In choosing Leon E. Panetta to be the next CIA director, President-elect Barack Obama appears to have concluded that a spy chief who understands politics may be better equipped to carry out the incoming administration’s national security agenda than one who understands espionage.

The surprise selection of Panetta, a former California congressman and chief of staff to President Clinton, would give Obama a CIA director with loyalty to the White House and an experienced managerial hand to steer the administration away from potential intelligence scandals.

But it runs the risk of putting an outsider at the helm of the CIA just as it seems to be regaining its footing after years of criticism over intelligence failures leading up to the Sept. 11 attacks and the Iraq war, and for aggressive interrogation tactics used in their aftermath.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-obama-cia-panetta6-2009jan06,0,5514283.story

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