It is time for the Dems to dig their heels in. The noises from Hillary have NOT been reassuring...she seems completely willing to accept the lying premises of the Bush/AIPAC/neocon crowd. (Now this does not apply solely to Hillary but she is by far the worst. Edwards was piss-poor at Herzilya, but he seems to be doing a little better lately. My God, is backbone in such short supply? Do we have to have another war and more Clinton equivocation?).

I don't think it's fair to lay all this at Bush's feet, not this time. The noise from our side of the aisle is almost as loud as what's coming from the White House: it seems to be choice between war with Iran now on the one hand, and sanctions first followed by war with Iran on the other. The second choice seems mildly better than the first, but only mildly.

For some reason, this piece from the AP made me think those generals know something I don't. Why would they make such a plaintive, public cry, unless they've heard there are plans in the air? It seems to me they would do better to try to organize some kind of movement behind the scenes rather than pour their guts out in public -- if, that is, they thought they had time to organize a movement.

Good post, Todd!

Did you get the bit about camels? Camels???

We're sending teams of camel veterinarians over to Iraq!

Camel vets? Do we have camel vets in this country?

What's the big idea? They're out of humvees, so now it's camel rides for the surge troops?

They should consider flocks of sheep that could precede our patrols and take care of IEDs. Highly trained sheep dogs are also needed for this tactic. Our Australian allies have a lot of sheep...

Which one is Crackpot-in-Chief and which one is Crony-in-Chief?

Tom

Anyone who listened to NPR's Morning Edition on January 31st may remember a segment on Iran by Jackie Northam. In that segment Dr Gary Sick of Columbia University stated what he felt the Administration was up to; 1- Since Iraq is a foreign policy disaster, the Administration is attempting to change the subject to Iran and; 2- Our Sunni allies in the Middle East are annoyed that the US in effect created another Shia state (Iraq) alongside Iran. The US is attempting to appease and rebuild their Sunni coalition by appearing to get tough with Iran.

If Sick is right this is brinkmanship diplomacy and this Administration is too immature to get into a high stakes match - the neocons want it all now like the bully who tries to take over every school yard game. Without directly intending to start a war, this Administration has shown they are stupid enough to create an incident that could trigger a major conflict. That's what happens when ideologues think they are foreign policy experts.

I agree with Fallows that a line needs to be drawn. The problem is that there are many in Congress (of both parties) running for the White House in 2008 and they are all going to be saying to themselves, "If I get elected do I want my hands tied over Iran?" Some Senate Republicans will vote for Warner's anti-surge resolution, but tying "their" president's hands over Iran is another matter. In the Senate it takes 60 votes because of the filibuster and Senator McConnell would filibuster.

Wabbits. They want to use wascally wabbits.

Australia, like most advanced countries, does some of its military training in simulators, including armed helicopters. The instructing staff were informed some actual crews, in actual helicopters, had strafed kangaroos.

Aside from any concerns about the kangaroos themselves, this was militarily unwise. It wasted ammunition, caused the crews to waste fuel making the runs, and encouraged unnecessary and risky low-level runs. So, the simulator programmers were told to put kangaroos into the simulation, with the idea that the instructors could give due criticism following the training mission debrief.

Like good programmers, the simulator group decided to do things in the easiest way, and soon found they had already programmed the figures of infantry. They appropriated the infantry software, and only paid attention to the graphic presentation. What had been men were now kangaroos.

When the first trainee crews went into the new simulators, they quickly spotted the kangaroos, and gave chase. That is when all were reminded that when reusing software, it is wise to check all programmed behaviors.

As the helicopters came threateningly close, selected kangaroos pulled out shoulder-fired antiaircraft missiles, presumably from their pouches, and let fly. Utter crew panic ensued, and several crews in a row crashed in their utter confusion, without the missile actually needing to hit the helicopter.

I am told they left in the feature, which left crews absolutely, positively, totally terrified of ever shooting at a kangaroo again.
--
Howard

*equal opportunity offense to both extremes*

Bullies don't always get whipped. And when the bully has scores of enablers supporting him, he can go a good long time.

The damage a sick bastard can do before someone stands up and caves in his skull is usually great and irreparable.

But I'm thinking that it no longer matters. In a hundred years pretty much every living thing will be gone and Washington and Crawford will be under two hundred feet of water. Sounds fair.

Tie their feet together and drop them in the mid Atlantic. Let 'em swim back to Texas.

Cheney will say he's swimming to Wyoming. That's how he was eligible to run with W in 2000.

Tom

Halliburton must own a subsidiary that up-armors dromedaries.
Pantheon

In the absence of the nuclear option, something no thinking man would use, I cannot imagine anyone would think the US is in any position to pick another war. I worry these fools intend to use nuclear bombs to make their point.

Welcome the the pariah country, all.

Chiming in late here, but Zbigniew Brzezinski laid out the probable scenario nicely in his remarks last week before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Which, incidentally, did not escape the attention of Commander Josh (tpmemo date Feb. 1, 12:28 p.m. with link to full testimony).....
"If the United States continues to be bogged down in a protracted bloody involvement in Iraq, the final destination on this downhill track is likely to be a head-on conflict with Iran and with much of the world of Islam at large. A plausible scenario for a military collision with Iran involves Iraqi failure to meet the benchmarks; followed by accusations of Iranian responsibility for the failure; then by some provocation in Iraq or a terrorist act in the U.S. blamed on Iran; culminating in a "defensive" U.S. military action against Iran that plunges a lonely America into a spreading and deepening quagmire eventually ranging across Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, and Pakistan.".....The only thing I'm worried about is his remarks may have given the NEOCON Artists some new ideas, because Richard Perle couldn't have planned it better.