Intelligence Bill Finally Passes

It has been a long and winding road for the intelligence bill that finally passed Congress.

It is a very interesting story. The best part, of course, started with ordinary citizens. Of course, these ordinary citizens were the families of the September 11th victims. They demanded that the government do something to investigate attacks and whether the government could have done something to prevent them. President Bush and many in Congress ignored their pleas for a long time and went on the record as being against the creation of the commission.

To make a long story short, these people went to their representatives in Washington, D.C. and made sure that their voices got heard. Now granted, since they were the families of 9/11 victims, they probably got more attention than most of us would get, but they still had to fight hard and learn the system to get the government to move on their requests.

The 9/11 Commission Hearings were fascinating and their report that was made public this summer was a best-seller. Not all of their recommendations have been included in this bill.

My big complaint is that again, the media has done a poor job of covering this story. I've had a busy last week or so, and I haven't had the time to dig deeply into what this bill is all about. In following the news, the way most people do, all I've been able to learn is that there was a lot of in-fighting among Republicans on this bill. There were, if fact enough votes to pass the bill (many Democrats supported it along with most Republicans) but but House Speaker Dennis Hastert wouldn't bring it forward for a vote without the support of two key Republican Committee Chairs.

But that shouldn't be the part of the story that gets most of the coverage. In the short amount of time I had to learn about this bill, most of what the media gave me was the politics of the story, not the facts and information about what the bill will do. Those are my real concerns. Will the intelligence reform bill make the U.S. safer?

In a nutshell, here is what I know:
1. The bill will create a new cabinet level position. This "Director of Intelligence" will be responsible for coordinating all of the 15 government agencies that collect intelligence.
2. The Pentagon opposed parts of the bill because they believed it took away some of their authority to collect and use intelligence data, and might harm military efforts.
3. Two well-meaning Republican members of the House frustrated the President and Republican leaders of the Congress by refusing to compromise on certain provisions before today. (One of them is Rep. Duncan Hunter from CA; he actually has a son serving in the military in Iraq.)

Is this bill a good idea? I don't know and it frustrates me. The original proposal by the 9/11 committee seemed like a wise recommendation, but I can't tell you, at this point, what Congress has done to their recommendations in this bill.

The press needs to do a better job of informing the public on crucial details, and stop focusing on all the political drama.