‘Act of madness’ gains allies in complacent media

[babylonsister]

http://www.nwanews.com/adg/Editorial/193516/

‘Act of madness’ gains allies in complacent media

Gene Lyons

Posted on Wednesday, June 20, 2007


During the Cold War, Moscow had two major newspapers.

Propaganda-wary Russians joked bitterly that “There is no Pravda in Izvestia, and no Izvestia in Pravda” (“ There is no Truth in News, and no News in Truth. ” ) People didn’t so much read the press as attempt to decode it: Who wants me to believe what and why ? We’re not there yet, but we’re definitely headed that way. Even so, when The New York Times and The Washington Post feature same-day, front-page stories stressing the White House’s unhappiness with Iran, it’s definitely no coincidence. Like the proverbial turtle on a fence post, somebody put them there. Ah, but who? The Times cites anonymous “senior administration officials” on both sides of a passionate debate between factions loyal to radical cleric—um, make that Vice President Dick Cheney and Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. Needless to say, Cheney’s keen to bomb the Persians back at least to the Savafid Dynasty (1502-1736 ), while “friends and associates” say Condi is “increasingly moved toward the European position,” i. e., the sane one, although there’s no graver insult in the neo-conservative lexicon.

Actually, a less inflammatory comparison might be the film “Groundhog Day,” because we’ve all seen this movie before—during the run-up to invading Iraq, with Cheney beating war drums, Rice prating about “mushroom clouds” over American cities and Secretary of State Colin Powell cast as the cautious voice of moderation. We all recall how that ended, with Powell’s lamentable speech to the U. N. touting Saddam Hussein’s apocryphal weapons of mass destruction.

This time, the Decider himself, George W. Bush, is described as having until “next spring... to decide whether to take military action.” At the expense of being hopelessly old-fashioned, exactly where in the U. S. Constitution does it say the president can unilaterally declare war? Does anybody believe this Congress will allow Bush to bequeath to his successor yet another misbegotten crusade against a Middle Eastern country three times larger than neighboring Iraq ? And with what army, pray tell?

snip//

Meanwhile, with U. S. armies occupying Iraq and Afghanistan (Iran’s neighbors to the east and west ), two U. S. carrier groups deployed in the Persian Gulf, hostile Pakistan and Israel bristling with nuclear weapons and U. S. Sens. John Mc-Cain and Holy Joe Lieberman calling for pre-emptive bombing attacks against the Tehran regime, it’s supposed to be we Americans who go to bed at night fearing mighty Persia.

To ponder this hallucinatory mindset in all its fullness, I recommend neo-conservative elder statesman Norman Podhoretz’s recent Wall Street Journal op-ed “The Case for Bombing Iran.” Seemingly unaware that Iran’s constitution gives Ahmadinejad no authority whatsoever over its armed forces, Podhoretz portrays him as the new Adolf Hitler, a demented madman poised to obliterate Israel and convert Europe to “the religio-political culture of Islamofascism” through nuclear blackmail, leading to his stated goal of “a world without America.” Gee, I wonder how you say Blitzkrieg in Persian. To date, Bush administration attempts to drum up a casus belli against Iran have fallen flat. No sooner do U. S. spokesmen claim that Iran is arming its hereditary enemy, the Taliban, than Afghan officials call it nonsense. Similar allegations have been dismissed by Iraq’s government. International Atomic Energy Agency head Mohamed ElBaradei describes attacking Iran as “an act of madness.” Indeed so. Bombing Iran now would be like taking a shotgun to a hornet’s nest, doing a whole lot of random killing without eliminating the problem and infuriating the survivors.

[mod mom]

1. The Dems in congress only need to look at their sagging poll numbers to realize

people have had enough of this reckless madman running (ruining) the country. Enough already! impeach this bastard. Only a war crimes tribunal will show the world we don't live by double standards!

[Tesha]

2. But we *DO* live by double standards. :-( (NT)