There they go again.
Bush and company are using the same tactics to drum up war with Iran-- lying about their intentions, using unethical, partisan reporters to raise the stakes with claims of Iranian abuses and dangers to America and American interests.
Just as they lied about their intentions about attacking Iraq, then lied about the dangers of WMDs, they are at it again.
If the democrats don't do something very, very soon, very tough, clear and decisive, then the US will be attacking Iran. It will have thrown itself and we the people into an insane, dangerous devastatingly expensive and unaffordable conflict that will change the world and our lifestyles.
Baldfaced Lies to the American Public
We know, through reports like this Guardian article that the plans and preparations for war with Iran is very advanced. Guardian reports:
US preparations for an air strike against Iran are at an advanced stage, in spite of repeated public denials by the Bush administration, according to informed sources in Washington.
The present military build-up in the Gulf would allow the US to mount an attack by the spring. But the sources said that if there was an attack, it was more likely next year, just before Mr Bush leaves office.
Neo-conservatives, particularly at the Washington-based American Enterprise Institute, are urging Mr Bush to open a new front against Iran. So too is the vice-president, Dick Cheney. The state department and the Pentagon are opposed, as are Democratic congressmen and the overwhelming majority of Republicans. The sources said Mr Bush had not yet made a decision...
Robert Gates, the new US defence secretary, said yesterday: "I don't know how many times the president, secretary [of state Condoleezza] Rice and I have had to repeat that we have no intention of attacking Iran."
But Vincent Cannistraro, a Washington-based intelligence analyst, shared the sources' assessment that Pentagon planning was well under way. "Planning is going on, in spite of public disavowals by Gates. Targets have been selected. For a bombing campaign against nuclear sites, it is quite advanced. The military assets to carry this out are being put in place."
He added: "We are planning for war. It is incredibly dangerous."
Mainstream Media Collusion, Ginning the Story
On the home front, amazingly, Michael R. GOrdon, the "journalist" who promoted and sold the war for the Whitehouse, while purportedly functioning as a NY Times reporter, with Judith Miller-- is now banging the drum about threats and dangers from Iran. Editor and publisher, reports in an article
Saturday's New York Times features an article, posted at the top of its Web site late Friday, that suggests very strongly that Iran is supplying the "deadliest weapon aimed at American troops" in Iraq. The author notes, "Any assertion of an Iranian contribution to attacks on Americans in Iraq is both politically and diplomatically volatile."
What is the source of this volatile information? Nothing less than "civilian and military officials from a broad range of government agencies."
Sound pretty convincing? It may be worth noting that the author is Michael R. Gordon, the same Times reporter who, on his own, or with Judith Miller, wrote some of the key, and badly misleading or downright inaccurate, articles about Iraqi WMDs in the run-up to the 2003 invasion.
Gordon wrote with Miller the paper's most widely criticized -- even by the Times itself -- WMD story of all, the Sept. 8, 2002, "aluminum tubes" story that proved so influential, especially since the administration trumpeted it on TV talk shows.
When the Times eventually carried an editors' note that admitted some of its Iraq coverage was wrong and/or overblown, it criticized two Miller-Gordon stories, and
noted that the Sept. 8, 2002, article on page one of the newspaper "gave the first detailed account of the aluminum tubes. The article cited unidentified senior administration officials who insisted that the dimensions, specifications and numbers of tubes sought showed that they were intended for a nuclear weapons program."
This, of course, proved bogus.
The Times "mea-culpa" story dryly observed: "The article gave no hint of a debate over the tubes," adding, "The White House did much to increase the impact of The Times article." This was the famous "mushroom cloud" over America article.
Now, more than four years later, Gordon reveals: "The Bush administration is expected to make public this weekend some of what intelligence agencies regard as an increasing body of evidence pointing to an Iranian link, including information gleaned from Iranians and Iraqis captured in recent American raids on an Iranian office in Erbil and another site in Baghdad."
Gordon also wrote, following Secretary of State Colin Powell's crucial, and appallingly wrong, speech to the United Nations in 2003 that helped sell the war, that "it will be difficult for skeptics to argue that Washington's case against Iraq is based on groundless suspicions and not intelligence information."
Shame on the NY Times for publishing this hack's writing. But people are smarter now, and we are here to remind them that they were lied to this way before.
Only One Solution; Binding Legislation
There is only one solution-- the congress must pass binding legislation that absolutely forbids Bush from launching any kind of weapon or attack on Iran. They must explicitly state that any past authorization does not included Iran. They must make it clear that if Bush does order any action against Iran that drastic consequences will apply. They must make it a criminal act.
There's no other more important legislation to be dealing with. This should be a no-brainer. Will the right wingers in congress oppose it? Maybe. If they do, they will be sealing the end of the Republican party in any leadership role.
This can't wait. They need to do it now.
