The point is program management & constitutionality:

1. Do programs exist over which Congress has no knowledge and/or oversight. If so, this is likely unconstitutional.

2. Do programs exist because Congressionally appropriated funds have been covertly redirected to those programs without Congressional knowledge. If so, likely unconstitutional.

3. Have whistleblowers been threatened or harmed to prevent disclosure and/or testimony. If so, likely a violation of US criminal statutes, and likely unconstitutional - particularly if those whistleblowers intended to provide Congressional testimony in accordance with Congress's oversight role.

The point is not disclosure, confirming existence or declassification - despite what you may hear. It could be one or more of those things occur, but likely not via these hearings.

Oversight can be as simple as notice to the "Gang of Eight" ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gang_of_Eight_(intelligence), or possibly the Intel/Defense committee ranking members, and need NOT to be to the entire Congress or even full committee membership. The accusations in these hearings seem to allege this minimal notice did not take place. The testimony also claims extra-governmental (possibly private sector) program management with no political accountability.

In sum... this appears to be a (necessary) power struggle over programs & information. At the same time - and depending on what the real truth may be - one can make a convincing argument little of this information should be public & these programs should remain off the books. Depends on your confidence in the body politic and Congress.

> If so, this is likely unconstitutional.

Perhaps, but as we've seen the law and the Constitution are subject to interpretation and to the extent that the law is enforced.

There are no aliens hidden by any government in the world. It's impossible to keep something like that under wraps. This whole thing is put on because it's a good way to distract the public and all politicians who are tough on aliens get political points and votes.

And just to be clear - you can't simultaneously think that the government has the capability to hide aliens but also discredit that the moon landings (for example) were faked. If you find yourself thinking "well they could be hiding aliens" ask yourself if you also find "they faked the moon landing" to be ridiculous - it's the same logic.

They do already know. They've already gotten a full briefing, and won't ask any questions that they don't know the answer to.

The purpose of the hearing is to do that again in public. In theory, the idea is to get the information distributed more widely. In practice, it's usually about grandstanding, so that the politicians get to make speeches on TV.

Incorrect. If you listen to the actual testimony or have been paying attention to the details you will learn Congress is being stonewalled and its ability to provide oversight and appropriation (its constitutional duties) appears to be nonexistent. These hearings are shining a very public light on this as a means of rallying support for real Congressional oversight and less "off the books" management of these programs. That's not to say this is a good idea. Congress is inept and a good argument can be made for the status quo ante.

This hearing really isn't about theory or based on your notions of what is likely. Instead, it stemmed from a whistleblower complaint regarding bureaucratic security layers to obfuscate projects from Congressional oversight. These projects are compartmentalized behind SAPs and misappropriation of government funds.

Presuming there was actually some aliens/UFOs to know about in the first place (I'm pretty confident there aren't any actual alien UFOs, but that doesn't mean there aren't secret programs dedicated to UFOs), it is likely that most of congress wouldn't know about it and only a few congressmen on the right committees would know. Not every member of congress is informed of all the secrets the American government has. Particularly, those 17 on the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence know a lot more than the rest. And even they may be kept in the dark about some things.

I have always felt that given how far away they must be, and the challenge involved in crossing that space, the most ridiculous belief is that some extra-terrestrial intelligent life is simultaneously able to build ships that get here (meaning they're far more technologically advanced than us) and yet not able to hide them from us. Or that they get here and have a breakdown right over New Mexico. Or their drone couldn't just self-destruct before we got it. Etc.

While the odds are almost 100% that there's intelligent life somewhere, the idea that it got here and then made a mistake seems strange to me.

And I've always thought the military didn't investigate these UFOs because they weren't unidentified to them. They're just FOs when you're the one who built them.

I really doubt we've been visited by aliens but one could have stolen a ship and took a ride here not knowing how to fully operate it. It's entirely possible their government is suppressing the existence of aliens and we've been visited by their whistleblowers/journalists.

I really hope that is the case because it’s a great story.

I also can’t imagine a species that has interstellar travel, but manually operated ships. I think we are not that far from humans not operating any forms of transportation anymore, and we are at best thousands of years from having the technology to visit anywhere life may exist.

Would you self destruct your broken down car so that ants couldn't get a hold of the technology? Would you care if the ants you are studying notice you?

I imagine it would be kind of similar to how we feel about those remote tribes in Brazil or India, or places like that where governments intentionally and prohibit contact, yes. I mean I can’t be sure of that by any means, but I think that if we discovered life on another planet, we would probably leave it alone, unless, of course, it had something we need. And it’s hard to imagine one planet having any resources that are important to somebody who already has faster than light travel.

> While the odds are almost 100% that there's intelligent life somewhere

I disagree, it's pretty easy to make "Drake equations" go to zero, particularly if you limit the scope to just the Milky Way galaxy (only 10^11 stars.) The Rare Earth Hypothesis is consistent with all of our empirical observations of the universe thus-far.

I don’t think it’s easy to make the Drake equation go to zero, though it is within the relatively limited section of the universe from which of visitor could get here.

Two or three independent "one in a million" chances will push the Drake equation to near zero in the milky way. Such chances could be things like "chance of multicellular life developing from unicellular" (took billions of years on earth, maybe it was never likely to happen in the first place) or "chance for multicellular life to invent radios" (overwhelming majority of multicellular life on earth was never going to invent radios. Evolution isn't directed to create tool-inventing apes.)

Or it could be a few dozen 50/50 chances that need to be cleared, or some mix of the two. Drake equations only spit out "aliens likely" if you assume earth-like planets will inevitably create human-like life but that's a hell of an assumption. And then we look into the night sky and see/hear nothing from the aliens that supposedly must be up there and call it a paradox... well it's not a paradox if the Rare Earth hypothesis is true. If the empirical evidence is saying one thing and the speculative math is saying another thing, it's probably the speculative math that's wrong.

A whistleblower is alleging that information has been kept from Congress. Why do you expect Congress to know that information?

The various congressional committees are supposed to know everything the federal government is doing so they can provide oversight, AFAIK. Something big like UFOs should have come up I'd imagine

Supposed to know is not the same as know. If they learn from a whistleblower that a program exists and has been kept secret from them, the people that are supposed to know about it, what would you have them do? Publicly investigate the claims, right? That's what they're doing.

Because that whistleblower was paid to make those allegations by the DoD.

What evidence do you have to support that claim?

Probably the same amount of evidence the whistleblower has to support theirs.

There is good evidence on both sides.