New House Intel Chairman Knows Less About Middle East Than Most MoJoBlog Readers

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I’ve long believed that the skills that make someone good at getting elected are not the skills that make someone good at governing. And yet, I’m still a bit shocked and disappointed when I read stories like this one from Congressional Quarterly‘s Jeff Stein. I won’t bother to block quote it because it’s worth reading in full, but suffice to say Stein sat down with new House Intelligence Committee head Silvestre Reyes and asked a series of questions that are right in Reyes’ new wheelhouse: Is al Qaeda Sunni or Shiite? What is Hezbollah? And so on. Reyes, like the Republicans that held his position before him, did very poorly. Demoralizingly so.

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Owned by no one—except you.

We just keep seeing it happen: Newsrooms owned by billionaires and corporations are spinning their own narratives, overwriting the truth, following only stories that keep them in the pocket of those with even more power.

Not here. We’re not owned by anyone. We’re not part of any cult that demands our allegiance to a bottom line. We’ve spoken up and spoken out while other newsrooms changed their stories—or cut them altogether—to keep the C suite happy.

Our mission is to find the truth and amplify it. That’s why we’re independent, nonprofit, and, crucially, funded by readers. The investigations on our website will always be free to read, watch, and listen to, but our newsroom is powered by readers who pitch in what they can so we can keep asking the hard questions.

Can you chip in today?

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