Meet US Feminist Carly Fiorina - Failed CEO, Staunch Defender Of Torture, Advisor To The C.I.A. & War Hawk

During this month’s CNN debate, Fiorina distinguished herself from rival Donald Trump after he said he would meet with Russian president Vladimir Putin to resolve the Syria crisis. “Having met Vladimir Putin, I wouldn’t talk to him at all,” Fiorina shot back, adding she would instead “begin rebuilding the Sixth Fleet” and “conduct regular, aggressive military exercises in the Baltic states,” among other steps, so he would “get the message.”
Positioning herself as a steely advocate of aggressive counterterrorism programs, Republican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina offered a vigorous defense of CIA waterboarding as a tactic that helped “keep our nation safe” in the aftermath of 9/11.

After Hayden became CIA director in 2006, he named Fiorina as chair of an agency external advisory board consisting of former top intelligence officials, generals and business leaders. In that capacity, she made regular trips to CIA headquarters in Langley, Va., including overseeing one specific project requested by Hayden: Provide advice on how the CIA could maintain its undercover espionage mission in a culture of increasing government leaks and demands for greater public accountability and openness.

– From the Yahoo article: Carly Fiorina Defends Bush-era Torture and Spying, Calls for More Transparency

By Michael Krieger: As a result of Ron Paul’s decision to run for President under the Republican ticket in 2008 and 2012, as well as the explosive popularity of his message, many people naively assumed the GOP was the obvious vessel under which libertarianism and/or constitutional ideas would ultimately take hold and flourish. The past year has completely discredited this pipe dream.
Yes, the Republican party has pivoted since Dr. Paul’s last run in 2012. It has pivoted decisively and resolutely toward authoritarianism and demagoguery. This can be seen in Rand Paul’s total failure to generate any sort of momentum (although his personal lack of judgement and poorly run campaign deserve plenty of criticism), but it is most clearly evidenced in the type of characters who have surged in the run-up to next year’s primaries.
For starters, there’s Donald Trump, who is a genius at throwing emotional red meat to the base, but shows no indication of an appreciation of freedom, liberty and the U.S. Constitution. Recall what he said about Edward Snowden in 2013:

“I think Snowden is a terrible threat, I think he’s a terrible traitor, and you know what we used to do in the good old days when we were a strong country — you know what we used to do to traitors, right?”

But this post isn’t about Trump. It’s about one of his competitors, Carly Florina, who’s been surging in the polls as of late.
So who is Carly Fiorina? Well as the title suggests, she is a failed CEO, a staunch defender of torture, a former top advisor to the CIA, and unabashed war hawk.
Michael Isikoff over at Yahoo recently wrote an excellent article about her. Here are a few excerpts:

Positioning herself as a steely advocate of aggressive counterterrorism programs, Republican presidential candidate Carly Fiorina offered a vigorous defense of CIA waterboarding as a tactic that helped “keep our nation safe” in the aftermath of 9/11.

“I believe that all of the evidence is very clear — that waterboarding was used in a very small handful of cases [and] was supervised by medical personnel in every one of those cases,” Fiorina told Yahoo News. “And I also believe that waterboarding was used when there was no other way to get information that was necessary.”

Unfortunately for Carly, as John Adams famously said: “facts are stubborn things.” The internet makes it much harder to just make stuff up.

A Senate report last year portrayed waterboarding as “near drownings” that were tantamount to torture and concluded that the agency’s often brutal interrogations produced little actionable intelligence. But Fiorina rejected those conclusions, calling the report “disingenuous” and “a shame” that “undermined the morale of a whole lot of people who dedicated their lives to keeping the country safe.”

Well of course she “rejected those conclusions,” she was a top advisor to the C.I.A. beginning in 2006.

But first, how would Carly deal with Russia? By starting World War 3 of course…

They also come at a moment when Fiorina is seeking to emphasize her hawkish national security credentials in the crowded GOP presidential field. During this month’s CNN debate, Fiorina distinguished herself from rival Donald Trump after he said he would meet with Russian president Vladimir Putin to resolve the Syria crisis. “Having met Vladimir Putin, I wouldn’t talk to him at all,” Fiorina shot back, adding she would instead “begin rebuilding the Sixth Fleet” and “conduct regular, aggressive military exercises in the Baltic states,” among other steps, so he would “get the message.”

Apparently, Carly wants to do to the world what she did to Hewlett Packard:

Now on to Carly’s close ties to the CIA:

Fiorina’s relationship with the U.S. intelligence community dates back to the weeks after the Sept. 11, 2001, terror attacks, when she got an urgent phone call from then NSA director Michael Hayden asking her to quickly provide his agency with HP computer servers for expanded surveillance.

While he did not tell Fiorina the details, Hayden confirmed to Yahoo News last week that he needed the HP servers so the NSA could implement “Stellar Wind” — the controversial warrantless wiretapping program, including the bulk collection of American citizens’ phone records and emails, that had been secretly ordered by the Bush White House. “Carly, I need stuff and I need it now,” Hayden recalled telling Fiorina.

After Hayden became CIA director in 2006, he named Fiorina as chair of an agency external advisory board consisting of former top intelligence officials, generals and business leaders. In that capacity, she made regular trips to CIA headquarters in Langley, Va., including overseeing one specific project requested by Hayden: Provide advice on how the CIA could maintain its undercover espionage mission in a culture of increasing government leaks and demands for greater public accountability and openness.

One specific recommendation she made, Fiorina said, involved Jose Rodriguez, the former chief of the CIA’s Counterterrorism Center, who supervised the agency’s aggressive interrogation of terror suspects and later came under criminal investigation for ordering the destruction of videotapes of the waterboarding of two high-value detainees. (No charges were ever filed.)

In 2007, Rodriguez was preparing to retire. Fiorina said she urged that “he step forward and be a spokesman for the agency.”

Yes, you read that right. Carly suggested the man who destroyed videotapes on CIA torture become a spokesman for the agency. Just in case you were wondering what sort of accountability government officials would face under a Florina Presidency.

Told of Fiorina’s suggestion that Rodriguez should have been a “spokesman” for the CIA, Amnesty International’s Shah said she was “astounded,” given that he acknowledged ordering the destruction of the CIA’s waterboarding videotapes. “Jose Rodriguez has said he tried to destroy evidence of torture,” she said. “To make that person a spokesman for the U.S. government would be a total travesty of justice.”

Fiorina said, “I’m not aware of circumstances” in which NSA surveillance “went too far,” although she supports “the checks and balances” put into place by Congress that ended agency bulk collection of phone records. She also suggested that there were greater government threats to privacy than NSA surveillance and other U.S. intelligence programs.

Now wait for this one. The greatest threat to liberty in America she sees is the…”Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.”

“The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau is sweeping up hundreds of millions of credit records and mortgage applications on ordinary American citizens,” she said. “Congress does not have oversight on them. They are a bunch of bureaucrats. They are accountable to no one. I tell you — that worries me a lot. So I wish somebody would start talking about the kinds of information that government has in civilian agencies, whether it’s your health care records that government has through Obamacare or it’s mortgage applications.”

There’s another unaccountable, undemocratic force with way more power. It’s called the Federal Reserve. Don’t hold your breathe waiting for Carly “CIA Torture is Good” Fiorina to call them out.
On one level the purpose of this post is to expose Carly Fiorina, but on a much deeper level it is to hammer the point home that the Republican Party is worthless. Anyone who still cares about freedom, liberty and the Constitution should give up hopes for the GOP immediately and focus on what I identified as “the 70%” back in 2012.
Drop any hopes for the Republican establishment now; they’re “just not that into you.” It’s time for a total breakup.
Finally, while this post wasn’t about Carly Fioria’s failure as CEO of Hewlett Packard and the golden parachute which followed, the issue does deserve attention. If you’re interested, check out the following stories:
From Time: Carly Sneed Fiorina
From Wharton: HP After Carly: What Went Wrong?
From Politico: Why I Still Think Fiorina Was a Terrible CEO

While her predecessor, revered HP CEO Lew Platt, traveled coach in commercial planes, she demanded the company buy her a Gulfstream IV.

From Yahoo Finance: Another Corporate Outrage: ‘Golden Parachutes’ for Failed CEOs

In Liberty,
Michael Krieger

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