current cnn.com headline:Report: U.S. 'preparing the battlefield' in Iran

[spanone]

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- The Bush administration has launched a "significant escalation" of covert operations in Iran, sending U.S. commandos to spy on the country's nuclear facilities and undermine the Islamic republic's government, journalist Seymour Hersh said Sunday.

White House, CIA and State Department officials declined comment on Hersh's report, which appears in this week's issue of The New Yorker.

Hersh told CNN's "Late Edition with Wolf Blitzer" that Congress has authorized up to $400 million to fund the secret campaign, which involves U.S. special operations troops and Iranian dissidents.

President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have rejected findings from U.S. intelligence agencies that Iran has halted a clandestine effort to build a nuclear bomb and "do not want to leave Iran in place with a nuclear program," Hersh said.

"They believe that their mission is to make sure that before they get out of office next year, either Iran is attacked or it stops its weapons program," Hersh said.

http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast/06/29/us.iran/index.html

[EFerrari]

1. Who in Congress authorized that spending? I'm sorry if I missed it

but who the hell did that? :grr:

[spanone]

2. our secret government?

[EFerrari]

3. This @$$hole has six months and about three weeks to set the world on fire

and the Torture Congress is going to let him do it. I really hate these people.

[hokies4ever]

23. Sad to say

but the anticipation of an Obama presidency is also about crossing your fingers and hoping that Bush doesn't ruin our nation anymore. I don't think that people truly understand the gravity of this situation. Attacking Iran will start WWIII. It'll be USA, Israel, and Britain (hope they're not still mad about the WMDs Bush lied about) on one side and Iran, Syria, and Russia on the other side. China will take the opportunity to put the smackdown on Tibet and all hell will have officially broken loose.

[hokies4ever]

16. $400 million for the year for Iran

vs. about $120 billion per year for Iraq. 1/3 of 1 percent. They can just skim that off the top of the Iraq War spending and we would never know.

[EFerrari]

19. I'm just trying to figure out how they appropriated the funds.

:grr:

[hokies4ever]

20. Kyl-Lieberman

I'm guessing that's a good starting point. Also, I'm sure that the reasoning for the funds appropriation might be legitimate. For example, Cheney can just have the Pentagon tell Congress that they're using the money to secure the Iraq-Iran border where the IEDs are flowing and then just use the money for something else. It's no secret that the military spending has been corrupt from the very beginning, especially thanks to Cheney, Halliburton, etc.

[EFerrari]

25. Found it in Hersh's article (link down thread) and it's these so called people:

Current Members of the Gang of Eight

* Nancy Pelosi, Speaker of the United States House of Representatives
* John Boehner, Republican House Leader
* Harry Reid, Democratic Senate Leader
* Mitch McConnell, Republican Senate Leader
* Silvestre Reyes (D), Chair of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence
* Peter Hoekstra (R), Ranking Member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence
* John D. Rockefeller, IV (D), Chair of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence
* Kit Bond (R) Ranking Member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gang_of_Eight

[wordpix]

21. you don't know the "unitary president" BushCheney can do what they want?

Isn't it obvious that King Gorge is going down in a blaze of "glory," taking the world with the BushCo madness? :grr:

We've got to stop these assholes. :nuke:

[KansDem]

4. DAMN IT!!! Haven't we learned our lesson?

President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have rejected findings from U.S. intelligence agencies that Iran has halted a clandestine effort to build a nuclear bomb and "do not want to leave Iran in place with a nuclear program," Hersh said.

They've pulled this shit before...with disastrous consequences.

LISTEN TO YOUR OWN INTEL, YOU ASSHOLES!!!

[wordpix]

22. "we" learned it in Vietnam but BushCo never learned it

[carlyhippy]

5. well, there ya have it, our world is going to hell in a handbasket

it just keeps getting worse every day, why can't he just sit down somewhere and ride out the rest of his term quietly?!

[Warren Stupidity]

6. So we have committed acts of war against a sovereign nation

again and without a declaration of war. Both unconstitutional and a treaty violation that amounts to a war crime.

[EFerrari]

8. And it's not even the CIA funding a few people with their drug money.

It's the flaming CONGRESS giving Bush an illegal green light, if this report is true.

They must be insane. What are they thinking. Has the whole government sold their so called souls to the defense industry? :wtf:

[blues90]

7. And they will do it and get away with it

The people will pull out the flags as the fear begins to build up .

I am so sick of this sort of shit. When are we going to wake up and stop following along with the insanity.

We just voted in the enablers in 2006.

[amandabeech]

9. Time to write those nit-wits in Congress.

Not that it will do any good.

[bdamomma]

15. get on the backs of these Senators and Reps.

while they are vacation do not give up, let's be a nuisance to them.

[Occam Bandage]

10. Hm. This is the first news re: Iran that I believe is inconsistent with anything but

a possible plan for an attempt to use overt military force against Iran.

[Amerigo Vespucci]

11. Bush's tiny presidential penis is standing at full attention

Anyone who thinks he's going to leave office without attacking Iran, now would be the time to raise your hands.

He wants this ALMOST as much as he wanted to bust up Saddam...and he GOT that. Why would he POSSIBLY leave office without adding this to his resume as well?

[hokies4ever]

17. Agreed. He's going to double down, go all in.

If he leaves his legacy the way it is now, he will be judged as an utterly incompetent fool. So he really doesn't have much to lose in terms of his legacy. The 25 or 30 percent of people who approve of him now would approve of him no matter what he did.

[readmoreoften]

12. Okay, I demand to see Dick Cheney's stock portfolio. That's it.

Risking the lives of 20-40 million people because you want your oil investment to go up on Monday is not even the normal behavior for a criminal.

They're now about 2 million times more depraved and deadly than the worst serial killers in American history.

What kind of sentence does that get ya?

[bluesmail]

13. This scares me to NO END! Along with the economy tanking,

Blackwater's imperialistic powers, sociopathic Wall Street Hedge Fund CEO's or whatever they're called, the Climate Crisis, there's no where to hide to get away from Corporate Control/Rule.

[EFerrari]

14. Kick

[tuckessee]

18. War by fiat.

So much for the checks & balances.

The Fuhrer & Chief can do what he pleases with his pretty armies.

[EFerrari]

24. Link to Hersh article + snippet:

Preparing the Battlefield
The Bush Administration steps up its secret moves against Iran.
by Seymour M. Hersh July 7, 2008


L ate last year, Congress agreed to a request from President Bush to fund a major escalation of covert operations against Iran, according to current and former military, intelligence, and congressional sources. These operations, for which the President sought up to four hundred million dollars, were described in a Presidential Finding signed by Bush, and are designed to destabilize the country’s religious leadership. The covert activities involve support of the minority Ahwazi Arab and Baluchi groups and other dissident organizations. They also include gathering intelligence about Iran’s suspected nuclear-weapons program.

Clandestine operations against Iran are not new. United States Special Operations Forces have been conducting cross-border operations from southern Iraq, with Presidential authorization, since last year. These have included seizing members of Al Quds, the commando arm of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard, and taking them to Iraq for interrogation, and the pursuit of “high-value targets” in the President’s war on terror, who may be captured or killed. But the scale and the scope of the operations in Iran, which involve the Central Intelligence Agency and the Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC), have now been significantly expanded, according to the current and former officials. Many of these activities are not specified in the new Finding, and some congressional leaders have had serious questions about their nature.

Under federal law, a Presidential Finding, which is highly classified, must be issued when a covert intelligence operation gets under way and, at a minimum, must be made known to Democratic and Republican leaders in the House and the Senate and to the ranking members of their respective intelligence committees—the so-called Gang of Eight. Money for the operation can then be reprogrammed from previous appropriations, as needed, by the relevant congressional committees, which also can be briefed. (Emphasis mine. ef)

“The Finding was focussed on undermining Iran’s nuclear ambitions and trying to undermine the government through regime change,” a person familiar with its contents said, and involved “working with opposition groups and passing money.” The Finding provided for a whole new range of activities in southern Iran and in the areas, in the east, where Baluchi political opposition is strong, he said.


http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2008/07/07/080707fa_fact_hersh

[spanone]

27. thanks

[bdamomma]

26. listen to Sy Hersh on Democracy now

we have to stop this.

http://www.democracynow.org/