Recently in Iran Category

The Savaging of Scott McClellan continues. But it is not just the right that is tearing him apart. Several of our own progressive members of Blogstonia appear to be piling on just as righteously. Over at TPM, there are continued posts of Scott's past statements that, by his own recent admission, were misleading and lies. And yet, despite his admissions, he is being ridiculed, mocked, and smeared.

Was David Brock, a man most of us know to have been instrumental in the defamation, and eventual impeachment of Bill Clinton, held to this level of scorn and ridicule? Obviously not, considering his website, Media Matters, is the go-to site for all things propaganda.

Over the last 6 plus years, since the run up to the invasion of Iraq, a nation obviously not capable of mounting any type of attack against us, we have been demanding that the administration acknowledge it's propaganda agenda. Time and again, on blogs and websites across the progressive spectrum, there has been anger and disgust at the lack of honesty and forthrightness.

Now, finally, Scott McClellan steps forward, announces quite loudly, and convincingly, that the Bush administration used propaganda in the run up to the invasion, and what does he receive? Our derision and scorn.

"Where the hell were you back in 2002? Why the hell did you not resign in protest back then?" Here are some links: CampusProgress, The Register-Guardian, MetaFilter, Oliver Willis, All Spin Zone.

Stop. It. Seriously. Stop it right now.

Scott McClellan has stepped forward, just like David Brock, just like Paul O'Neill, just like Richard Clarke. Now, when those three stepped forward, did it make a difference? Did Paul O"Neill's account of the fiasco that is the Bush administration's handling of the economy make things change? Doh! Of course not. Did David Brock's admission of being instrumental in the propaganda machine -- The Mighty Wurlitzer -- of the conservative right result in the failure of the propaganda machine? Do I need to type Doh! again? And do I really need to point out the lack of serious security despite Richard Clarke's admissions? Yeah, I thought not.

Okay, maybe Scott could have done the honorable thing and bowed out earlier. In the end, it would not have mattered one iota. They simply would have filled his position with another mouth piece. Gee, in fact, they've done it twice since he's left.

So, how about instead of bitching about what he didn't do, because it doesn't really matter, and take comfort in what he has done. Because, unlike David, Paul, and Richard, Scott's book, and it's timing, might actually prevent the invasion of Iran. He has become an ally to our cause. How about we accept him?

Besides, if you really want to bitch about someone doing the right thing and preventing this mess, how about you bitch about this. Because, in the end, having a different man as president would have been the only way to prevent the failure that is the Bush administration.

Here is the answer.

So, the NIE of last January actually states Iran stopped their Nuclear Weapons program as far back as 2003. Interesting. Yet, for the last 11 months we have heard non-stop from the White House about Iran's threat to our security. Well, you have to give the White House some credit. At least they are rattling their sabers at a country that stopped their weapons program within the last half decade. The first time, the country they claimed was developing nuclear weapons, stopped their program over 10 years earlier.

Reuters

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Former U.S. President Jimmy Carter on Wednesday denounced Vice President Dick Cheney as a "disaster" for the country and a "militant" who has had an excessive influence in setting foreign policy.

Cheney has been on the wrong side of the debate on many issues, including an internal White House discussion over Syria in which the vice president is thought to be pushing a tough approach, Carter said.

"He's a militant who avoided any service of his own in the military and he has been most forceful in the last 10 years or more in fulfilling some of his more ancient commitments that the United States has a right to inject its power through military means in other parts of the world," Carter told the BBC World News America in an interview to air later on Wednesday.

"You know he's been a disaster for our country," Carter said. "I think he's been overly persuasive on President George Bush and quite often he's prevailed."

Carter is showing some serious balls. He goes after Bush on torture, and he goes after Cheney on warmongering. Unbelievable. Where the hell is the rest of the Democratic Party? Any of them lining up to back those statements? Or are we going to see a weak, muted response, leaving President Carter to take the barrage of criticism all on his own? Not that Carter can't take it. Like I said in the previous post, the man still goes out and builds houses for other people.

I don't even want to see Bush swing a hammer. Mostly because I don't want to get hurt. The man would be a menace. I pity the Secret Service officers who would have to guard him during any photo op involving a hammer.

Do you think they get hazard pay for those situations?

The Boston Globe

WASHINGTON - The Army's top officer, General George Casey, told Congress yesterday that his branch of the military has been stretched so thin by the war in Iraq that it can not adequately respond to another conflict - one of the strongest warnings yet from a military leader that repeated deployments to war zones in the Middle East have hamstrung the military's ability to deter future aggression.

And yet Cheney's pipe dream is still on the table.

It's fucking insane.

Think Progress

On the Senate floor today, Sen. Jim Webb (D-VA) made an impassioned appeal to his fellow senators, declaring that the Lieberman-Kyl amendment on Iran should be “withdrawn” because the “proposal is Dick Cheney’s fondest pipe dream.” Webb cautioned that the “cleverly-worded sense of the Congress” could be “interpreted” to “declare war” on Iran.

There are so many good quotes in the article that you've just got to go read it for yourself. Quite frankly, Jim Webb kicks ass.

Bark Bark Woof Woof

What I have trouble getting past is that all this hue and cry does is prove that in spite of our tough talk about wiping out terrorism, "bring 'em on," and the Nuke Iran lobby making noise in the administration, we're really afraid of him to the point that some were willing to deny him the right to speak and answer questions. We've really lost something when we're that fearful of someone else's point of view, no matter how disgusting it may be. The best thing we can do to prove he's a petty and cruel dictator is let him talk.

Just another addition of "Ya, What He Said."

Alternate Brain

I'll give you something to think about before I split. Do you think, if Iran developed a nuke, they would allow it to get into the hands of terrorists? (We have more to worry about from an already-nuclear Pakistan in that regard.) Don't you think a nuclear attack (suitcase bomb, dirty bomb), were it traced to Iran, would be met with an all-out nuclear response? The Minuteman IIIs and B-52s would be launched within minutes. The Soviets knew it for 60 years and they had just as many missiles pointed at us.

Ya, what he said.

The Politico

President Bush and Karl Rove sat listening to Norman Podhoretz for roughly 45 minutes at the White House as the patriarch of neoconservatism argued that the United States should bomb Iran's nuclear facilities.

The meeting was not on the president's public schedule.

So, the neoconservatives get super secret, double code ring access to the President, while 60% of the country is getting ignored. I'd ask how this qualifies as working for the people, but it would be the rhetorical equivalence of an oxymoron.

USA Today

A B-52 bomber mistakenly loaded with at least five nuclear warheads flew from Minot Air Force Base, N.D, to Barksdale Air Force Base, La., on Aug. 30, resulting in an Air Force-wide investigation, according to three officers who asked not to be identified because they were not authorized to discuss the incident.

The B-52 was loaded with Advanced Cruise Missiles, part of a Defense Department effort to decommission 400 of the ACMs. But the nuclear warheads should have been removed at Minot before being transported to Barksdale, the officers said. The missiles were mounted onto the pylons of the bomber's wings.

Okay, what I see here appears to be a standard cover story. Or, more specifically, the decommissioning of 400 ACMs is a cover, with the nukes secretly being transported to unspecified locations around the Middle East.

Now, imagine, if you will, a sudden, unexpected, nuclear explosion somewhere in Iraq, close to the Iranian border. Gee, just that one bomb away?

Of course, there are all sorts of holes in this conspiracy of mine. But when you look back at the various rationals for invading Iraq, there were far more holes. Besides, I can drift into lunacy considering I'm talking about BushCo™. And they are certainly not going to be able to use the same old song and dance from back in 2003.

No, it's going to take another, newer, 9/11 style calamity to justify a bombing campaign against Iran. The detonation of a nuclear weapon, apparently the work of Iranian sponsored terrorists, would be just the sort of incident these idiots could wrap their war-mongering fingers around.

No Quarter

Barksdale Air Force Base is being used as a jumping off point for Middle East operations. Gee, why would we want cruise missile nukes at Barksdale Air Force Base. Can't imagine we would need to use them in Iraq. Why would we want to preposition nuclear weapons at a base conducting Middle East operations?

His final point was to observe that someone on the inside obviously leaked the info that the planes were carrying nukes. A B-52 landing at Barksdale is a non-event. A B-52 landing with nukes. That is something else.

So, it looks like Jr. is planning on nuking Iran.

That idiot's going to turn the entire world against us. We use nuclear weapons against a country that has not one iota of capability of attacking us, and we are the next Nazi Germany.