Sunday, August 07, 2005

the full consent of the Iranian government

* everyone is freaking out about this NBC sentence:
" Intelligence officials believe the high-explosives were shipped into Iraq by the Iranian Revolutionary guard or the terrorist group Hezbollah, but are convinced it could not have happened without the full consent of the Iranian government."
i dont see anything particularly new in it - we've seen a gazillion versions of this for years.

here's juan cole tho (go read the whole post):
"Be afraid when you begin to see US government agencies themselves handing out this highly suspect sort of information to major news networks. It means that the sting on the American people has moved from the smoke-filled back rooms to some higher operational level."


again, i dont see anything particularly new in *this* example, altho we have seen an increasing drum-drum-drum, including language like "infested with insurgents" and "rat-line" or whatever the fuck they call it. and i have no doubt that they want to have another war, and ive always said that the weaker bush is, the more dangerous (and scary) they are.

and ive always been nervous when blinky goes to texas - im sure theres a message in the madness - im sure its not 'just' arrogance, and it certainly isnt 'getting in touch with the heartland' or whatever the fuck they try to spin. and its certainly not the photo ops - you dont need 5 weeks to get the photo shot. but for some reason, these message masters are prepared to wear the inevitable jokes on leno and letterman and the daily show. and the 'working holiday' nonsense is CYA at best.

in this context, we've got blair who looks like he has completely lost control of the situation, and (separately) is trying to be uber-tuff and has completely hijacked the entire conversation of friday - and, in the process, fucked the libdems and the home office and others in the process (he turned multi-party support into complete disharmony virtually overnight).

something smells fishy.

be nervous. be very nervous.

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