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Is Panetta Right For The Cia?

Dianne Feinstein and Jay Rockefeller are unhappy with Obama's surprise choice of Leon Panetta to run the CIA. The beef is that a CIA director should be an intelligence professional without a political background.

On the other hand, George Tenet was an outwardly nonpartisan intelligence staffer for years before he was chosen to lead the agency. And we all know how that turned out. 

The flap over Panetta's selection obscures, incidentally, the arrival of another senior Clinton administration veteran high in the Obama team. Panetta was no cheerleader for Hillary during the campaign, to be sure--but he still doesn't exactly represent the future of the Democratic party. 

--Michael Crowley