bank shot!

This is different from appointing judges. Federal judges and Supreme Court justices are appointed for life; it is a major portion of the president’s power to create a lasting legacy… barring the possibility that John Roberts may decide to go skiing and pull a Sonny Bono, he will sit on the high court for decades. A recess appointment is much less satisfactory, because the judge will be “gone like yesterday” as soon as the president leaves (if not sooner).

But political appointees come in clutching the coattails of the president, and they leave the same way. Even if confirmed, Hayden would likely be replaced when the next president arrives

Some are afraid of this kind of confirmation fight because we all know Feingold will pull out all the stops to try to smear Hayden and in so doing, the Bush administration.

I have a different opinion tho. I think it would provide more ammunition for the Republicans come November by showing what the Democrats really think of National Security and our ability to listen in on Al-Qaeda. A majority of this country believes we should have that ability so I say let them bring it on.

And as Dadydd stated, Bush could also recess appoint him until the end of his term.

Win/Win.

A side note to this whole story has to be the eminent Dana Priest, the one tied so close to those who leaked national security to further her career, the one married to a avowed Communist apologist, has written a piece where….are you ready? She talks crap about Goss and how he led the CIA. I know, I know…hard to believe.

But as he walked out the glass doors of Langley headquarters yesterday, Goss left behind an agency that current and former intelligence officials say is weaker operationally, with a workforce demoralized by an exodus of senior officers and by uncertainty over its role in fighting terrorism and other intelligence priorities, said current and former intelligence officials.

Almost fell out of my chair laughing on that paragraph and that was just the beginning. The person whose career was made on these leakers is complaining about her treasonous contacts being forced out. Oh, don’t forget that some former intelligence officials are bitching about it also. Wonder who they are…cough VIP cough.

This lady is the person who has written countless anti-administration stories from information supplied by proven left-wing Democratic shills put in place during Clinton’s years. Now she prints a story, written almost entirely with “anonymous” sources inside the CIA, that attempts to protray the CIA as actually a pro-administration organization that was done in by a partisan Goss…..Puhlease. How freakin dumb does she think we are?

This lady is the person who has written countless anti-administration stories from information supplied by proven left-wing Democratic shills put in place during Clinton’s years. Now she prints a story, written almost entirely with “anonymous” sources inside the CIA, that attempts to protray the CIA as actually a pro-administration organization that was done in by a partisan Goss…..Puhlease. How freakin dumb does she think we are?