Obama's Promise: Change You Can Wait For!

Barack Obama, the most "transformative figure" who has floated to the top of our national cesspool in more than two generations, continues to show his hand, and it is not attractive -- or surprising.

The support it's been getting from the donkey party insiders is even less attractive, and less surprising. None of this is a surprise at all, except, apparently, to the vast majority of the allegedly dissident political bloggers of the supposedly angry somewhat left, who have a rude awakening ahead of them (if they ever wake up at all).

In other words, the bells of change are tolling, but they aren't tolling for you.

They're tolling against you.

As the AP reported via the IHT:

John Podesta, who's handling Obama's preparations to take over in the White House on Jan. 20, said on Sunday that Obama ... was working to build a diverse Cabinet likely to include Republicans and independents — part of the broad coalition that supported Obama during the race against Republican John McCain.

Defense Secretary Robert Gates has been mentioned as a possible holdover.

"He's not even a Republican," Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada said on CNN. "Why wouldn't we want to keep him? He's never been a registered Republican."

Who cares if Bob Gates is the leader of the world's biggest gang of war criminals? Not Barack Obama, clearly. And not Harry Reid, either.

"Why wouldn't we want to keep him? He's never been a registered Republican."

If that's the criterion, we're in for some fun, aren't we?

Obama had already shown his intentions, as if they weren't clear enough, by selecting Rahm Emanuel as his Chief of Staff.

Emanuel's recent background has been summarized as follows:

Emanuel was a political and policy aide in Bill Clinton's White House. Leaving that, he turned to investment banking, then won a Chicago-area House seat six years ago. In Congress, he moved quickly into the leadership. As chairman of the Democratic campaign committee in 2006, he played an instrumental role in restoring his party to power after 12 years in the minority.

But then again, this summary comes from FOX, and as usual it neglects to tell you something important. In his role as chairman of the Democratic campaign committee in 2006, Rahm Emanuel made sure that no Democratic congressional candidate received any support at all unless he (or she) toed certain very clear lines.

Thus were progressive candidates such as Clint Curtis and Robert Bowman hung out to dry: Curtis because he knows our elections are rigged and Bowman because he knows that 9/11 was an inside job.

Cynthia McKinney, who dared to support both the quest for verifiable elections and the quest for verifiable truth about 9/11, was thereby deemed overly critical of Israel, and her primary opponent suddenly received huge financial and logistical support from Jewish and Israeli groups. McKinney, who had introduced the first articles of impeachment against the Bush administration, was then portrayed as an anti-Semite in the national media, and duly weeded out, long before the general election began.

Without these acts of sabotage, and without similar self-destructive tactics, the Democrats would have had an even larger majority.

In other words, Rahm Emanuel knows what he's doing.

And so does Barack Obama.

By appointing as his Chief of Staff a foul-mouthed, quick-tempered Zionist who stands against both electoral integrity and 9/11 truth, Obama has marked the Oval Office off-limits to anyone who might be able to nudge our government toward accountability or our foreign policy in a positive direction. And as we must surely have realized by now, post-9/11 foreign policy as presently constituted has broken the bank in such a way that domestic policy is now so undernourished, it's virtually meaningless.

In other words, if we've got the GWOT, we've got nothing else. And that doesn't even begin to measure the horrific impacts of the GWOT on the rest of the world -- which is, after all, where the GWOT's primary victims once lived.

Obama's appointment of Emanuel guarantees that the GWOT will remain -- not only in play but also in power -- unchallenged except by a few madmen of the internet, for at least the next four (read: eight) years.

For their part, the Republicans are back to their most basic trick: while Emanuel is positioning himself to protect what they have done in the past eight years, they portray him as their opponent, and attack him pre-emptively. Thus, according to the same piece from FOX News,

Last week, the Republican National Committee put out a press release calling Obama's choice of Emanuel, "Obama's Broken Promise" because the Illinois politician has a reputation for being "hyper-partisan."

And Republican House leader John Boehner called Emanuel "an ironic choice for a president-elect who has promised to change Washington, make politics more civil, and govern from the center."

The notion of "governing from the center" is a mis-nomer, of course, and a deliberate one, if ever a deliberate lie was told in American politics.

When Republican politicians and pundits say Obama should govern from "the center", they mean "as close to the radical-right post-9/11 agenda as possible".

And when Obama's Chief of Staff moves in that direction, what is that but Change You Can Wait For?

Emanuel responded to the GOP's criticisms, saying, "President-elect Obama is very clear... that we have to govern in a bipartisan fashion."

"The challenges are big enough that there's going to be an ability for people of both parties, as well as independents, to contribute ideas to help meet the challenges on health care, energy, tax reform, education," he said.

Notice the issues that Rahm Emanuel lists as challenges. Do you see anything about foreign policy? Do you see any hint of the War on Terror, or the War on Drugs, or the gathering War on Pakistan, or the proxy war on Somalia, or the constant threats of War on Iran? Of course not. These are all approved by the radical right that calls itself "the center".

And Obama has made it crystal clear -- to all 17 of us who were listening -- that his main disagreement with the Bush administration is over Iraq, where we're losing and where we're wasting forces that could be more valuable in Afghanistan.

He's a Prince, all right! A Prince of Peace! Peace You Can Wait For!

How long must you wait? How much more can you take?

Wait as long as you can; wait as long as you will. Peace won't come during this snake's administration, nor -- if he gets his way -- during your lifetime. But Barack Obama and his backers would be very happy if you decided to sit and wait.

Should you decide to dance and sing, weep with joy or fall over in ecstasy, that would be ok too, of course.

In chess, a common tactic involves pinning a piece (fixing it to single square) and then capturing it (which is so much easier when it can't run away). In politics, things are almost as complicated. But instead of knights and bishops we have pied pipers, who create "dissident" personality cults which attract fiercely loyal supporters, who are then immobilized and captured in due course.

The difference, of course, is that in chess the pieces are all wooden and insensate, whereas in politics only some of them are. And therefore, some people may eventually start to believe that Barack Obama has compromised, or even betrayed, his principles.

But that's not true; they only believe it because they haven't been paying attention for long enough. Barack Obama has made it very clear, many times, that he has no principles.

Fortunately for Obama, his chief opponents, both in the donkey primary and in the general selection, had already made it even clearer that they were even more stupid, even more beholden, and/or even more ruthless.

But Obama, far from stupid, is probably the most dangerous of the bunch. And -- guess what? -- he's already convinced the world to let down its guard, while he's planning another huge increase in American military funding. For what, pray tell? Oh, I suppose you can guess ...

... or maybe you can't. Because you might be like the more than 97% of Americans whose attention spans clock in at less than 45 seconds ... and that's a real shame ... because ...

What were we talking about?

It doesn't matter.

Nothing matters very much, now that we've elected a transformative figure.

And isn't his wife beautiful? This is gonna be so much fun!

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Iranian President Says What TV Pundits Can't: American Empire Is Almost Over

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad offended quite a few people with his pointed remarks at the UN, as CNN reports:

Ahmadinejad: 'American empire' nearing its end

"As long as the aggressors, because of their financial, political and propaganda powers, not only escape punishment, but even claim righteousness, and as long as wars are started and nations are enslaved in order to win votes in elections, not only will the problems of the global community remain unsolved, but they will be increasingly exacerbated," the Iranian leader said.

He accused the United States of oppressing Iraqis with six years of occupation, saying Americans were "still seeking to solidify their position in the political geography of the region and to dominate oil resources."

This is particularly offensive to American media and political types not just because it's true, but because it's verboten truth.

Nobody in American TV-land can say these things, even though they are obviously correct.

CNN continues:

Meanwhile, he said, Palestinians have undergone "60 years of carnage and invasion ... at the hands of some criminal and occupying Zionists."

He said Zionists in Israel "have forged a regime through collecting people from various parts of the world and bringing them to other people's land, by displacing, detaining and killing the true owners of that land."

The Security Council, he said, "cannot do anything, and sometimes under pressure from a few bullying powers, even paves the way for supporting these Zionist murders."

Unable to refute any of this, CNN defers to a famous lie:

He stopped short of calling for Israel to be politically wiped off the map as he has in the past.

The fact that he has never said anything of the sort is clearly of no consequence to CNN -- not when there's an opportunity to fan the flames of fiction.

In the fictional media account, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is dangerous because of fearsome weapons that he doesn't have, and threatening statements that he's never made.

But in reality, he's a dangerous man because he suggests things like:

"a free referendum in Palestine for determining and establishing the type of state in the entire Palestinian lands."

Such a referendum -- direct independent democracy at its finest -- can never be allowed to happen, of course, because that would be the end of Israel.

And that's why the [Jewish]

Anti-Defamation League released a statement saying the Iranian leader showed he "is deeply infected with anti-Semitism" and displayed "the true threat the Iranian regime poses to Israel, the United States and the West."

The ADL says this so often and it gets published so everywhere and so unquestioningly...

First and foremost, Ahmadinejad is an anti-Zionist. Zionism is a political philosophy. Ahmadinejad doesn't like it much. That's his prerogative. I don't like it much, either. That's my prerogative.

Anti-Zionism is not the same as anti-Semitism. It's not even close. Only the deliberately, willfully ignorant -- and those who wish you were equally ignorant -- fail to see the distinction.

It's not the "anti-Semitism" that makes Ahmadinejad dangerous. That's only a cover story. The true threat Mahmoud Ahmadinejad poses -- to Israel, to the United States and to the West -- lies in his willingness to speak the verboten truth.

And that's a big problem for our "news" providers, because they can't just cancel his show.

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Big Dog, Little Tail / It's Too Late

Here's Chris Floyd, from his backup site, Empire Burlesque 1.0, in full and with kind permission:

I.
Let's be clear about one thing: Israel will not attack Iran without the full knowledge and approval of the United States government. The trigger of the "warning shot" of Israel's long-range air-strike exercise last week was actually pulled in Washington. The Israelis will not force or deceive the U.S. government into an attack on Iran; that attack – which grows more certain by the hour – will take place because America's bipartisan foreign policy establishment and military-industrial complex (to the extent that there is any real difference between the two) want it to happen, or are willing to let it happen.

It is of course an article of faith for some people that the Israeli tails wags the big American dog. This rather ludicrous assertion is nothing more than the pernicious doctrine of "American exceptionalism" tricked out in "dissident" drag. For its underlying assumption is that good ole true-blue American elites would never commit war crimes or seek empire and geopolitical dominion unless they had somehow been tricked into it by those wily Jews. This is exactly backwards. If Israel was of no use to the American elite's domination agenda, then it would be discarded, or at least downgraded in terms of military, economic and diplomatic support.

When a nation serves the American elite's interests well, it is rewarded, and its various shortcomings are overlooked, however egregious they might be. Saudi Arabia is a prime example. Egypt is another. Iraq is a negative example. When Saddam's regime was thought useful, it was supported, copiously. When Saddam was no longer useful – especially when he threatened the Bush Family's long-time business partners in Kuwait – then he became "a new Hitler." When Iran was governed by a tyrant friendly to Washington, it was lauded – and larded with the usual military support and diplomatic muscle. When unfriendly tyrants took over, Iran became a land of Persian devils. The list of such examples from American history goes on and on.

If Israel had, say, opposed the U.S. invasion of Iraq, it would have found itself shorn of much of its American largess very quickly. Israel is in fact almost entirely dependent on the United States for its military and economic well-being; in return it gives unstinting support to the interests of the American elite. It is in many ways one of the most abject client states in the world today, outside of Iraq or Afghanistan. The fact that there is a convergence of interests and ideology between militarist elites in the United States and Israel is hardly surprising. It would only be surprising if this were not the case. And so we see a cross-pollination of ideas, strategies, techniques, technologies – and even, in some cases, personnel (e.g. the "Clean Break" group) – between these elites.

For the same reasons, we also see a strong "Jewish Lobby" in the United States. For although those lobbying organizations do not actually represent the viewpoint of the majority of American Jews, they do offer unwavering support to the American elite's domination agenda. These organizations – like Israel itself – also serve as useful stalking horses and lightning rods. In the first instance, they can stake out radical positions which would be too impolitic for America's governing elite to espouse too openly. In the second instance, they can always be conveniently blamed for "radicalizing" or "duping" the American elite if one of the latter's schemes for loot and dominion go wrong. And of course they can be used to punish domestic politicians who fail to hew slavishly enough to the elite's imperial line. But if AIPAC came out tomorrow with, say, a demand that America dismantle its worldwide empire of military bases, or condemned the invasion of Iraq as a war crime, we would see its influence decline almost instantly. Again, it is the convergence of interests with the American elite, and their willingness to serve those interests, that give the government of Israel and non-representative organizations like AIPAC such a prominent role.

For example, AIPAC has played the stalking horse in helping push Resolution 362, the "Iran War Resolution," toward its virtually guaranteed passage by the House. The bill – supported by the usual broad spectrum of the "bipartisan foreign policy establishment" – calls for, among other things, a full blockade of Iran. This is of course an outright act of war, and one aimed directly and purposely at the Iranian people, who would be subjected to the same kind of treatment that left at least a million Iraqis dead during the many years of American-led, bipartisan sanctions against Saddam's regime. This fact – an impending act of war that could inflict untold suffering upon millions of innocent people, even before the first shot is fired – does not seem to trouble anyone in the American establishment, nor in the "progressive blogosphere."

Arthur Silber has a few choice words on this situation here, including:

In the fearsome, awful, terrifying wake of an attack on Iran, as the economy crumbles, as violence spreads throughout the Middle East, Asia and possibly elsewhere, as life falls apart in the United States, do you think anyone will give a damn about FISA? Do you think anyone will even remember FISA? Do you doubt that the government will seize and utilize powers that will make FISA look like child's play? Do you doubt that the government will do all this with the active, eager participation of the Democrats?

II.
The stated casus belli in the "Iran War Resolution" – which replicates exactly the bellicose intentions and deceptions of the Bush Administration – is Iran's "nuclear enrichment activities." This is presented as an unmitigated evil worthy of the most severe measures, including an act of war like a blockade. The truth, of course, is that these enrichment activities are entirely legal under international treaties governing nuclear proliferation, and are being carried out under the most extensive and stringent international supervision ever imposed on a nation, as Kaveh Afrasiabi notes in the Asia Times. Afrasiabi also details the rank falsehoods about Iran's nuclear programme, and the international inspection program overseeing it, that permeate the American media:

...in an article in The Wall Street Journal, US Congresswoman Jane Harman, who chairs the powerful Homeland Security Intelligence Committee, cites Iran's steady progress in installing new centrifuges and the dangers posed by "unsupervised, weapons-grade material" in Tehran's hands.

Never mind that IAEA reports clearly confirm that all of Iran's enrichment-related facilities are under the agency's "containment and monitoring", or that IAEA inspectors have had nine "unannounced visits" at the enrichment facility in Natanz since March 2007.

Thus, for instance, in a front-page article in the New York Times, dated June 20, Michael Gordon and Eric Schmitt break the sensational news about Israel's extensive maneuvers in preparation for an attack on Iran, indirectly rationalizing Israel's belligerency by omitting any mention of the IAEA's latest report confirming the absence of any evidence of military nuclear diversion and, instead, confining themselves to the following comment: "In late May, the IAEA reported that Iran's suspected work on nuclear matters was a 'matter of serious concern' and that the Iranians owed the agency 'substantial explanation'."

What ought to have been added was that the same IAEA report states unequivocally that it had received "no credible information" regarding the alleged "weaponization studies", nor has the agency detected any nuclear activity connected to those alleged studies. Besides, the same IAEA report more than a dozen times stresses the evidence of peacefulness of Iran's nuclear program...

To turn to another example of flawed coverage of Iran by the US media, a recent editorial in the Dallas News states categorically that the IAEA "has recently accused Iran of developing its program of enriching uranium". The editors appear unaware that the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), to which Iran is a signatory, does not prohibit Iran's uranium-enrichment program.

The IAEA has never declared Iran in material breach of its obligations and, certainly, has never "accused" Iran of pursuing a program sanctioned under the NPT. Rather, the governing board of the IAEA has simply requested from Iran to suspend its sensitive nuclear program as a "confidence-building measure", that is, as a time-bound and thus temporary "legally non-binding" step.

As Sam Gardiner notes, Bush and his minions are now pounding the "enrichment" theme as their chief drumbeat for war with Iran. And they have obviously succeeded in demonizing the entirely legal and carefully supervised process of enrichment, as demonstrated by the Congressional resolution and the press coverage, both of which also take up "enrichment" as an evil that must be stopped at all costs.

No doubt this is in response to the IAEA reports noted by Afrasiabi, which have found no credible information about "weaponization studies." (And those are just studies, mind you, not actual weaponization programs.) This is of course not the first time that the Bush Administration has moved the goalposts in its fearmongering campaign. As we noted here last December, just after the Administration's own intelligence agencies declared that Iran had no active nuclear weapons program, Bush announced that

Iran will not be "allowed" to acquire even the "scientific knowledge" required to build a nuclear weapon. Previous "red lines" which could trigger an attack had been based on Iran actually building a weapon; now even nibbling at the forbidden fruit of nuclear knowledge could serve as "justification" for a "pre-emptive strike" to quell the "danger." After all, as Bush rather illiterately told reporters, "What's to say they couldn't start another covert nuclear weapons program?" Better safe than sorry, right?

And at the very least, moving the goalposts in this manner will allow the Bush Regime to portray Iran as a dangerous, defiant menace for merely carrying on with its fully legal nuclear power program, as authorized by international treaty and monitored by the IAEA. Thus no matter what Iran actually does – or doesn't do – the Bushists will continue to use the "Persian menace" as fodder for the imperial war machine.

We see this playing out again today, in the scary talk – and Congressional resolutions – damning Iran's "enrichment activities." What was true then is true now: there is literally nothing that Iran can do – or not do – to divert the American elite's desire to strike at their land and bring it under domination. And apparently there is nothing that anyone in America with any power or a major platform will do to stop it either.

Arthur Silber concludes his damning analysis of our unforced march to new horror with a heartbreaking quote from Martin Luther King Jr. Let it serve as the last word here as well; no one will put it better:

There is such a thing as being too late.... Life often leaves us standing bare, naked, and dejected with lost opportunity.... Over the bleached bones of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words: "Too late."

Indeed. Arthur Silber often screams at the progressive blogosphere: "Why won't you do anything about this?" The big "liberal", "progressive" sites seem determined to avoid the issues on which they could do the most good. It's hard for me to imagine that this is unintentional. And I know this from heartbreaking experience.

What's needed, according to Arthur Silber, is "massive civil disobedience, including a sit-in of a minimum of several hundred thousand people shutting down Washington, D.C. completely", presenting a spectacle the media cannot avoid covering, threatening to shut the federal government down entirely, and holding the fort until more arrive. It's a lovely vision, but I'm not fortunate enough to share it.

Last summer there were a half a million people on the ground in Washington and the media barely gave them a peep. The "Active Denial" heat-ray crowd-control weapon is ready now and it provides a formidable long-distance supplement to the water cannons and pepper spray of old. Throw in the synthetic insects, and it's hard to see how even a couple million people could be a serious threat.

As if you could get them there. As if you could get them interested.

After the 2004 presidential election was obviously and blatantly stolen, I sat up all night leaving messages on all the "progressive" "Democratic" websites I could find. "Get yourself to Washington!" I wrote. "General strike -- now or never!" I exhorted.

I got two responses. One said, "I'd love to do it, but I gotta go to work in the morning." And the other one said, "You sound like you're ten years old."

Last year I wrote a whole series of big beautiful posts urging my readers to get involved in a General Strike planned for September 11th.

Nobody linked to a single one of those posts. No other blogger, to my knowledge, even mentioned the idea. I took this as a sign of the level of commitment to positive change among my readership. Namely: None.

As I wrote before the "election" of 2006,

By refusing to work every day, rather than refusing to "vote" once every two years, you could make your voice heard every day. Or at least that's the theory.

But in this case it's only a theory; and there will never be a general strike in the USA, no matter how clear it becomes that our "elections" are a farce.

Why? Because consumers would be required to sacrifice a little bit of material comfort for future of their democracy, and for the future of their children.

And that is the one thing Americans have proven they absolutely will not do.

I'd happily throw my weight behind Arthur Silber's call for massive civil disobedience. But my track record's not so good.

It's not as if you couldn't see this coming.

Here's an excerpt from a song I wrote in 1984.

It's Too Late

There's nothin' you can do about it
nowhere you can take your complaint
Everybody loves to shout but
no one ever listens until it's
too late

Everywhere you look there's life forms
buidin' little walls and fences
Hardly people anymore, just
owners of establishments, it's
too late

It's too bad
They never gave a thought to what they had

It's so sad
There's nothin' left of what they had

There's nothin' you can do about it
even though it makes no sense, there's
something comforting about
running into walls and fences
too late

Aw, it's too late
Aw, it's too bad
Aw, man, it's over.

Arab World Would Be "Pleased" If Israel Attacked Iran: John Bolton

In an incredible [not] interview with the UK's Daily Telegraph, John Bolton, former US ambassador [sic] to the UN, said the Arab world would be pleased by an Israeli attack against Iran, which could happen soon.

According to Bolton the "optimal window" would be between November 4, 2008, the date of the next US presidential election [sic] and January 20, 2009, when the new [sic] president is expected to be inaugurated [provided the current one decides to leave].

Toby Harnden: Israel 'will attack Iran' before new US president sworn in, John Bolton predicts

John Bolton, the former American ambassador to the United Nations, has predicted that Israel could attack Iran after the November presidential election but before George W Bush's successor is sworn in.

The Arab world would be "pleased" by Israeli strikes against Iranian nuclear facilities, he said in an interview with The Daily Telegraph.

"It [the reaction] will be positive privately. I think there'll be public denunciations but no action," he said.

It's an interesting point of view; the Arab world according to a neocon chickenhawk.

Mr Bolton, an unflinching hawk who proposes military action to stop Iran developing nuclear weapons, bemoaned what he sees as a lack of will by the Bush administration to itself contemplate military strikes.

"It's clear that the administration has essentially given up that possibility," he said. "I don't think it's serious any more. If you had asked me a year ago I would have said I thought it was a real possibility. I just don't think it's in the cards."

But what's not a real possibility is the notion that Iran could develop nuclear weapons anytime soon; they can't even do nuclear power.

Of course this is what the Americans and the Israelis are trying to prevent; but as a signatory to the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, the Iranians are entitled to enrich uranium for peaceful domestic purposes.

And the Iranians say they don't even want to develop nuclear weapons, but the Israelis say, "Don't believe their lies; believe our lies!" Which we do.

The ironic, bizarre, or typical thing about all this is that Israel has at least 150 nuclear weapons, whereas Iran has none, and even if Iran were to develop a nuclear weapons capability, they would still be staring down the barrels of all those guns.

But the narrative that floats has Iran the danger, and Israel the threatened.

Israel is still determined to prevent Iran from developing any nuclear capability, according to Bolton, who says:

The "optimal window" for strikes would be between the November 4 election and the inauguration on January 20, 2009.

"The Israelis have one eye on the calendar because of the pace at which the Iranians are proceeding both to develop their nuclear weapons capability and to do things like increase their defences by buying new Russian anti-aircraft systems and further harden the nuclear installations.

"They're also obviously looking at the American election calendar. My judgement is they would not want to do anything before our election because there's no telling what impact it could have on the election."

But waiting for either Barack Obama, the Democratic candidate, or his Republican opponent John McCain to be installed in the White House could preclude military action happening for the next four years or at least delay it.

I need not point out that this is a very bizarre assertion.

"An Obama victory would rule out military action by the Israelis because they would fear the consequences given the approach Obama has taken to foreign policy," said Mr Bolton, who was Mr Bush's ambassador to the UN from 2005 to 2006.

This is bizarre as well, since it comes after Obama's statement that he would do "anything, and I mean anything" to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons. Hmmm. Could John Bolton be selling something here? In other words, is he doing an ad for John McCain?

Maybe not. McCain is too much of a dove for Bolton.

"With McCain they might still be looking at a delay. Given that time is on Iran's side, I think the argument for military action is sooner rather than later absent some other development."

There's more [of course] and it's really twisted [of course]:

On Friday, Mohamed ElBaradei, head of the UN International Atomic Energy Agency, said military action against Iran would turn the Middle East into a "fireball" and accelerate Iran's nuclear programme.

Mr Bolton, however, dismissed such sentiments as scaremongering. "The key point would be for the Israelis to break Iran's control over the nuclear fuel cycle and that could be accomplished for example by destroying the uranium conversion facility at Esfahan or the uranium enrichment facility at Natanz.

"That doesn't end the problem but it buys time during which a more permanent solution might be found.... How long? That would be hard to say. Depends on the extent of the destruction."

Talk about scaremongering!!

The US has no problem giving enriched uranium to Saudi Arabia -- and you won't find a more primitive and radical Islamic state anywhere.

But we're prepared to nuke Iran to prevent them from enriching uranium!

As usual, it's one lie after another, with an occasional truth thrown in.

No wonder the Angry Arab is so angry.

And that's the news.

War!! Hypocrisy!! US Attacks Iran: Global Community Must Respond (Suggested Response Included)

The long-rumored war between the United States and Iran has begun, but not with a radioactive bang, as some had feared. That can still come later, of course. "All options are on the table," as they say -- "they" being all the so-called "serious presidential candidates" and the statement itself being thinly veiled "diplomatic code" threatening a nuclear attack against the Iranians.

Rather than an attack with "bunker-busters", the first attack of the war was made with a "bank-buster", and it came in the form of a shot across the bow of the global banking system. The hypocrisy couldn't be clearer, not that this will matter much to the Iranian victims -- unless the truth suddenly becomes as important to the world's bankers as it is to some of the world's bloggers.

The first alleged casus belli against Iran was supposed to be its purported pursuit of nuclear weapons. The Iranian leadership has renounced any desire to obtain such weapons; the international governing body, IAEA, has inspected Iran repeatedly without finding anything resembling a program designed to develop nuclear arms, and technically sound experts such as Scott Ritter scoff at the notion that Iran is even close to developing any nuclear capability.

There's irony in the American threat to use nuclear weapons against Iran, supposedly in order to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons itself. If the subject matter were any lighter; if there were not literally millions of lives at stake immediately, and many more thereafter; the irony would almost be funny.

But it's not. It is an affront to any sensibility not tainted by "American exceptionalism": the widespread American belief that the United States is uniquely blessed with democracy and liberty and therefore has the right to dictate the foreign and domestic policies of every other country on Earth -- at the point of a weapon if feasible. In other words, everyone save Americans -- and only those blinded by the propaganda barrage -- can see that this line of "reasoning" is bogus.

But that's just the beginning. Now, apparently because of the American failure to create a credible nuke-related casus belli, they've turned to a new game -- charging Iran with laundering money, supporting terrorism, and committing financial crimes detrimental to the world's financial community.

Using little-known provisions in the "USA PATRIOT Act", the exceptional Americans are cracking down on Iran for doing what comes naturally to the Bush administration: money-laundering, supporting terrorism, and endangering the global economy.

The "PATRIOT Act" itself is exceptional: it was passed by a Congress that hadn't read it and signed by a "President" who had never been legitimately elected; it strips Constitutionally guaranteed freedoms from American citizens and at the same time it purports to give the American administration control of global systems; it's an enormous piece of legislation amending hundreds of laws which was presented to the House only a month after the attacks of September 11, 2001 -- supposedly in response to those attacks and supposedly in order to prevent future attacks.

The problem, of course, is that the attacks of September 11 were never properly investigated; the sham investigation initiated by the White House didn't even get started until a year after the "PATRIOT Act" was made law; thus there was no way for the drafters of the "PATRIOT Act" to know what changes in legal and security structures would have been needed for the United States to prevent future attacks of the kind -- assuming, of course, that the United States National Security apparatus was not already fully prepared to prevent the attacks of 9/11, and for some reason chose not to do so.

The final assumption appears to be completely unjustified, but even if it were true, the "PATRIOT Act" would still be an abomination. So it's only fitting, in an Orwellian kind of way, that it would be used to start a war of aggression against a peaceful country that has never threatened the United States.

The accusations against Iran may be true, in part. It appears that Iranian banks have altered records to obscure some transactions. And Iranians have been accused of funding terrorism in the Middle East and of providing weapons for use against the Americans in Iraq. No credible evidence has ever been presented to support the weapons charge, but for the sake of the current analysis let's pretend it's a valid allegation. Let's just add up the charges, put them in context, and see what we've got.

A couple of Iranian banks were caught pulling a couple of shifty stunts. Does anything like that ever happen with American banks? Tell the truth, now.

The American intelligence services operate with black budgets in the multi-billion dollar-a-year range; they ship and sell weapons and drugs all over the world to generate even more billions (not to mention assisting the twin scourges of murder and drug addiction); Americans shipped pallets of hundred-dollar bills to Iraq which then simply disappeared; the list of money-laundering crimes goes on and on, and the financial crime not only tolerated but in fact perpetrated by official US government agencies runs in the hundred-billion dollar-a-year range; and the US has the gall to accuse the Iranians of laundering money. Nice.

Did Iranians send weapons to Iraq to be used against the Americans? Have Americans ever sent weapons to Iraq to be used against the Iraqis? Tell the truth again. Have they sent men to fire those weapons? Let's tell the whole truth: They're using radioactive ammunition, too.

The Americans have openly spent hundreds of billions of dollars every year for the past five years to fund their attack on a defenseless nation which had not threatened them. They have shipped more than a million men and women to fight there, at least 4,000 of whom have died in Iraq. Countless others have been wounded, physically or mentally or both. And that's just the American side of the damage sheet. On the Iraqi side it's much worse -- as usual when American troops destroy a foreign country. Tell the truth; it's good for all of us.

How many countries has the United States done this to? Count invasion and occupation; count bombing and inciting terrorism; count starting civil wars and setting up death squads; count covert subversion and overt sabotage of democratic processes; count Vietnam and Guatemala and Chile and Somalia and Grenada and Haiti and Iran and ... oops! did I just mention Iran? Strike that. Trust me: it's the Iranians who are to be feared for inciting terrorism. Just ask George Bush.

Are the Iranian banks to be feared for jeopardizing the global financial system? Again you can ask the Americans, but don't mention Enron or BCCI or (fill in the blank here _____) or any of the other tips of corrupt American financial icebergs that have been floating around sinking unsuspecting voyagers on the rough waters of national and international finance. Why? Just because, that's why!!

Because is the key word in all this; because the Americans claim to control the global financial system; because the Americans accuse the Iranians of certain crimes against that system; because Americans are exceptional and can never be held to account for obvious and egregious crimes against humanity; because of all these factors the allegations against a few Iranian banks have been spun into a threat against all Iranian banks -- and all banks which deal with Iranian banks!

The threat goes like this: the allegedly offending Iranian banks are to be isolated; all banks which do business in Iran are to be treated likewise; all banks which do business with any Iranian bank likewise as well. It's an international quarantine on Iranian banking interests, based on allegedly anti-terrorism provisions of the "PATRIOT Act". The inevitable result will be widespread poverty in Iran. The obvious intent is provoke the Iranian government into doing something that could be used as a casus belli -- a "case for war".

Two drippingly ironic facts are hidden in all this maneuvering.

First, the United States has no international legal right to quarantine Iran as it is doing -- with heavy-handed blackmail and threats of "cooperate with us or you'll be next". No nation or national bank wants to be seen as cooperating with terrorism -- and yet, in their efforts to eschew "terrorists" and cooperate with the Americans -- this is exactly what they're doing.

Secondly, by invoking these financial threats -- threats which could lead to genocidal economic blockade -- the Americans have provided the Iranians with a casus belli of their own, to be used against the United States. But Iran doesn't want war; so it doesn't need a casus belli. What it needs -- what is always needed when a schoolyard bully starts picking on a little kid -- is strength in numbers among the potential victims.

The "schoolyard bully" analogy may not be particularly apt in the context of international relations; but then again in this case it might be just perfect.

To everybody except the exceptional Americans, there appears to be one rogue state in the world. Its dubious public pronouncements are willingly swallowed by an increasingly centralized "news" media and broadcast to gullible idiots everywhere; the result is death and destruction on a scale and of a type heretofore unknown in the history of human conflict.

The residue of depleted uranium munitions will render a large chunk of the Middle East unfit for human habitation forever -- and the radioactive debris is spreading, slowly and inexorably, to the rest of the world.

But Iran is a threat! Iran must suffer sanctions! Iran must be isolated and punished! It's unbelievable -- or not -- depending on how low you think the Bush administration will stoop. (Here's a helpful hint: there's no limit!)

If the depleted uranium alone isn't enough to make the nations of the world band together against the schoolyard bully; if the Bush doctrine -- preemptive war, anywhere, anytime, based on the flimsiest lies -- is not enough; if the countries of the world are not drawn together by the enshrinement of torture and indefinite confinement as national norms in a country known (rightly or not) as a world leader for human rights; perhaps this overt act of war against Iran can provide the impetus. After all, the "justifications" used by the Americans also apply -- in every case and with overwhelming force -- to crimes committed by the Americans themselves.

Therefore, in my view, it is time for an alliance of all the life-affirming countries of the world -- an Axis Against Evil that could be based on a document as simple as the following:

WHEREAS the American use of radioactive ammunition in Iraq and Afghanistan poses an existential risk to humanity and all other forms of life all over the world,

WHEREAS the United States has nuclear weapons, has used them, and has threatened to use them again, while Iran has no nuclear weapons and no plans to develop any such weapons,

WHEREAS the United States of America has a long history of terrorism and fomenting terrorism,

WHEREAS covert agencies of the United States government regularly launder billions of dollars a year,

WHEREAS American banks are currently -- as always -- a grave threat to the global financial system,

WHEREAS America is currently and obviously guilty of all the crimes of which Iran is accused, and many more, on an unimaginably greater scale,

WHEREAS the American administration is now threatening Iran with economic destruction, allegedly to further the prevention of terrorism,

WHEREAS the blackmail tactics used by the United States in attempting to isolate Iran are reprehensible and typical, and constitute a form of terrorism in and of themselves,

THEREFORE BE IT RESOLVED that from this day forward and until all said issues are resolved to our satisfaction, we shall do NO BUSINESS with any American Business and NO BANKING with any American Bank, nor shall we enter into any transaction with any Bank or Business doing Business with any American Business or Banking at any American Bank; and we will do our coercive best to make sure that all Banks and Businesses within our jurisdiction do the very same.

[Signed]

[your name]

___________________________

[your country]

___________________________

[your position; circle one]

(King) (Queen)
(President) (Prime Minister)
(Prince) (Princess)
(Grand Poobah) (Petite Poobah)

It sounds like a crazy idea, but if we get two or three dozen of the right signatures, the American imperial project is finished.

Otherwise we are.

~~~

NOTES: My main computer has been down for the past several hours; I wrote this post on a machine that is not much more than a typewriter. It's a lovely discipline, for sure, but the piece is not as well-annotated as usual, nor does it quote any sources. Therefore:

[1] If you didn't click the links above, please do so now:

John McGlynn: The March 20, 2008 US Declaration of War on Iran

Chris Floyd: Worried Just a Bit? Bush Launches Economic 'Shock and Awe' on Iran

[2] If you are a world leader, you are invited to sign the declaration above. Otherwise, please bring it to the attention of your leader(s).

Get Ready To Rumble: Petraeus Blames Iran for Green Zone Attack

Chris Floyd's site has been hacked too much; it's up again at the moment but who knows for how long?

In event of emergency, Chris will post at his original blogspot site, Empire Burlesque Now dot blogspot dot com. In the meantime I will try to mirror some of his work here, just in case.

Here's the latest from Chris, by kind permission, as always.

Still Not Worried? Petraeus Blames Iran for Green Zone Attack

Yesterday, we noted the story that the Saudi government is now preparing plans to deal with "any sudden nuclear and radioactive hazards" that may arise from an attack on Iran's nuclear reactors. This was reported by a top Saudi newspaper, Okaz, and relayed by a leading German news service, dpa -- one day after Dick Cheney paid a visit to the kingdom. As we noted, no one knows exactly what was said at that confab of allied authoritarians -- but something sure lit a fire under the Saudis, and convinced them that urgent action is needed to brace for the lethal overspill from a strike on Iran.

Now today comes word that the sainted General David Petraeus, commander of U.S. forces in Iraq -- and recepient of perhaps the most copious bipartisan tongue bath ever given to a serving military officer by the U.S. Congress -- has blamed Iran for the multiple mortar attack on Baghdad's Green Zone on Sunday. As the BBC reports:

The most senior US general in Iraq has said he has evidence that Iran was behind Sunday's bombardment of Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone.

Gen David Petraeus told the BBC he thought Tehran had trained, equipped and funded insurgents who fired the barrage of mortars and rockets.

He said Iran was adding what he described as "lethal accelerants" to a very combustible mix.

That's not all. After praising himself for his brilliant "counterinsurgency" masterstroke of paying Sunni insurgents and violent religious extremists to kill other Iraqis instead of Americans for awhile -- while also arming, training and funding the Shiite extremists now in charge of the Iraqi army and security forces to kill and torture other Iraqis -- Petraeus went on to blame Iran for being the main cause of violence in Iraq. (For a true picture of what Petraeus and the vaunted "surge" has actually wrought in Iraq, see Michael Schwartz's detailed and devastating report, "The Battle of Bagdhad."). From the BBC:

In an interview with BBC world affairs editor John Simpson, Gen Petraeus said violence in Iraq was being perpetuated by Iran's Quds Force, a branch of the Revolutionary Guards.

"The rockets that were launched at the Green Zone yesterday, for example... were Iranian-provided, Iranian-made rockets," he said, adding that the groups that fired them were funded and trained by the Quds Force.

"All of this in complete violation of promises made by President Ahmadinejad and the other most senior Iranian leaders to their Iraqi counterparts."

The Iranians, of course, have deep, intricate and longstanding ties to the "Iraqi leaders" whom Petraeus is now helping maintain in "power" -- if that's the word for the operations of a gang of brutal kleptocrats whose residence in office is sustained wholly by the foreign military forces who invaded their country at the order of another gang of brutal kleptocrats in Washington. But Petraeus -- and the White House kleptos -- have continually pushed the line that Iran is attacking a government led by their ideological and religious allies, in order to....what, exactly? Replace them with,er, ideological and religious allies? Well, logic has never been the strong suit of the Crawford Caligula and his courtiers, who believe they can "create their own reality" by the assertion of imperial will -- and by the expenditure of human cannon fodder. (Petraeus' remarks came on the day that the American military death toll in Iraq reached 4,000.)

Actually, of course, these charges aren't meant to make logical or geopolitical sense. They are simply being tossed out there, week after week, month after month, to "catapult the propaganda" for war with Iran "at the time, place, and in the manner of our choosing," to quote Bush's doctrine of preemptive war in the official "National Defense Strategy of the United States." Or as I noted here last year about an earlier round of charges:

[Petraeus] is asserting as unassailable fact accusations which have never been substantiated, not even by the Regime's own intelligence agencies -- whose bar for "confirming" provocative intelligence is, as we all know, preternaturally low. Petraeus doesn't intend for his words to be taken seriously -- that is, not in the real world, where military attacks by one nation on another lead to an immediate response. No, his words are intended for the media echo chamber, where they will bounce around in the midst of all the other mind-obliterating noise, with a few key scraps falling into the mix: "Iran" -- "killing Americans" -- "Qods" -- "Iran" -- "killing Americans" -- "Qods." That's all they want -- and that's all they need -- to get across. They certainly don't want anyone to pay close attention to the details of the patter they're putting out. They just want a few keywords to filter into the battered public consciousness, because these are the elements they will invoke when the time comes to launch their own unprovoked military agression against Iran: "Iran's Qods Force is killing Americans, and we must, reluctantly, retaliate. Therefore, tonight I have ordered a series of air raids on Qods Force bases in Iran...."

And hey: "Qods" sounds a lot like "al Qaeda," doesn't it? That gives you extra traction in the echo chamber -- more bang for the propaganda buck.

Let's be clear about this. This is an administration that claims the right to go to war on the merest suspicion that some evil foreign entity might attack Americans at some time in some way. This is an administration that has already acted on this deranged -- but oh-so-war-profitable -- "national defense strategy." This is an administration that specifically named Iran as a dire threat to the nation in the most recent version of this official strategy.

And now, we have Petraeus' j'accuse -- the culmination of more than a year of statements by U.S. officials accusing Iran of direct involvement in attacking and killing American personnel in Iraq. By the morally demented but consistent "principles" enunciated and acted upon by the Bush Administration (principles which of course include the use of manufactured evidence and knowing deception to launch wars in the name of "national security"), the White House has already established an iron-clad case for attacking Iran. Indeed, by their own lights, they have actually been criminally negligent and weak-kneed for not having attacked Iran long ago -- as the most vociferous wingnuts and con-jobs out there keep insisting.

As we said last week, the groundwork for the attack has already been laid. When and if a strike comes, it will almost certainly come quickly, without warning. There will be no new major PR campaign, just a "surge" in the same "mind-obliterating noise" of lies and accusations that has barraged us for so long. And no doubt we will see the redoubtable Petraeus take the lead in this surge against the American people -- with the same slickness and vigor with which he has perpetrated the murderous ethnic cleansing of Baghdad -- when he comes to Congress for another tongue-bath next month.

Note: Petraeus has been an eager dissembler for L'il Boots since the beginning, as Glenn Greenwald pointed out in this remarkable compendium of spin, waffle and flim-flam. For more on the saint's progress on the road to glory see: The Imperator Reports: Let the Blood Flow On; Killers and Extremists in the Pay of Petraeus; and Shotgun Wedding: The Saint, the Insurgents, and the Surge's "Success."

Plus: Winter Patriot tells us of another success story of the "humanitarian intervention" in Iraq: Fallujah.

One Tick Closer: Cheney Visits Saudi Arabia; Saudis Prepare To Radiate

Chris Floyd's site has been hacked too much; it's up again at the moment but who knows for how long?

In event of emergency, Chris will post at his original blogspot site, Empire Burlesque Now dot blogspot dot com.

Here, by kind permission of the author, is his latest piece.

Worried Yet? Saudis Prepare for "Sudden Nuclear Hazards" After Cheney Visit

I. One Tick Closer to Midnight

Last Friday, Dick Cheney was in Saudi Arabia for high-level meetings with the Saudi king and his ministers. On Saturday, it was revealed that the Saudi Shura Council -- the elite group that implements the decisions of the autocratic inner circle -- is preparing "national plans to deal with any sudden nuclear and radioactive hazards that may affect the kingdom following experts' warnings of possible attacks on Iran's Bushehr nuclear reactors," one of the kingdom's leading newspapers, Okaz, reports. The German-based dpa news service relayed the paper's story.

Simple prudence -- or ominous timing? We noted here last week that an American attack on Iran was far more likely -- and more imminent -- than most people suspect. We pointed to the mountain of evidence for this case gathered by scholar William R. Polk, one of the top aides to John Kennedy during the Cuban Missile Crisis, and to other indicators of impending war. The story by Okaz -- which would not have appeared in the tightly controlled dictatorship without approval from the top -- is yet another, very weighty piece of evidence laid in the scales toward a new, horrendous conflict.

We don't know what the Saudis told Cheney in private -- or even more to the point, what he told them. But the release of this story now, just after his departure, would seem to be a clear indication that the Saudis have good reason to fear a looming attack on Iran's nuclear sites and are actively preparing for it.

II. A Nuclear Epiphany in Iran?

And they certainly should be bracing themselves. A U.S. attack on Iran will come suddenly, and if it is indeed aimed at destroying Iran's nuclear capabilities -- a "threat" being talked up again with new urgency by both Cheney and Bush lately -- it has the potential for unimaginable consequences. As we noted here in a previous piece:

Twelve hours. One circuit of the sun from horizon to horizon, one course of the moon from dusk to dawn. What was once a natural measurement for the daily round of human life is now a doom-laden interval between the voicing of an autocrat's brutal whim and the infliction of mass annihilation halfway around the world.

Twelve hours is the maximum time necessary for American bombers to gear up and launch an unprovoked sneak attack – a Pearl Harbor in reverse – against Iran, the Washington Post reports. The plan for this "global strike," which includes a very viable "nuclear option," was approved months ago, and is now in operation. The planes are already on continuous alert, making "nuclear delivery" practice runs along the Iranian border, as Sy Hersh reports in the New Yorker, and waiting only for the signal from President George W. Bush to drop their payloads of conventional and nuclear weapons on some 400 targets spread throughout the condemned land.

And when this attack comes – either as a stand-alone "knock-out blow" or else as the precusor to a full-scale, regime-changing invasion, like the earlier aggression in Iraq – there will be no warning, no declaration of war, no hearings, no public debate. The already issued orders governing the operation put the decision solely in the hands of the president: he picks up the phone, he says, "Go" – and in twelve hours' time, up to a million Iranians could be dead.

This potential death toll is not pacificist hyperbole; it comes from a National Academy of Sciences study sponsored by the Pentagon itself, as The Progressive reports. (Although Bush's military brass like to peddle the public lie that "we don't do body counts" of the enemy, in reality, like all good businessmen they keep precise accounts of their production outputs: i.e., corpses.) The Pentagon's NAS study calibrated the kill-rate from "bunker-busting" tactical nukes used to take out underground facilities – such as those which house much of Iran's nuclear power program.

Another simulation by scientists, using Pentagon-devised software, was even more specific, measuring the aftermath of a "limited" nuclear attack on the main Iranian underground site in Esfahan, the magazine reports. This small expansion of the Pentagon franchise would result in stellar production figures: three million people killed by radiation in just two weeks, and 35 million people exposed to dangerous levels of cancer-causing radiation in Afghanistan, Pakistan and India. Bush has about 50 nuclear "earth-penetrating weapons" at his disposal, according to the Union of Concerned Scientists.

Nor is the idea of a nuclear strike on Iran mere "liberal paranoia." Bush himself pointedly refused to take the nuclear option "off the table" this week. But what's more, Bush has made the use of nuclear weapons a centerpiece of his "National Security Strategy of the United States," issued last month, The Progressive notes. While reaffirming the criminal principle of "pre-emptive" attacks on perceived enemies which may or may not be threatening America with weapons they may or may not possess, Bush declared that "safe, credible and reliable nuclear forces continue to play a critical role" in the "offensive strike systems" that are now a key part of America's "deterrence."

In the depraved jargon of atomic warmongering, a "credible" nuclear force is one that can and will be used in the course of ordinary military operations. It is no longer to be regarded as a sacred taboo. This has long been the dream of the Pentagon's "nuclear priesthood" and its acolytes, going back to the days of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. For decades, a strong faction within the American power structure has been afflicted with a perverted craving to unleash these weapons once more. An almost sexual frustration can be discerned in their laments as time and again, in crisis after crisis, their counsels for "going nuclear" were rejected – often at the very last moment. To justify their abberant desire, they have relentlessly demonized an ever-changing array of "enemies," painting each one as an imminent, overwhelming threat, led by "madmen" in thrall to pure evil, impervious to reason, fit only for destruction. Evidence for the "threat" is invariably exaggerated, manipulated, even manufactured; this ritual cycle has been enacted over and over, leading to many wars – but never to that ultimate, orgasmic release.

Now this paranoid sect has at last seized the commanding heights of American power...they have found a most eager disciple in the peevish dullard strutting in the Oval Office. Under their sinister tutelage, Bush has eviscerated 40 years' worth of arms control treaties; officially "normalized" the use of nuclear weapons, even against non-nuclear states; rewarded outlaw proliferators like India, Israel and Pakistan; and is now destroying the last and most effective restraint on the spread of nuclear weapons: the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT).

The treaty guarantees its signatories – such as Iran – the right to establish nuclear power programs in exchange for rigorous international inspections. But Bush has arbitrarily decided that Iran – whose nuclear program undergone perhaps the most extensive inspection process in history – must end its lawful activities. Why? Because the country is led by "madmen" in thrall to pure evil, impervious to reason, who one day may or may not threaten America with weapons they may or may not have....

So the NPT is dead. As with the Geneva Conventions and the U.S. Constitution, it now means only what Bush says it means. Force of arms, not rule of law, is the new world order. The attack on Iran is coming...The obvious, murderous insanity of such a move in no way precludes its implementation by this gang – as their invasion of Iraq clearly shows.

The nuclear sectarians have waited decades for this moment. Such a chance may never come again. Will they let it pass, when with just a word, in just twelve hours, they can see their god rising in a pillar of fire over Persia?

Click here for the article in its original context, with live links.

Stream Of Unconscious

If you turn off your mind, relax and float downstream ... and just read for a while ... the Wall Street Journal can explain how the Democratic primary in South Carolina just might change the face of racial politics in the South forever, since Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama are trying such different strategies.

Clinton is using an old-style political machine, trying to scoop as many endorsements as possible from political leaders and media types and preachers; Obama is using a grass-roots campaign to mobilize an entirely different group of people, or so the WSJ wants me to believe.

They may be right. But they lost me when they started talking about poor blacks looking to their preachers for "both spiritual and political guidance". White people don't do that, of course. Not since 2004, anyway.

Meanwhile, in an effort destined to earn even more ... um ... credibility ... said Journal carries a piece from Norman Podhoretz called "Stopping Iran", in which he argues -- quite falsely -- that hardly anybody disputed the 2005 NIE which said Iran was racing to build nuclear weapons.

Podhoretz also asserts that Iran has no need for nuclear power since it has all that oil.

Let's see, now: If I had all that oil, and it was selling for $100 a barrel, with no sign of a price decrease ever ... Would I rather sell it ... or burn it? Hmm, that's a tough one. Podhoretz would burn it, obviously. Apparently he doesn't understand the value of money. So he argues that Iran must be stopped from obtaining nuclear technology.

And it seems to me I've heard that one before. Have you? It's funny how Podhoretz doesn't seem too concerned about the entirely credible allegations made by Sibel Edmonds, who says US government insiders were selling nuclear secrets to the highest bidder on the black market, and much more.

Actually, no one in the US media seems much concerned about that; they're more interested in a hypothetical threat than evidence of any actual crimes, especially with crimes as serious as these -- crimes committed by powerful people who could ruin your reputation!

Naturally, the Democratically controlled Congress can't find time to look into it either, since their feckless leader, Henry Waxman, is so busy chasing down a chump who last played in the big leagues five years ago so he can find out what the chump knows about some illegal injections of steroids.

Illegal injections of cash are far less interesting to our bought-and-sold friends in the political/media circus, who don't give a damn about a million dead Iraqis but can't stop writing about one dead Marine.

So this is post-democratic America in its embryonic form: stupid; distracted; cut adrift from reality; corrupt to the bone; fighting a one-sided war of choice and bragging about it; and torturing people until they get mad at us.

And then, if they get mad enough to want to hurt us, we're morally obliged to torture them again, aren't we?

World Must Unite Before It's Too Late: Respected World Leader

The rest of the world must unite and rally against the United States “before it is too late,” according to a dramatic speech given by a respected world leader on Sunday in the Middle East.

In an address to government and business leaders in an opulent hotel in Abu Dhabi, he focused not only on what the rest of the world sees as America's global-imperial ambitions but also its increasingly obvious support for destabilizing terrorism in countries it wants to conquer without actually invading.

He called America’s government “the world’s leading sponsor of terrorism” and accused it of imposing repression and economic hardship at home and abroad.

“America’s actions threaten the security of nations everywhere,” he said. “So the rest of the world must consider new security arrangements as well as finding ways to strengthen longstanding friendships everywhere and rallying friends around the world to confront this danger before it is too late.”

Or something like that.

Tom Toles: Hold It A Second!

As Tom Waits puts it, the large print giveth and the small print taketh away.

With Tom Toles, quite often the large print sets it up and the small print knocks it down.

Click on the cartoon if you can't read it all.

How Long Does It Take For A National Intelligence Estimate To Expire?

U.S. Says Iran Ended Atomic Arms Work

A new assessment by American intelligence agencies concludes that Iran halted its nuclear weapons program in 2003 and that the program remains frozen, contradicting judgment two years ago that Tehran was working relentlessly toward building a nuclear bomb.

Mark Mazetti of the New York Times:

The assessment, a National Intelligence Estimate that represents the consensus view of all 16 American spy agencies, states that Tehran is likely keeping its options open with respect to building a weapon, but that intelligence agencies “do not know whether it currently intends to develop nuclear weapons.”

Iran is continuing to produce enriched uranium, a program that the Tehran government has said is designed for civilian purposes. The new estimate says that enrichment program could still provide Iran with enough raw material to produce a nuclear weapon sometime by the middle of next decade, a timetable essentially unchanged from previous estimates.

But the new estimate declares with “high confidence” that a military-run Iranian program intended to transform that raw material into a nuclear weapon has been shut down since 2003, and also says with high confidence that the halt “was directed primarily in response to increasing international scrutiny and pressure.”

and so on... exactly what we've been hearing from neutral observers such as the IAEA, and Scott Ritter, and many others...

Dafna Linzer and Joby Warrick of the Washington Post add a few more details and a somewhat different, um, tone:

U.S. Finds That Iran Halted Nuclear Arms Bid in 2003

The new findings, drawn from a consensus National Intelligence Estimate, reflected a surprising shift in the midst of the Bush administration's continuing political and diplomatic campaign to depict Tehran's nuclear development as a grave threat. The report was drafted after an extended internal debate over the reliability of communications intercepts of Iranian conversations this past summer that suggested the program had been suspended.

"Tehran's decision to halt its nuclear weapons program suggests it is less determined to develop nuclear weapons than we have been judging since 2005," a declassified summary of the new National Intelligence Estimate stated. Two years ago, the intelligence community said in contrast it had "high confidence that Iran currently is determined to have nuclear weapons."
...

Even if Iran were to restart its program now, the country probably could not produce enough highly enriched uranium for a single weapon before the middle of the next decade, the assessment stated. It also expressed doubt about whether Iran "currently intends to develop nuclear weapons."

Iran put a stop to weapons-related activities, including efforts to study warhead design and delivery systems, shortly after U.N. inspectors began probing allegations of a clandestine nuclear program. The timing of that decision, according to the intelligence estimate, "indicates Tehran's decisions are guided by a cost-benefit approach rather than a rush to a weapon irrespective of the political, economic, and military costs."

and so on...

What does it all mean? Former intelligence analyst Ray McGovern, via Consortium News, says it's a miracle:

A Miracle: Honest Intel on Iran Nukes

For those who have doubts about miracles, a double one occurred today. An honest National Intelligence Estimate (NIE) on Iran’s nuclear program has been issued and its Key Judgments were made public.

With redraft after redraft, it was what the Germans call “eine schwere Geburt”—a difficult birth, ten months in gestation.

I do not know how often Vice President Dick Cheney visited CIA Headquarters during the gestation period, but I am told he voiced his displeasure as soon as he saw the first sonogram/draft very early this year, and is so displeased with what issued that he has refused to be the godfather.

This time Cheney and his neo-con colleagues were unable to abort the process. And after delivery to the press, this child is going to be very hard to explain—the more so since it is legitimate.

McGovern then lists the main points of the NIE:

“We judge that in fall 2003, Tehran halted its nuclear weapons program...

“We assess with moderate confidence Tehran has not restarted its nuclear weapons program as of mid-2007.

“We do not have sufficient intelligence to judge confidently whether Tehran is willing to maintain the halt of its nuclear weapons program indefinitely...

“We judge with moderate confidence Iran probably would be technically capable of producing enough highly enriched uranium sometime during the 2010-2015 time frame.

“We judge with high confidence that Iran will not be technically capable of producing and reprocessing enough plutonium for a weapon before about 2015.”

Having reached these conclusions, it is not surprising that the NIE’s authors make a point of saying up front (in bold type) “This NIE does not (italics in original) assume that Iran intends to acquire nuclear weapons.”

This, of course, pulls out the rug from under Cheney’s claim of a “fairly robust new nuclear program” in Iran, and President Bush’s inaccurate assertion that Iranian leaders have even admitted they are developing nuclear weapons.

Apparently, intelligence community analysts are no longer required to produce the faith-based intelligence that brought us the Oct. 1, 2002, NIE “Iraq’s Continuing Program for Weapons of Mass Destruction”—the worst in the history of U.S. intelligence.

and so on ...

Larisa Alexandrovna fills in some of the background:

The NIE on Iran...

Cheney and the gang have been trying to keep this NIE from seeing the light of day.

Here is what former spook Larry Johnson has to say about it:

Now we know why some in the Bush Administration–Dick Cheney’s folks in particular–fought like hell to keep the National Intelligence Estimate on Iran’s nuclear program under wraps.
...

This report was ready to go in December of 2006 but Cheney and his allies pushed back hard to stop it. They knew, as they know today, that this headline does not help them in their rush to start a new war. Damn it all!!! How dare those pesky Iranians prove malleable to diplomatic initiatives and pressure. You mean we can solve things without starting a war and killing civilians?

Well, it certainly appears that way. But who says we're trying to solve things?

Peter Baker and Robin Wright of the Washington Post say it could throttle Bush's foreign policy with respect to Iran:

A Blow to Bush's Tehran Policy

President Bush got the world's attention this fall when he warned that a nuclear-armed Iran might lead to World War III. But his stark warning came at least a month or two after he had first been told about fresh indications that Iran had actually halted its nuclear weapons program.

The new intelligence report released yesterday not only undercut the administration's alarming rhetoric over Iran's nuclear ambitions but could also throttle Bush's effort to ratchet up international sanctions and take off the table the possibility of preemptive military action before the end of his presidency.

Preemptive military action off the table?? Wouldn't that be un-American?

Steven Lee Myers writes for the New York Times about how this NIE will change the world in "endless" ways:

An Assessment Jars a Foreign Policy Debate

An administration that had cited Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons as the rationale for an aggressive foreign policy — as an attempt to head off World War III, as President Bush himself put it only weeks ago — now has in its hands a classified document that undercuts much of the foundation for that approach.

The impact of the National Intelligence Estimate’s conclusion — that Iran had halted a military program in 2003, though it continues to enrich uranium, ostensibly for peaceful uses — will be felt in endless ways at home and abroad.

It will certainly weaken international support for tougher sanctions against Iran, as a senior administration official grudgingly acknowledged. And it will raise questions, again, about the integrity of America’s beleaguered intelligence agencies, including whether what are now acknowledged to have been overstatements about Iran’s intentions in a 2005 assessment reflected poor tradecraft or political pressure.

Seldom do those agencies vindicate irascible foreign leaders like President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, who several weeks ago said there was “no evidence” that Iran was building a nuclear weapon, dismissing the American claims as exaggerated.

The biggest change, though, could be its effect on President Bush’s last year in office, as well as on the campaign to replace him. Until Monday, 2008 seemed to be a year destined to be consumed, at least when it comes to foreign policy, by the prospects of confrontation with Iran.

There are still hawks in the administration, Vice President Dick Cheney chief among them, who view Iran with deep suspicion. But for now at least, the main argument for a military conflict with Iran — widely rumored and feared, judging by antiwar protesters that often greet Mr. Bush during his travels — is off the table for the foreseeable future.

Military conflict with Iran off the table for the foreseeable future?

Much depends on how far into the future you can foresee, doesn't it?

It takes a bit more of a cynic -- by which I mean somebody who's been paying attention for more than a couple of weeks -- to see the likely fate of this NIE.

The White House is already trying to undercut it, as Chris Floyd points out:

The White House has already shown what it will do with the NIE report: lie about it. Bush's national security adviser, the Uriah Heepish Stephen Hadley, was trotted out to say that far from showing that Bush and his minions have been lying through their teeth for years about the non-existent threat of Iran's non-existent nuclear weapons program, the report is actually a vindication of Bush's strategy....because it shows that all of the pressure that Washington has been putting on Tehran for the past four years somehow, er, magically induced the Iranians to go back in time and put the brakes on any arms programs in 2003. The truth, of course, is that nothing the Bush Administration has done in the past four years has made the slightest bit of difference to Iran's non-existent nuclear weapons program -- because the program did not, er, exist during the time of what Hadley's calls Bush's "successful" strategy.

And predictably, Hadley's main reaction to the NIE report was to call for an intensification of the current strategy: more and tighter sanctions, more diplomatic isolation. This, we are told in forceful terms, will, er, keep the Iranians from, uh, continuing their non-existent nuclear weapons program, which poses such an imminent threat to the world -- or would pose such an imminent threat, if the program in fact, er, existed.

But hey, these guys have launched wars on less than this. So while we may be treated to a few weeks of hard-to-decipher rumblings from within the Washington Kremlin -- similar to what we saw in late 2002, when the Bush Senior faction (Brent Scowcroft, etc.) fired off a few public warnings to Junior about the mess he was getting into -- I don't think we should light up the peace pipes just yet. The warmongers' fightback has just started, and heavier guns than poor old Goober Kurtz will be brought into play. But anything that puts a crimp in the White House plans for more mass murder -- even if only for a few weeks -- is a welcome development.

A welcome development indeed, but it doesn't strike me as one with legs.

Larisa again:

the Bush administration had anticipated that this NIE would one day see the light of day and changed its strategy :

"In addition to shifting from a strategy that uses an alleged immediate threat posed by a nuclear-armed Iran to one featuring IEDs as the tool by which Iran is allegedly trying to sabotage the efforts of US forces in Iraq, the administration has also moved toward directly implicating the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps – sometimes referred to as the Islamic Revolutionary Guard – by labeling the group a "specially designated global terrorist" organizations.

According to an August 15, Washington Post article, the Guard will be designated a global terrorist organization under Executive Order 13224, which was issued shortly after the attacks of September 11, 2001 to target and block funding to terrorist organizations such as Al Qaeda.

The Iranian Revolutionary Guard is the largest branch of Iran's military, boasting well over 100,000 elite active duty soldiers and roughly 300,000 reservists. The designation of the Guard as a "specially designated global terrorist” would be the first time a foreign military has been declared a terrorist organization.

Some officials speculate that the administration is trying to provoke the Iranians into an incident that will justify an airstrike in response, suggesting that the combined effect of circumstantial evidence tying Iran to the IEDs and an event or incident involving the Iranian Revolutionary Guard might “just be enough” to justify military action against Iran."

Have no fear! It might just be enough!

In other words, it might not matter whether they've failed to fix the intelligence around the policy this time -- as long as they keep trying to discredit the intelligence.

Like this: These same agencies have been wrong before; how can we rely on them now?

It rings just as hollow as: We only trust the intelligence that agrees with our previously determined course of action.

... which is, of course, exactly what they accuse their opponents of doing.

But the pro-totalitarian politicians and the pro-totalitarian media and the pro-totalitarian bloggers don't have opponents: they have enemies!

And tomorrow, when the foreseeable future is over and the NIE has lost its novelty and the preemptive strike against Iran is sitting on the table, there will still be a few lone wolves howling at the moon in the darkness, braying on and on about reality, which hardly even seems to matter anymore.

And I might even be one of them.