Top Secret America

Washington reacts to 'Top Secret America' revelations

Acting as Director of National Intelligence David C. Gompert issued a statement Monday morning time (PDF) reacting to The Washington Post series "Top Secret America," by Dana Priest and William M. Arkin.

"The reporting does not reflect the Intelligence Community we know," he said.

"We accept that we operate in an environment that limits the amount of information we can share," he said. "However, the fact is, the men and women of the Intelligence Community have improved our operations, thwarted attacks, and are achieving untold successes every day.

"In recent years, we have reformed the IC in ways that have improved the quality, quantity, regularity, and speed of our support to policymakers, warfighters, and homeland defenders, and we will continue our reform efforts. We provide oversight, while also encouraging initiative. We work constantly to reduce inefficiencies and redundancies, while preserving a degree of intentional overlap among agencies to strengthen analysis, challenge conventional thinking, and eliminate single points of failure. We are mindful of the size of our contractor ranks, but greatly value the critical flexibility and specialized skills they contribute to our mission.

obama looking at girl

obama looking at girl

This is the photo of President Obama checking out the girl at the photo shoot for the G8 Conference in Italy yesterday.Now we also have Nicholas Sarkozy, the President of France copping an eyeful of the tushie there, but then that is the sort of behavior we expect of short Frenchmen (yes, he does wear platform heels).

But President Obama? Is this really the behavior we expect of the anointed one who has come to save us all from the hateful years of Bush....well, actually, yes, this is the behavior we expect of any healthy male when presented with a thing of beauty.No, not to do anything about it, but at least to note the presence of one of God's gifts to creation. There's also two further cultural issues to consider.

Firstly, they are meeting in Italy, where contemplation of La Bella Figura is an art form in itself and some of this may have rubbed off on the President. The other is that the tushie in question belongs to the lady accompanying the Brazilian President: Brazil being a country where admiration of such feminine perfection is thought of as a compliment to she who is being admired.