Senate demands answers from Obama administration on Fort Hood case
It's good to learn that the Senate has stepped in to help following Obama administration's attempt to stonewall Congress's investigation (Hat tip: Hot Air):
See also this NPR report that reveals how Hasan was dangerously incompetant as a psychiatrist (also via Hot Air).
A bipartisan group of senators began a concerted push Wednesday to get more cooperation from the Obama administration in its reviews of the Fort Hood shootings, which left 13 dead and a raft of questions about information-sharing among intelligence agencies.In order to prevent more horrors like this from occurring in the future, that's why we need to know exactly what led to the political correctness and irresponsibility the top brass exhibited.
In addition to the public hearings that Sen. Joseph I. Lieberman (I-Conn.) is set to begin Thursday, Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Patrick J. Leahy (D-Vt.) demanded Wednesday that his panel receive the results of a White House review of agency investigations of suspect Nidal M. Hasan's communications with a radical Muslim cleric who has ties to al-Qaeda.
Congressional Democrats have not been nearly as aggressive in their oversight of the Obama administration as they were during the Bush administration. The actions on Capitol Hill this week, however, demonstrate a growing impatience, particularly among senators, with the White House's preference that lawmakers slow down their inquiries.
Lieberman's hearing Thursday, the first on Capitol Hill regarding the Texas shootings, will start what potentially could be a more assertive approach to administration oversight, at least on matters of national security.
"We are not interested in political theater," Lieberman, chairman of the Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, said Wednesday. "We are interested in getting the facts and correcting the system so that our government can provide the best homeland security possible for the American people."
Sen. Susan Collins (R-Maine), who is leading the investigation with Lieberman, said information-sharing is the most troubling issue that must be addressed. "There's a lot we don't know at this point. That's why we're doing the investigation," she told reporters. "But that's an example of an information restriction that I feel I need to learn more about."
The briefing, coordinated by the National Security Committee, for House and Senate leaders was scheduled after the administration bowed out of a closed hearing of the Senate Armed Services Committee that was supposed to happen on Monday.
Collins, the ranking Republican on the Senate Homeland Security Committee, said she’s calling on the administration to work with the committee to cooperate with its investigation of the Nov. 5 shooting deaths at Ft. Hood. Army psychiatrist Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan has been charged with the crime, which Collins called “certainly” an example of home-grown terrorism.
See also this NPR report that reveals how Hasan was dangerously incompetant as a psychiatrist (also via Hot Air).
Labels: islam, jihad, military, terrorism, United States, war on terror, White House
