That said, ordinary Americans find it impossible to assess whether they get good value for the billions they spend on intelligence.

ECONOMIST: Michael Hayden wants to shake up the CIA. Good luck to him

Business groups spend to get intelligence and minimize political risk.

WSJ: Tom Daschle's Washington

It helped produce the success of the last decade: not a single follow-up al Qaeda attack in the U.S. Exclusive reliance on drones and a no-capture policy spend down the investments in intelligence that made this hiatus possible, without replenishing the interrogation-gained information needed to predict future threats.

WSJ: John Yoo: Obama, Drones and Thomas Aquinas

Only 25% of your job successes are predicted based upon intelligence and technical skills, though we spend most of our education and most companies hire based upon this category.

FORBES: Are Happy People Just Plain Dumb?

In 2008, Reapers and Predators, the Air Force's two primary remote-controlled vehicles, will spend almost 120, 000 hours in the air on reconnaissance and intelligence missions, up from just over 80, 000 hours last year and less than 5, 000 in 2001.

FORBES: War Without Soldiers

Besides the financial support, the pharmaceutical companies, most of which spend millions on their own investigations to fight counterfeiting of their medicines, will step up sharing with Interpol the intelligence they uncover.

NPR: Drugmakers, Interpol Ramp Up Fight Against Fakes