To the Point

Centralizing Intelligence

There were outrage and embarrassment when the Immigration and Naturalization Service announced that it had approved student visas for two skyjackers six months after their suicide strike of September 11. Although it-s not one of the nation-s 14 major intelligence agencies, the INS is one of dozens of others that share counter-terrorism responsibilities and whose intelligence-sharing is complicated by their distinct missions and restrictions enacted to prevent the compromise of criminal investigations. We examine our crazy-quilt intelligence community, and obstacles and turf wars that plague it, with experts from the CIA, FBI and Congress, including Senator Bob Graham of the Senate Intelligence Committee. Newsmaker: Egypt Air Flight 990 and Suicide Three years after the crash of Egypt Air-s Flight 990 off New England, the National Transportation Safety Board is about to issue its final report. Former commercial pilot William Langewiesche, whose article about the crash appears in this month-s Atlantic Monthly, calls the delay in releasing the report and cause of the crash an attempt to avoid embarrassing our allies in Egypt. Reporter's Notebook: The Jerry Springer Opera Strange bedfellows, beloved operas and trash TV both draw inspiration from infidelity, misdirected love, rage and untimely death, so why not an opera about Jerry Springer? Marshall Sella authored -Aria of the Lesbian Dwarf Diaper Fetishist,- in this week-s New York Times Magazine, about the revoltingly funny, wildly successful Jerry Springer: the Opera, currently at London-s Battersea Arts Center.