Negroponte Briefs Senate Panel
From the Washington Post: Intelligence
Voices Blend Into One
Director of National Intelligence John D. Negroponte showed yesterday that he
could certainly dominate what the leaders of the primary U.S. intelligence agencies
say at a public hearing — even if members of Congress have questioned whether he
can control how those leaders do their jobs.In his first time presenting the annual worldwide threat assessment to the Senate
Select Committee on Intelligence, Negroponte took an hour and a half to deliver his
25-page prepared statement, while CIA Director Porter J. Goss; FBI Director Robert
S. Mueller III; Lt. Gen. Michael D. Maples, Defense Intelligence Agency director;
and other intelligence officials sat silently beside him.By the time Negroponte finished, at about noon, almost half the committee members
who turned up for the session had left, and the subsequent question-and-answer session
with the remaining senators ended at 1:45 p.m.
That last part sounds about right. I am surprised they lasted that long. If they’re
not the ones doing to talking, they don’t have much interest.