Opinion: In today’s pages: Fannie, Freddie, farm aid, fees
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UCLA’s Amy Zegart says we’re still vulnerable to terrorism:
CIA Director Michael V. Hayden finally declassified 19 pages of the agency’s voluminous internal 9/11 review on Tuesday. Now we know why the CIA fought Congress to keep that report deep-sixed for the last two years: It points fingers, outlining exactly who screwed up and how. At the top of the hit list: former CIA Director George J. Tenet, former clandestine service chief James L. Pavitt and former Counterterrorism Center Director J. Cofer Black....It’s comforting and easy to find fault with a few men at the top. But the ugly reality is that 9/11 stemmed from a far more frightening cause: the inability of our entire intelligence system to adapt to the rise of terrorism after the Cold War ended. Organizational breakdown, not individual error, is the key to understanding what went wrong -- and what is still wrong six years later.
Columnist Rosa Brooks argues that Bush’s thinking on Iraq will lead us to another Vietnam instead of preventing one. Columnist Joel Stein offers his take on farm aid. And UC San Diego’s Christopher Thornberg looks at the history of Fannie and Freddie to figure out their future.
The editorial board asks who will control the North Pole after Russia’s land grab, and tells the city to give advice to homeowners instead of bailouts. Finally, the editorial board laments that ticket fees are here to stay, even if Live Nation splits from Ticketmaster.
Readers respond to The Times’ series on memory. Mar Vista’s Susan Black-Feinstein exclaims, ‘What is the world coming to? Using the front page of The Times to headline a series on biology and medical science research and discovery? There is hope for the world!’