No pass for Hayden.

Byline: The Register-Guard

President Bush has proclaimed that Gen. Michael Hayden is "the right man to lead the CIA at this critical moment in our nation's history." The U.S. Senate must reclaim the oversight role that it abandoned after Sept. 11, 2001, and challenge that dubious assumption as it considers Hayden's nomination.

So far, Republicans and Democrats alike have expressed reservations. Rep. Peter Hoekstra, the Michigan Republican who heads the House Intelligence Committee, has called Bush's choice to succeed CIA Director Porter Goss "the wrong person, the wrong place, at the wrong time."

Yet the congressional tough talk may wilt in the face of the inevitable Rovian offensive that will seek to steamroll opposition and secure a swift and perfunctory confirmation for Hayden.

Americans should hope that doesn't happen. One need only reflect briefly on the Bush administration's mismanagement and manipulation of this nation's intelligence bureaucracy to be wary of any candidate for the CIA nominated by the current occupant of the Oval Office.

Hayden's resume raises significant concerns. Currently the deputy director of national intelligence under John Negroponte, Hayden was the principal architect of the National Security Agency's secret, warrantless domestic spying program and has been one of its most prominent defenders. Hayden insists that the program is legal even though it clearly circumvents the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, which specifically prohibits warrantless surveillance.

Then there's the troubling prospect of an Air Force general heading a civilian intelligence agency at a time when Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld has vastly expanded the Pentagon's intelligence network. To be sure, the CIA has had military people in charge before, most recently Adm. Stansfield Turner under President Jimmy Carter. But it's unclear whether Gen. Hayden would stand up to Rumsfeld and his fellow generals in the Pentagon when, not if, they encroach on the CIA. Nor is it clear, based on Hayden's enthusiastic and unqualified defense of the NSA program, whether he would stand up to President Bush when it comes to keeping the CIA within its constitutional limits.

Even though Hayden has considerable intelligence experience, he would come to the CIA directorship as an outsider. That's probably an unwelcome prospect to employees of an agency that has suffered a severe loss of morale and talent under another outsider, Porter Goss. At this critical juncture in the troubled agency's history, Bush might have been wiser to select a career CIA veteran who better understands what the agency must do to heal from the wounds of Goss' "housecleaning," as well as the deeper wounds stemming from the agency's pre-Sept. 11 and pre-Iraq war intelligence failures.

Congress must scrutinize the Hayden nomination intensely. And when the confirmation hearings are finished, lawmakers should remember their constitutionally mandated responsibility to oversee the nation's intelligence system.

America's national security - and its most treasured freedoms - depend on such vigilance.