CIA fulfills fantasies

Tim Weiner author of Legacy of Ashes the History of the CIA was on C Span Book TV (I don't know when but the link leads to a video of the show). He defends the CIA because he says that all the bad things the CIA ever did was just following the direct orders of the President. He says Kennedy read James Bond books and saw himself in that role when he planned coups to overthrow countries. The ways the CIA planned to kill Castro were indeed 007 mentality, even the employing of Mafia members (can you ever get back out of bed with them?) and the author thinks the assassination of Kennedy may well have be retaliation by Castro. He didn't talk on air about Reagan using the CIA to sell drugs to finance the contras but his central theme was that the CIA directly serves the President and they never raise their hands to volunteer for illegal activities. My assumption is that Bush sees himself as a misunderstood cowboy saving the world and his fantasy life dictates the current techniques.

Tim Weiner is a journalist for the New York Times and has reported on the CIA for twenty years. Mr. Weiner received a Pulitzer Prize for his reportage of secret spending by the Pentagon in 1998 while working for the Philadelphia Inquirer. He is the author of "Blank Check: The Pentagon's Black Budget" and co-author of Betrayal: The Story of Aldrich Ames, an American Spy