There’s a handful of things you can do that guarantee a congressional probe: apply for a job as a supreme court justice; have an extra marital affair and fail to hide it; or deploy teams of trained killers to the middle east and not tell anyone about it.
The CIA, under then-Vice President Cheney’s lead, targeted several al Qaeda figures and failed to inform the houses of congress about the operations. Though the CIA runs covert operations and none of the planned killings were actually carried out, the law states that congress must be currently informed of any such plans. The CIA learned recently that congress’ probing finger gets mighty itchy when things don’t adhere to the rules.
While it may seem logical to hide secret intelligence operations from the room full of jabbering idiots that congress can turn into from time to time, the regulation of disclosure is in place to keep the CIA from turning into SAVAK. A breach leads to a probe: the system works.
