I am going to wait for Obama to be sworn in before I pass judgment on him. Nevertheless, GG does raise areas of concern about his interview with George Stephanopolous yesterday, especially his comments about “looking forward” with respect to the numerous criminals in the Bush Administration. I suspect that some of those comments may be designed to allay the very strong possibility that George W. will pre-emptively pardon himself, Cheney and others for the lawless activities of his Administration. (I note that he specifically avoided the subject of pardons at today's press conference) We will have to wait and see if W. actually does pre-emptively pardon himself and others. If he does, that will be a rallying cry that will galvanize public support for not simply “looking forward,” but looking forward in a way that will insure that future administrations don’t take the law into their own hands as the Bush Administration did. I always suspected that the real reason Clinton was impeached was not the so-called “rule of law” that the Republicans were calling as the reason for the impeachment, but the impending renewal of the Special Prosecutor Act, which conveniently was allowed to expire prior to the end of Clinton’s term. Democrats who had endured eight years of Kenneth Starr had had enough of special prosecutors. If we had had a special prosecutor in place during the Bush Administration, I suspect that much of the lawbreaking would never have happened.

Touché.

Based on your astuteness, I'm sure you already know that Jim Jones is often referred to as the Father of the United States Constitution.

William M said this awhile back,

"...in truth if Iran enriches uranium (as it can legally do) it will be close to being able to make nuclear weapons. So there is a time factor. It is important to negotiate a timely settlement with Iran that will guarantee its security in exchange for its willingness to forego domestic uranium enrichment. This doesn't justify Obama's dangerous rhetoric, but it is important to keep in mind."

There are a few other commenters here who have noted the difference between making power grade materials and weapons grade materials. And one noted that to pursue a bomb, one doesn't have to make a bomb.

Obsfucating the conflation that I spoke about before does make it seem that Iran is more dangerous to Israel, or even the United States, than any U.N. observers or the U.S. intelligence agencies have evidence to support.

I suspect Obama understands that Iran has no bomb and has no intention of building one. He's talking tough, based on his not publicly acknowledging the difference and significance between approx. 4% enrichment and 95%+ enrichment. There may even be a current military program to destabilize Iran's gov. or sabatoge the nuclear power infrastructure.

I suspect all this is to justify the embargo and continuing effort to marginalize and undermine Iran. The purpose of that is to maintain and promote American influence in the area. The purpose is not about stopping some existing nuclear weapons program.

My point was exactly that the Greeks hated the Persians. Points for obstinacy?

The rulers of Iran are fanatical about getting their hands on a nuclear bomb. The writers of the NIE however, seemed to understand that giving that information to the Bush administration would cause another war so I believe that they decided to put off dealing with the Iranian bomb until someone more rational (not Cheney) was in charge.

Obama now probably has the real information in his hands which shows that the Iranians are closing in on nuclear capability. How he deals with this will be very difficult, but it will be a more rational response than anything that Cheney would come up with, and the intelligence world knows it.

Iran's leverage in this matter has diminished significantly of the past 4-6 months with the drop in oil prices and the defeat of their proxy in Gaza.

The latest from Gordon Prather:

http://www.antiwar.com/prather/?articleid=14041

A Serious Crisis With Iran?

by Gordon Prather

Last month the Congressional Commission on Strategic Posture issued an interim report, on the basis of which one of its co-chairmen, former Secretary of Defense William Perry, publicly predicted this week that President-elect Obama will soon face a "serious crisis with Iran."

*snip*

a new threat has "come to the fore – that of catastrophic terrorism." Hence the commission's proposed four "security imperatives":

*To reduce and provide better protection for existing nuclear stockpiles of weapons and fissile material.

* To keep new nations from going nuclear.

* To provide effective protection for the fissile material generated by enrichment activities, reprocessing facilities, and commercial nuclear reactors.

* To improve our tools to detect clandestine delivery of nuclear weapons and to disable and otherwise defend against them.

Now, presumably commission members know the difference between nuclear weapons and nuclear power plants.

So when Perry et al. declare one of our "security imperatives" to be keeping new nations from "going nuclear," the commission must mean keeping them from acquiring anything "nuclear," peaceful or otherwise.

"The efforts to keep other nations from going nuclear are obviously multinational. The 6-party talks have had limited success to date in dealing with North Korea but may ultimately be successful. However, there is no similarly comprehensive diplomatic approach to Iran, which has constructed a major facility for enriching uranium.

"It appears that we are at a 'tipping point' in proliferation. If Iran and North Korea proceed unchecked to build nuclear arsenals, there is a serious possibility of a cascade of proliferation following. And as each new nuclear power is added the probability of a terror group getting a nuclear bomb increases."

Well, there you have it. Iran has constructed and is operating – subject to IAEA Safeguards – a major facility for enriching uranium.

Since Iran is unquestionably within its rights – under the NPT, the IAEA Statute, and the UN Charter – the commission is correct in noting that there is no "comprehensive diplomatic approach" to forcing Iran to give up those "inalienable" rights.

So what does former SecDef Perry mean when he predicts that Obama will soon face a serious crisis with respect to Iran?