I'm only going to be able to start on this one now, as it's sections from a book:
Smist, Jr., F. J. (1994). Congress Oversees the U.S. Intelligence Community.
We're starting at chapter 6 "Congress and Intelligence, 1985-92: The Era of David Boren and Dave McCurdy."
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"The Reagan administration had an inordinate amount of faith in covert actions. They loved them. [DCI] Casey loved them. The DCI does not control the intelligence community. The DCI controls little of the budget. The DCI is second fiddle to the secretary of defense. But the DCI does control covert action and Casey loved covert action. The advantage of covert action is that the action can be done without the approval of Congress. A covert action 'finding' doesn't need the approval of Congress. This is the big attraction of covert action to the executive branch." (p. 257-258. This is a quote from Lee Hamilton, the chair of the House Intelligence Committee in 1985-1986. Brackets are in the original in this case)
"... [T]he Reagan administration actively sought to both undermine and destroy the accountability standards built up so carefully and painstakingly by congressional intelligence overseers since 1976." (p. 263)
This is the same Reagan as started SDI.
"Despite President Reagan's soothing words [in response to the Tower commission report], the failure to keep adequate records was not inadvertent.
The Reagan administration played fast and loose with the requirements for covert action findings." (p. 263)
I'm not suggesting anything specific here, but it does sort of at least give an idea of what was going on here, the context during this time period.
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And here's another area of context perhaps relevant to the time frame of my life experiences:
"After the Iran-Contra investigations were completed, Oliver North spoke out publicly for the first time when he delivered the commencement address at Liberty University on May 2, 1989. Liberty University's founder, the Reverend Jerry Falwell [of Moral Majority fame], introduced the already indicted North by comparing him to Jesus Christ: 'We serve a savior who was indicted and crucified.' Picking up on this theme, North responded: 'Those accusations [charges that he lied to Congress, etc.] are not a brand - they are an honor. God willing, with your prayers and support, we will prevail, even in Washington.' North also lashed out at the Congress in Nicaragua. North stated: 'We must not just choose the right president in 1988; we need a better Congress.'" (p. 267; brackets in the original)
If you are old enough to remember the days of the Moral Majority's ascent to influence in American political life, it might not be so incredible to imagine that this kind of thinking also permeated East European missions, which that article from my pre-Vienna orientation week exemplifies, too. It sounds like Jerry Falwell thought it was okay to lie or otherwise do the things Oliver North did if it was for the sake of the far right-wing cause. That's not dissimilar to my experience of the apparent ends-justifies-the-means modus operandi I found in East European missions.
Also, I would say again that at this point I was still relatively a-political in my persuasions. Even after returning home from Vienna I still didn't have strong political views as far as right or left is concerned. However, in Bible school I had taken a class on current religious issues, which covered in a fair amount of depth several sort of movements or thrust happening in America at that time, and one of the issues we covered was the Moral Majority, and my professor didn't like what that was doing to the Church. I thought that was a refreshing view, although I don't know how many of his colleagues agreed with him there at the Bible school. But even so, there was no indication that he was necessarily left wing, although he undoubtedly had more political opinions than I did at the time.
By the time I went to Vienna as a full-time missionary I had read and studied enough to not believe in Communism and also dislike how they treated believers. I don't think I agreed with liberation theology either, but I wasn't as vehement about that as I was about being against Communism. I might say more about this later, just to assuage any fears that in being anti-Moral Majority I went way over the other direction.
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I haven't even finished this chapter, but I did finish what I want to get out of this section of the chapter, and I have to go to my doctor appointment now, so I'll pick up on this later.
~ Meg
