Efforts to pass the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA), the comprehensive defense spending bill for the year, have been slowed by debate over controversial provisions moving most phases of terrorism prosecutions from law enforcement to the military. Yesterday, Senators Carl Levin (D-MI) and John McCain (R-AZ), the chairman and ranking member of the Senate Armed Services Committee, announced they had reached a deal to move the bill forward. Inexplicably, however, the deal did not address the concerns with the legislation that have been expressed by bipartisan national security experts, the Pentagon and other relevant security-related committees. Pentagon and outside leaders immediately noted that the "deal" fails to address ley legal and practical problems with the measure and suggested that it, in the words of NSN Senior Adviser Major General (ret.) Paul Eaton, "undermines the capabilities" of the executive branch to combat terrorism.

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