Creating a new and separate justice system designed to accommodate the Bush administration's torture regime, as Jaffer and Wizner compellingly argue, would be to undermine every goal Obama claimed he intended to achieve in this area.

Might this sentence be clearer if the portion in italics were placed after "intended to achieve in this area"? As written, even though you say "compellingly", the phrase might refer to the "Creating a new..." part of the sentence. I don't know if this struck any other readers...I could be totally off...it wouldn't be the first time.

Thank you for conversation on this topic [and all the others]. It's much appreciated.

Everything GG has been writing about is connected:

June 1984- THE JONATHAN INSTITUTE, a private research institute based in Jerusalem and concentrating, among other things, on terrorism, sponsored a conference in Washington…(NYT: “Rolling Back the Barbarians”, a book review of “TERRORISM How the West Can Win” edited by Benjamin Netanyahu, which is a compilation of writings regarding this meeting) One of their ideas is that: “behind these terrorist states is the Soviet Union - training and manipulating the terrorists and sustaining the terrorist states.”

July 10, 1996-Benjamin Netanyahu-(Israel’s PM), addresses joint session of Congress. Borrowing from “A Clean Break”, he calls for “democratization" of terrorist states in the Middle East and warned that peaceful means might not be sufficient. War might be unavoidable.” He adds Iran to the mix. (U)

Late 2005- “Raymond Tanter, of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, recommended that the Bush administration use the MEK and its political arm, the National Council of Resistance of Iran (N.C.R.I.), as an insurgent militia against Iran…they” are not only the best source for intelligence on Iran's potential violations of the nonproliferation regime…are also a possible ally of the West in bringing about regime change in Tehran.” (U) He suggested using tactical nuclear weapons-“bunker busting bombs” against Iran (even though it is illegal to do so against a non-nuclear state); and that we could get around this by using the fact that "the United States has sold Israel bunker-busting bombs, which keeps the military option on the table." In other words, the U.S. can't nuke Iran, but Israel, which never signed the treaty and maintains an unacknowledged nuclear arsenal, can.” (U)

NOTE: [This is exactly how the US got around the laws against providing arms to Iran [through Israel] during Iran-Contra.]

July 2005-House intelligence committee chairman Peter Hoekstra (Republican, Michigan) and committee member Curt Weldon (Republican, Pennsylvania) met secretly in Paris with an Iranian exile known as "Ali." Weldon had just published a book called Countdown to Terror, alleging that the C.I.A. was ignoring intelligence about Iranian-sponsored terror plots against the U.S., and Ali had been one of his main sources…But according to the C.I.A.'s former Paris station chief Bill Murray, Ali, whose real name is Fereidoun Mahdavi, fabricated much of the information. "Mahdavi works for Ghorbanifar," Murray told Laura Rozen of The American Prospect. "The two are inseparable. Ghorbanifar put Mahdavi out to meet with Weldon." (U) [See August 2006]

August 2006-Peter Hoekstra released a House-intelligence-committee report titled "Recognizing Iran as a Strategic Threat: An Intelligence Challenge for the United States." Written by Frederick Fleitz, former special assistant to John Bolton, the report asserted that the C.I.A. lacked "the ability to acquire essential information necessary to make judgments" on Tehran's nuclear program…"This is like pre-war Iraq all over again," David Albright said in The Washington Post. "You have an Iranian nuclear threat that is spun up, using bad information that's cherry-picked and a report that trashes the inspectors." [See July 2005] (U)

November 2006-"Iran is Germany, and it's 1938, except that this Nazi regime that is in Iran … wants to dominate the world, annihilate the Jews, but also annihilate America."-Netanyahu (on CNN) (U)

November 27, 2006- Seymour Hersh reports in The New Yorker that a classified assessment by the C.I.A. had found no conclusive evidence as yet that Iran had a secret nuclear-weapons program. (U) (See [11/27/06-THE NEXT ACT] http://www.newyorker.com/printables/fact/061127fa_fact ]

Date? US deploys “Navy ships to Persian Gulf…high level personnel shifts signaling new focus on naval and air operations…patriot missiles to ME to defend US allies (presumably from Iran). (U)

January 10, 2007-Bush gives speech on Iraq war…mentions IRAN six times. “Bush vowed to "seek out and destroy the networks providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies”. [Iran is] “providing material support for attacks on American troops.” (U) At about the same time his speech was taking place, U.S. troops stormed an Iranian liaison office in Erbil, a Kurdish-controlled city in northern Iraq, and arrested and detained five Iranians working there.” (U)

Spring 2007-"Everything the advocates of war said would happen hasn't happened, and all the things the critics said would happen have happened. [The president's neoconservative advisers] are effectively saying, 'Invade Iran. Then everyone will see how smart we are.' But after you've lost x number of times at the roulette wheel, do you double-down?"- Grover Norquist (who backed the Iraq invasion) (U)

***********

(U) “From the Wonderful Folks Who Brought You Iraq”, by Craig Unger, March 2007

http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2007/ [...]

Isn't Netanyahu trying to win an election in Israel "as we speak"?

Our congress "supports" Israel, and Israel says Iran is a threat...one more turn around the sun...

How predictable.

Welcome, Glenn, from a fellow member of the racist-antisemite club.

the ONE time I actually responded quickly...and now it looks like a non-sequiter...oh, well.

Good Morning! Thanks for the poem.

Please contact Jebbie on the WOG...he has the information.

Congratulations! And happy BIRTH day!

I tried to focus on the innocent beauty.

Wonderful moment. Precious moment.

So, and I toast... I hope. Good to you.