Yippie-K-IAEA, Motherfucker

* much of the early media noise about the recent nthkorea issue was prefaced with 'the nyt is reporting that...' - heres the opening para of that nyt story LINK :

"White House and Pentagon officials are closely monitoring a recent stream of satellite photographs of North Korea that appear to show rapid, extensive preparations for a nuclear weapons test, including the construction of a reviewing stand, presumably for dignitaries, according to American and foreign officials who have been briefed on the imagery."

a viewing stand for dignitaries? sounds like propaganda to me... and there are anonymous sources everywhere - not a single person on record. and then seven paras down we get this:

"The accounts of North Korea's activities have come from three American officials who have reviewed either the imagery or the intelligence reports interpreting them. They were confirmed by two foreign officials who have been briefed by the Americans, but who cautioned that their countries had no independent way of interpreting the data.
Officials at one American intelligence agency said they were unaware of the new activity."

- so we go from the opening para where it appears dual sourced, "...American and foreign officials...", to the reality which is that americans told 'foreign sources' something, and un-named said sources agreed that the ams had told them something. nice trick.

and then this:

"Asked if the intelligence agencies had differences of opinion about the satellite photographs, the official said: " This looks like the real thing. There is wide agreement in the community.""

and the rest of the article contains similar-sounding nonsense-sounding claims - not least that it appears that you cant actually see anything from the 'viewing platform':

" ...only a test site puts the rock and other sealing materials back into the hole after the weapon is installed deeply inside. The goal is to create a impenetrable barrier that keeps the powerful blast and radioactivity locked up tight inside the earth."

i dont particularly have a view on Sanger (the journo) - but the article sounds totally judymiller-ish (of course they cant use her any more)

and as an aside, isnt nice to see Mohammed el-Baradei being trotted out? its almost as though they now think he is an expert or something... bolton must be so conflicted right now :-)