Joe Lieberman: “I also thank my friend and colleague from Oregon for a very thoughtful statement and a very thought-provoking amendment…”

“I also thank my friend and colleague from Oregon for a very thoughtful statement and a very thought-provoking amendment that he has offered. I know it comes out of his service and the service of the other bipartisan cosponsors on the Intelligence Committee and some experiences they have had, shall we say, which have not been satisfying, in which they have believed they and the public have been deprived of information in a timely way that did not allow them to make informed judgments. I want to say a few things after thanking Senator Wyden. One is there are members of our committee who both shared the experience of membership on the Intelligence Committee and brought it to bear on the deliberations of our committee in presenting the Collins-Lieberman proposal which is now before the Senate. That all goes to the priority on sharing of information and the independence and objectivity of intelligence, and on the responsibility of the intelligence community to Congress to provide timely and objective information. And the proposal that the committee brought out is full of provisions aimed at doing just that.”