I Wonder How Dick Annotated THIS Hersh Article?
We know that Dick reads–and probably annotates–Sy Hersh’s articles. No lesser source than Patrick Fitzgerald suggested as much in his filing describing which newspaper articles he’ll submit as evidence during Libby’s trial. You remember–the filing where he showed us Dick’s annotated copy of Wilson’s op-ed? Well, in the same filing, he revealed that a copy of Sy Hersh’s famous Stovepipe article circulated around OVP, and Libby and "others" had annotated the article.
Finally, the government notes in the interest of completeness that it may offer annotated copies of an October 2003 article by Seymour Hersh in The New Yorker if it appears that the defendant will pursue the defense that he was too focused on other urgent national security matters to remember accurately what took place during his conversations with reporters. The government received from the OVP multiple copies of the same article bearing handwritten annotations, apparently by the defendant and others in his office. However, it is not the government’s present intention to offer those annotated copies.
Which leads me to wonder whether Dick and Libby Addington annotated this most recent Hersh article, describing Lebanon as a dry run for the bombing campaign against Iran.
Has Bush called some people to inquire if they would be willing to replace Rumsfeld? In the past ten days?
Has Lord Cheney called some people as well?
Actually, I wrote something similar this morning. Great minds?
US government consultant with close ties to Israel
…or David Wurmser
Wurmser is, AFAIK, still a OVP employee, not a consultant.
Dick
Didn’t see that–yes, great minds. There’s another reference to Rummy being not on board somewhere, earlier I think. Which might be the first instance where Rummy showed his disloyalty, since Rozen referred back 10 days, before Hersh’s article.
Nice dot-connecting, EW? Then the question is: Who might Bush have called to take Rummy’s job? My surmise: Dick Lugar, Peter Hoekstra, but not McCain, not Chuck Hagel, not Holy Joe, not Anthony Zinni. Definitely not Holy Joe, because they are not done wtih him in his current Dem spoiler role.
ecoast
Agree, not McCain (you’d lose a Senator), not Holy Joe (you’d lose a Senator), not Chuck or Zinni (they’re sane). But I also expect Lugar is too sane for it too. Hoekstra, maybe, but I think they like having wingnuts over at intell–plus Weldon is next in line (I think) and he’s, well, dangerous. So the answer is I still don’t know.
Frankly, I think any confirmation process would be disastroust for BushCo, because they need someone who will bomb Iran, which means that’s precisely what any candidate will get asked about.
I read pretty much but I still can’t decipher why exactly Cheney etal want to get into it with Iran in a big way.
Is it the profiteering? To cover up, by complicating, the Iraq disaster? It simply can’t be oil, Iran would shut off that pipeline toot-suite. The nuclear thing is too far away to be a real threat right now. So what is it?
One argument is that Bush et al want to put an end to the Axis of Evil and figure that the next Administration won’t be strong/insane enough to do it. It may be a race against time – will Congress stop them before the attack, or just a way to get to negotiations.
Susan
IMO it is the oil, kind of.
US hegemony depends on two things: oil to fuel our fabulous lifestyle. And the dollar as reserve currency, which allows us a lot more budgetary flexibility than anyone else, and which depends on oil-producing countries using the dollar for exchange. To maintain hegemony, we need to (at a minimum) maintain a large military presence in the ME (to make sure we keep the oil flowing and protect our clients there), and make sure that anyone who moves away from dollars on oil exchange is punished. We went to war in Iraq to 1) replace Saudi bases with Iraqi ones, 2) punish Saddam for switching to the euro.
Problem is, with Peak Oil approaching and Chinese and Indian demand skyrocketing, we’re probably a (say) year away from shortfalls. So it’s no longer enough to just protect our clients, we need to 1) make sure we prevent China and India from acquiring huge chunks of the reserves, 2) actually occupy some oil space.
And, as you point out, we fucked up Iraq, which (if nothing else happens), means the Chinese allied Iranians will gain effective control over some, if not all, of Iraq’s oil, not to mention it’ll make it hard for us to maintain bases there.
So the Iran invasion is because:
1) It has oil and natural gas and we’d like it
2) It is in the most convenient spot for getting oil and gas out of the Caspiran region, and we’d like to occupy that spot
3) It has threatened to move its oil exchange off the dollar
4) It threatens all the goals we had in Iraq
5) Even left alone, Iran would end up supplying China and allowing it to economically rival the US
6) Our clients are Sunnis; increasing Iranian power threatens to shift the balance of power in the ME to Shiites
Yikes, when you put it that way, we’re doomed. We’re effed if we don’t, we’re effed if we do. We can’t expect anything better from this DoD than the Iraq result.
What about the Iranian population that is majority younger, wears Levi’s, likes our culture. Why would we turn them into enemies, why can’t we â€Cold War†them, wait for the older clerics to die off and let culture and nature take it’s natural course?
Okay, nevermind, now I’m just being Sunday morning after Church optimistic, and asking dumb questions. There is no long term planning with this bunch, and going green is out of the question for these oilmen.
But, doesn’t Iran need the US oil market to keep themselves fat? Okay no, there’s always Russia and China. It’s the dollar thing that will implode us. But considering our current war debt won’t the dollar be useless anyway with another couple trillion owed to Japan and everybody else?
Considering the energy stakes, and the over-the-top military options, someone like Frank Carlucci comes to mind. He may be up there in years, and was a college buddy of Rumsfeld, but the profile (Reagan DOD, Carlyle group etc) fits the bill.
Reading the main post just again makes me wonder why anyone refers to the â€Bush Administration†it is the Cheney Administration and it always has been. I almost wonder if Dems running for office shouldn’t start framing that way, using the phrase repetedly could undermine some of the BS â€good old boy†sympathy that still seems to be a minor currency for the face of this presidency.
And yes Sara, we are f’d either way. But being f’d has been coming for a long time. With or without the war’s. There isn’t enough oil for the whole world to roll the way we do, even if our tremendous stupidity weren’t clearly destroying the planet. Change is a coming, on a fast horse.
Many speak here as if Iran is merely a farsi-speaking version of Syria, but tackling Iran is a wholly different prospect. The Iranians are a harder target in every way. The are better equipped, more recently battlehardened, and resourceful. There is a reason that you don’t see Israel routinely violating Iranian airspace to buzz the leader’s home.
Then too, Iran’s medium term political evolution is very much in question. No one can be sure their next leader won’t be far more accommodating to the west, if only because Iran’s youth are.
A wait and see attitude suggests itself. The alternative would be far too perilous and expensive.
Chefrad
I don’t see where anyone suggested Iran was anything but formidable. Just because we observe the Administration claiming it is formidable, doesn’t mean it is.