Dominology
Joe Klein is saying that’s he’s just spoken to a “senior U.S. intelligence official” who told him that the NIE was released now because
our “collection” capability within Iran has improved considerably over the past few years.
That would be directly attributable to our presence in Iraq. Such intelligence-collecting was finally possible once we were in a position to exploit the cross-border traffic between Iraq and Iran.
Thus, if one believes that Iran did suspend its nuclear weapons program, it must also be one’s belief that they did have one to suspend. Right? But why should the intelligence community —which has now apparently been upgraded to “IC” for Intelligence Community— even be trusted on this? Didn’t they and the President say just two years ago that Iran was furiously working away at nuclear weapons? Now that they supposedly aren’t, what are we to think?
That the dominoes keep falling. Future wars are averted because present wars are waged. The tacit and not-so-tacit threats of annihilation are justified when their outcome is peace.
I am eager to see how Dinnerjacket reacts to all of this. Maybe it will somehow serve to weaken his credibility with those who believed in all of his code words and suggestions of Iran’s right to the Bomb.
