Jane Harman: “Mr. Chairman, I hail from California, the land of earthquakes. Yesterday, Washington experienced two near simultaneous…”

“Mr. Chairman, I hail from California, the land of earthquakes. Yesterday, Washington experienced two near simultaneous earthquakes. In California, we would call that 'the big one.' The first was the Duelfer report, which conclusively established that we invaded Iraq based on wrong intelligence. Four ancient chemical warheads, one vial of Botox and a centrifuge hidden under a rose bush in 1991 did not and do not constitute an imminent threat. The second earthquake was last evening's spectacular 96-to-2 victory of the Collins-Lieberman-McCain legislation, S. 2845, implementing the 9/11 Commission recommendations. Kudos to Senators Collins and Lieberman, amazing legislators who presided over 2 days of markup and withstood votes on dozens of floor amendments over 6 days to produce an excellent bipartisan bill. In contrast, Mr. Chairman, although this House was first to identify our intelligence gaps and could have played the leadership role in fixing them, we are playing catch-up.”