The Stink of Politics Surrounds Lake Departure

Afrustrated and embittered Anthony Lake has withdrawn himself as President Clinton’s nominee for director of Central Intelligence with a stinging denunciation of the “political circus” staged by his critics on the Senate Intelligence Committee. Lake was nominated three months ago and the committee, both before and during its formal hearings, had full opportunity to research and question the nominee and identify any disqualifying trait in his character or performance. Had the committee been allowed to vote this week it almost certainly would have approved Lake’s nomination. But Chairman Richard C. Shelby (R-Ala.) was not interested in a vote. His game was to prolong a process that had already become essentially repetitive and sterile. His goal was to kill the Lake nomination, and he succeeded.

That Lake was not the strongest candidate for the job was clear from the beginning. His experiences as an academic and in government service had not given him the administrative background that’s preferred for anyone overseeing the nation’s multifaceted, $29-billion-a-year intelligence operations. Further, Lake was burdened with some heavy political baggage, especially his failure to inform congressional intelligence committees about the Clinton administration’s tacit approval of Iranian arms shipments to Bosnia. More recently, Lake was made to look bad for apparently knowing too little about how the National Security Council, which he headed during Clinton’s first term, might have been connected to dubious political fund-raising activities for the president’s reelection campaign. These are all blemishes. But neither singly nor together would they ordinarily be considered disqualifying.

Until now, the Intelligence Committee had been regarded as something of a model of bipartisan cooperation. Does the treatment of Lake signal a change in that tradition, or does it reflect not much more than the abiding if never explained personal animus of the committee chairman and a few of his colleagues to the nominee? Lake, in his withdrawal letter, expressed the concern that the politicizing of the confirmation process meant that the CIA itself might again become compromised by external political interference. That is a danger that must be vigorously and vigilantly resisted. A strong, independent-minded and respected director of Central Intelligence is the first line of defense against the threat of political intrusion, whether that threat comes from the White House or Congress.