The people who are supposed to guard the United States from Islamic terrorism are appallingly, utterly clueless about the enemy: Incoming House intelligence chief botches easy intel quiz.

WASHINGTON (CNN) — Rep. Silvestre Reyes of Texas, who incoming House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has tapped to head the Intelligence Committee when the Democrats take over in January, failed a quiz of basic questions about al Qaeda and Hezbollah, two of the key terrorist organizations the intelligence community has focused on since the September 11, 2001 attacks.

When asked by CQ National Security Editor Jeff Stein whether al Qaeda is one or the other of the two major branches of Islam — Sunni or Shiite — Reyes answered “they are probably both,” then ventured “Predominantly — probably Shiite.”

That is wrong. Al Qaeda was founded by Osama bin Laden as a Sunni organization and views Shiites as heretics.

Reyes could also not answer questions put by Stein about Hezbollah, a Shiite group on the U.S. list of terrorist organizations that is based in Southern Lebanon.

Notice: rather than admit he didn’t know, Silvestre took a wild guess. Hey, what the heck. It’s a 50-50 chance, right?

Just the person we want running national intelligence.

And Silvestre Reyes is far from the only know-nothing in Washington: lgf: Who’s Minding the Civilization?