The brouhaha over the leak of the April 2006 NIE report is interesting for several reasons. It appears that the leaked info was "cherry-picked" from the report to show the Bush administration in the worst light. It is obvious that there are people in the intelligence agencies that are anti-Bush, and are trying to help Democrats in the upcoming elections. I think it is very important for us to identify those people and their motivation; are they just partisan Democrats, or are they traitors? That is an important question.

Then there is the matter of the credibility of the intelligence agencies. Why should we trust their judgement anyway? They don't seem to be very good at their job. At least they weren't in the past. The NSA is great, but the HUMINT seems to be grossly lacking. Much of this is due to the work of the Chuch Commission back when Carter was President, and it deteriorated further under Clinton, who wouldn't allow the employment of unsavory characters (that is, the type of people who steal secrets and take bribes, etc.)