Incoming House Intelligence Committee Leader Fails Intel Quiz

All Headline News - Incoming House Intelligence Committee Leader Fails Intel Quiz - December 15, 2006: "It seems ironic that the person selected by incoming House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to chair the Senate Intelligence Committee would fail to pass a basic intelligence quiz.

But that is exactly what happened when Rep. Silvestre Reyes (D-Texas)-who is slated to take the helm of the Intelligence Committee in January-attempted to take a simple quiz put together by Congressional Quarterly.

Reyes struggled when asked even simple questions about major terrorist organizations, Al Qaeda and Hezbollah.

For example, Reyes' response to a question asking which branch of Islam-Sunni or Shiite-comprised Al Qaeda was "probably both, predominantly, probably Shiite."

That answer is incorrect. In fact, Al Qaeda was founded by Osama Bin Laden and is a Sunni organization which rejects Shiites as heretics.

Reyes was also unsure who or what Hezbollah was-a major terrorist group which operates outside of Southern Lebanon.

CQ National Security Editor Jeff Stein, who posed the questions to Reyes, said he was "amazed" by Reyes lack of knowledge about the two major terrorist organizations, telling CNN, "If you're the baseball commissioner and you don't know the difference between the Yankees and the Red Sox, you don't know baseball. You're not going to have the respect of the people you work with.""