BUSH OF THE CIA SOFTENS AN IMAGE

• Document Type: CREST
• Collection: General CIA Records
• Document Number (FOIA) /ESDN (CREST): CIA-RDP99-00498R000100040032-5
• Release Decision: RIPPUB
• Original Classification: K
• Document Page Count: 1
• Document Creation Date: December 20, 2016
• Sequence Number: 32
• Content Type: OPEN SOURCE

STAT
Approved For Release 2007/06/22 : CIA-RDP99-00498R000100040032-5
WASHITTGTONT STAR (GREEN LP`TE~
16 APRIL 1976
Bush of the CIA
Softens an Image
You'd have thought Frank Sinatra
had enough to do, perhaps, singing,
insulting people. But he seeks more.
He covets a second career as a spy.
He took up his yearning to moon-
light in a trench coat with the CIA
director himself at a February meet-
ing in New York, according to a story
in the Boston Globe. George Bush,
making a nervous appearance before
the American Society of Newspaper
Editors, had no comment on the
story, which sounded like a confirma-
tion.
The source of the story is the direc-
tor's brother Jonathan, who confided
that the testy warbler dropped a
number of big names at the seance
and repeatedly offered his services to
his country.
HE MIGHT OR might nor have met
Sinatra, Bush said with anxiety writ-
ten on his well bred face.
During the question period, a Globe
editor asked if the company often
books entertainers for its activities.
"I'm not going to comment on it,
Bush replied stiffly. "I would say
that any American who wants to sup-
port the CIA, he or she would be wel-
come."
Sinatra, of course, had already had
a speaking acquaintance with the
agency. He was a pal of those two
patriotic mobsters, Sam Giancana
and Johnny Roselli, who were re-
cruited by the CIA in the early sixties
to poison Castro with a cigar or a pen
or a pill or something.
Bush's "no comment" about Sina-
tra turned out to be the most interest-
ing thing he had to say. He seemed to
want to convince the editors that the
"rogue elephant" is now being run by
a nice guy. He flung out a handful of
initials to prove that a new spirit of
reform and openess is sweeping
through Langley.
There is, he said, his pale blue eyes
blinking in the bright television
lights, something called the CFI, if
that makes you feel better. It's the
Committee on Foreign Intelligence,
but he doesn't say. what it does. He
only promised that it is "the machin-
ery to control resources" - whatev-
er that means. sentatives declined to print or react
even after it had been published.
HE ALSO GAVE the comforting
news that the Forty Committee, It says something about the editors
which brought you the Chilean de- that while they asked Bush about
stabilization, the support of the Frank Sinatra, they did not ask him
Greek colonels and other proud mo- about Schorr. The unity and loyalty
ments in American foreign policy, is of the press to one of its own in trou-
. now know as the OAG, or the Office ble over a freedom of the press issue
of the Advisory Group. can best be measured by the fact that
Didn't he have more important when Schorr belatedly identified him-
things tb do, the Globe editor wanted self as the
a number of CBS ill gates pe-
Frank to know, than to sit around with report,
Sinatra? titioned CBS to fire him.
Actually, Bush's most important' The CIA has nothing to fear from
job is to see that the agency does not George Bush obviously, or from Con-
cause the, President any election- gress, either. All Bush has to worry
year embarrassment. The CIA had about is explaining his secret meet-
weathered the storm of the congres- ing with Sinatra, who is a vocal re-
sional probes, and the President has minder of "the bad stuff" that Bush
insured that it will go on as before, says isn't happening at the agency
only with greater secrecy, under the any more.
benign eye of a supervisory hoard
heavy with the king of cold warriors
who got it into trouble in the first
place.
Congress was routed in the fight
.with the spooks. The agency was
lucky in the chairmen of the two
investigating committees: Frank
Church of the Senate had one eye on
running for the president. Otis Pike
of the House never looked behind
him; that is to say, when he took on
the President or the secretary of
state and demanded this or threat-
ened that, he failed to notice that he
did not have his members with him.
The Senate report is expected next
week. What the House investigation
principally spawned was another
investigation by the House of itself.
Maddened by leaks from the commit-
] . tee, the House refused to look at the
i budget figures of the agency and in-
stead voted $150,000 to find out who
leaked the committee's report to
Daniel Schorr of CBS, who leaked it
to the Village Voice.
The country doesn't care. No
candidate mentions the CIA unless
asked about it, even Church, who is
now campaigning full-steam.
Approved For Release 2007/06/22 : CIA-RDP99-00498R000100040032-5
THE ONLY PERSON caught up in
any proceedings relating to- years of
abuses, excesses, illegalities and per-
juries is Schorr, who has been sus-
pended from his CBS job while the
House assembles detectives to track
down the person who Rave.-him a