mushroom cloud
Norman Podhoretz, first cheerleader of the let’s bomb Iran until the rubble bounces crowd, is not going to just take the NIE report lying down. Nope, Stormin’ Norman is going to lie from all manner of positions.

And like a good Neo-Con…no, make that the Alpha Neo-Con, there is no catastrophically wrong former position of his that he cannot twist into supporting his new, even more catastrophically held, position:

It is worth remembering that in 2002, one of the conclusions offered by the NIE, also with “high confidence,” was that “Iraq is continuing, and in some areas expanding its chemical, biological, nuclear, and missile programs contrary to UN resolutions.” And another conclusion, offered with high confidence too, was that “Iraq could make a nuclear weapon in months to a year once it acquires sufficient weapons-grade fissile material.”

Damn, that Medal of Freedom Bush gave him sure must be shiny.

But good ol’ Norm goes right from that monstrosity demonstrating nothing so much as his own intellectual criminality to this:

I entertain an even darker suspicion.

OF….COURSE…YOU…DO… I’m going to guess it doesn’t have to do with the paternity of J-Pod?

It is that the intelligence community, which has for some years now been leaking material calculated to undermine George W. Bush, is doing it again. This time the purpose is to head off the possibility that the President may order air strikes on the Iranian nuclear installations. As the intelligence community must know, if he were to do so, it would be as a last resort, only after it had become undeniable that neither negotiations nor sanctions could prevent Iran from getting the bomb, and only after being convinced that it was very close to succeeding. How better, then, to stop Bush in his tracks than by telling him and the world that such pressures have already been effective and that keeping them up could well bring about “a halt to Iran’s entire nuclear weapons program”—especially if the negotiations and sanctions were combined with a goodly dose of appeasement or, in the NIE’s own euphemistic formulation, “with opportunities for Iran to achieve its security, prestige, and goals for regional influence in other ways.”

It’s really too bad that Norm did not follow his ideal calling and become the Jewish guy that writes Jack Chick comics

Related posts:

  1. Second Iranian Nuclear Facility Discovered; Obama, Brown, Sarkozy Pledge Sanctions Unless IAEA is Allowed to Investigate
  2. Negotiation Works? Iran Nears Agreement on Nuclear Deal
  3. More Insane Rantings from the Crazy Man in the Attic
  4. How Can We Negotiate in Good Faith with the Iranians When We Play Dumb About Israel’s Nukes?
  5. Thomas Fingar on the Politics of NIE/NIAs