When director of national intelligence Dennis Blair, defending the CIA's not informing Congress of an anti-al Qaeda assassination program, told The Washington Post, "It was a judgment call" and that "we believe in erring on the side of working with the Hill as a partner," was he creating a new precedent for the intelligence community? For decades, the CIA and other intelligence agencies have often taken the less-said-the-better road when it comes to keeping Congress posted on its doings.This hasn't always been an ideological or partisan matter. Washington geezers should recall that back in the 1980s, Senator Barry Goldwater, the die-hard conservative Republican chair of the Senate intelligence committee, often decried Bill Casey, Ronald Reagan's CIA chief, for not being forthcoming with the committee.

So when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says the CIA has lied to her or when it turns out that an assassination program--operational or not--has not been briefed to Congress, it really ought not to be a big surprise. There are plenty of hard-working, diligent folks at the CIA,and I imagine some might have argued that the assassination program ought to have been shared with the agency's congressional overseers. Yet institutionally, the CIA has frequently been more tight-lipped than it should have--which is, of course, a natural tendency for spies and covert operators.

And when you throw into the mix Dick Cheney, who reportedly urged that this program be kept secret from Capitol Hill, the inclination to keep legislators out of the loop probably increases by a factor of 10--or 100.

There's still a lot not known about this kill-al-Qaeda program, as Slate points out. But that Post article reports that it was dormant but about to be reactivated. Thus, it was brought to CIA director Leon Panetta's attention--but months after he had taken the job. He then quickly notified Congress that Congress had never been notified about it. And since then, the rest of us have been left to puzzle over what really went on with this project.

Which brings me to this point: it would not be too hard for a congressional intelligence committee to mount a quick probe to determine what did happen and to produce a report safe for public consumption. WIthout disclosing all the details of the program--some of which might have to remain classified--the House or Senate intelligence panel certainly could tell the public what Cheney's role was in keeping the program from Congress and examine whether the CIA violated any laws (or just good Washington manners) by doing so.

This dust-up has generated a lot of smoke this past week. The public deserves some light. Will Congress deliver?

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In the latest issue of The New Yorker, CIA chief Leon Panetta says of Dick Cheney:

I think he smells some blood in the water on the national-security issue. It's almost, a little bit, gallows politics. When you read behind it, it's almost as if he's wishing that this country would be attacked again, in order to make his point. I think that's dangerous politics.

Cheney today struck back, saying, "I hope my old friend Leon was misquoted."

Hours later, the CIA put out a statement:

The Director does not believe the former vice president wants an attack. He did not say that. He was simply expressing his profound disagreement with the assertion that President Obama's security policies have made our country less safe. Nor did he question anyone's motives.

This explanation hung on a thin reed: that Panetta had said that it was almost as if Cheney wanted another attack, not that he actually desired one. Still, it did look as if Panetta had been brushed back by Cheney.

And Chris Matthews, Michael Isikoff, and I sliced and diced this episode on Hardball:

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With one hand, he giveth, with the other....

By tapping Leon Panetta to be CIA chief, Barack Obama sent a clear signal: no to torture. A year ago, Panetta wrote an article declaring, "We cannot and we must not use torture under any circumstances." And he included waterboarding--which the CIA has used---as torture. In fact, Obama's reported first choice for the CIA job, John Brennan, a career CIA official, had had his chances scuttled after bloggers and others griped that he had been soft, if not supportive, when it came to torture and CIA renditions. A New Yorker piece by Jane Mayer identified him as a "supporter" of so-called enhanced interrogation methods. And in a 2006 PBS interview, Brennan said, "we do have to take off the gloves in some areas" but without going so far as to "forever tarnish the image of the United States abroad." He added that the "dark side has its limits."

Well, Brennan didn't get the top post at Langley. But Obama has selected him to be his chief counterterrorism adviser in the White House. The job requires no Senate confirmation. So Brennan will not be inconvenienced by questions regarding any past involvement with CIA renditions and waterboarding. (Brennan has reportedly told Obama he had no direct role in CIA's abusive interrogation policies and even internally expressed reservations.)

Is this another sign of the Big O's pragmatism? Brennan, no doubt, knows plenty on the subject of counterterrorism. And he has called for breaking with the Bush policy on Iran and the Middle East. For instance, he has criticized Bush and his aides for unduly bashing Iran. But tapping him does partially negate the message conveyed by the Panetta pick.

I think people are going to have to get used to this sort of Obama give-and-take. Critics certainly don't have to accept it. But they should expect more of these sorts of episodes. I assume there will be plenty of other instances when Obama will exasperate and hearten his supporters simultaneously. (And don't forget about Rick Warren.) In this particular case, Obama supporters can only hope that Brennan will now use whatever experience he collected on "the dark side" for the forces of good.

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Yesterday, I posted a piece noting that Leon Panetta, Barack Obama's choice as CIA director, could draw opposition from CIA insiders and vets because he has been a fierce foe of waterboarding (a torture tactic used by the CIA), has advocated greater congressional oversight of CIA covert operations, and in the 1990s, as President Clinton's budget chief, pushed for cuts in the CIA's budget. Yet the first important blasts came from Democrats. Both Senator Dianne Feinstein, the incoming chair of the Senate intelligence committee, and Senator Jay Rockefeller, the outgoing chair of the committee, huffed that Panetta was no intelligence professional.

Their knee-jerk response--which seemed to contain a resentful dose of no-one-in-the-Obama-camp-asked-me-about-this--could give cover to those who object to Panetta on policy grounds and to CIA people who don't want an outsider taking control of a troubled agency that screwed the pooch on 9/11 and Iraq WMDs. Remember Curveball?

My CQ blogger colleague Jeff Stein raises a good point: