Bush is gearing up to attack Iran

* your preznit speaks:

"'Now maybe the only people who pray in America come to my events."

can someone please shoot me. now.

* and he speaks again:

"Bush: "The answer to that question is, if General Casey [Army Gen. George W. Casey Jr., the top U.S. commander in Iraq] feels like he needs more troops, we'll send them. . . .

"I'm constantly asking General Casey that question. I've got direct contact with him through secure video.

"Q: What if he's wrong?

"BUSH: Then I picked the wrong general.

"Q: You wouldn't override his decision in any instance?

"BUSH: Well, how -- I mean -- I query him thoroughly. I'm certainly not a military expert, nor am I in Baghdad. I talk to Zal [Khalilzad, the U.S. ambassador] all the time. In other words, we get -- and I ask for data. So I know how to ask questions. I think I'm pretty good about filtering out which is real and which is not.""

* compare and contrast - david corn talking about david kay talking about the Idiot Son:

"And as (kay) tells us -- it’s quoted in the book -- (kay) says he had never met a more un-inquisitive fellow at such a senior level of government. And he is shocked by this."

* froomkin:

"In his column, Lowry also writes that it appears Bush is gearing up to attack Iran next.

"[H]is language suggests that the Robert Kagan thesis that the seemingly interminable Iran diplomacy is the necessary run-up to a strike on Iran has something to it. Bush says, 'It is very important for the United States to try all diplomatic means.' That's what we did in Iraq: 'I'm often asked what's the difference between Iran and Iraq. We tried all diplomatic means in Iraq.' Iran, he seems to imply, might eventually prove impervious to diplomacy, but that's something we have to find out. He says, of members of the military, 'I owe it to their loved ones and I owe it to this country to see if we can't achieve [diplomatically] the objectives which, in Iran's case, the short-term objective is no nuclear weapon. So that's what you're seeing happen.'""

* froomkin:

"Chas Freeman, the president of the Middle East Policy Council, told me this a while back: "Only two people in the world actually believe that there's any possibility of a new caliphate being established, stretching from Spain to Indonesia: Osama bin Laden and George W. Bush."