The same one GW was reading this morning when he said the biggest threat facing the incoming President is international terrorism.

More of the Fucking same. Aren't you glad you voted for a motto wielded by an ambitious opportunist?

Off with their heads, said the Red Queen. He was right. The Evil Empire has another salesman, with a brown face this time.

Dear Glenn - I share your frustration but not your surprise. Whatever led you to think that Obama would be anything but conciliatory towards the centrist establishment on practically every issue? Did you really believe that he would turn Guantanamo inside out, prosecute the torturers, lock AIPAC out of his office, call Blue Dogs to heel, and implement a rational Iran policy? He's much too comfortable joining the Washington club to be a troublemaker. (The pictures of him posing happily with W, Clinton and Bush Sr. are revealing. Only Carter stands somewhat apart.) If anything "new" comes out of Obama's presidency, it will be entirely incremental and barely perceptible.

I'm more afraid of people like you, who are apparently willing to provide a "work-around" for this whole unfortunate enhanced interrogation business, than I am of KSM.

You and your ilk have created literally hundreds of KSMs.

I'M not crazy. You're the one who's crazy. Keep it up. I'm hoping the damage to this country isn't irreparable quite yet. Apparently you won't rest until it is.

Civil liberties extremist my ass.

Why are you surprised?

Dear Glenn - I share your frustration but not your surprise.

-- Ssen

That shit again? Please, either pay attention or go sit in the corner with your well earned dunce cap on.

Oops, shit, that's secret, can't discuss it.

Iran exports oil. Iran wants nuclear POWER, which means ~3% enrichment. Nuclear WEAPONS, like Israel has, requires ~97% enrichment. If Iran has nuclear POWER they can sell more OIL since they'll have nuclear POWER to generate electricity. Get it? How hard is this to grasp?

Did Obama parrot the famous "wiped off the map" canard?

He's Bush43 with a darker complexion, guys, get used to it. Nothing is going to change. Buy a couple-three bottles of your favorite hard liquor because you're going to need it over the next month.

I haven't written Obama off yet but I am very skeptical. I wrote several letters here during the election expressing consternation about Obama. I very nearly didn't vote for him because of the fact that he scammed my primary vote by lying about his position on FISA. But in the end I voted for him in the general too as the far lesser of two evils.

Unfortunately, I haven't seen much since then that assuages my concerns about him. I'm most upset about all the bullshit talk about not looking backward and maybe not investigating the crimes of the Bush Administration.

On other issues, like Iran and trying terrorists, I'm more ambivalent. I think its safe to say that Iran would like nuclear weapons and its doubtful that in the long run they've completely taken that off the table. We know they tried in the past. What country wouldn't want nuclear weapons when their enemies have them? Pakistan has them. The U.S. and

israel, which have repeatedly threatened to attack them, have them. Of course they want them -- and justifiably so. Only a completely unselfconscious and hypocritical American would find this despicable.

But much as I dislike the idea of Iran getting a nuke capacity we have to ask ourselves what can we really do about this? Technology and technological know-how inevitably increase and spread. Unless there is a worldwide movement to completely eliminate nuclear weapons, including those of Russia, the U.S., and Israel, and to make it a serious international crime which is seriously enforced to produce them, then inevitably more and more countries will develop them and/or spread them around. I don't like it but I am at a loss to think of how to stop it.

Re terrorists who have been tortured: I don't want to release someone if they are in fact a clear and present danger to the U.S., but how can they be? Is there something unique about Al Qahtani or any of the others whom we will be unable to prosecute because of Bush's crimes? Send them back to Saudi Arabia or wherever they came from and don't let them back in. I don't see how they can add to our danger. Its not like there is any lack of America-hating terrorists out there who wouldn't be willing to carry out any mission that Al Qahtani isn't available for. In fact, our ongoing support for things like Israel's disproportionate attack on Gaza ensures there is a basically limitless supply of America hating terrorists, so I don't see the special nature of the threat of having to release an Al Qahtani.

In his final news conference (01/12/09)

"Not finding weapons of mass destruction was a significant disappointment."

That must have been a bitter pill for him to swallow. Particularly, since his hyping a non-existent threat of nuclear weaponry cost over a million innocent people their lives. I have no doubt, though, that we've have learned from such a grievous, catastrophic mistake.

NOW back to the more pressing issue.

Iran is acquiring nuclear weaponry and we can't allow a mushroom cloud to be the smoking gun!

"Why are you surprised?"

-- Ssen

Where did Greenwald express "surprise" on this point? He didn't.

GLENN, watch McConnell interviewed by Charlie Rose this weekend, he totally qualifies the last intelligence report, particularly with regards to Iran, explains how he "wishes he had written it differently," and says he thinks Iran is trying to manufacture nuclear weapons, "Although he has no evidence." Yes, that is what he says. I think this perspective may be key to Obama's 'New Direction.' Sickening. Why can't the new president make the RIGHT compromise, FOR ONCE, as you said, Glenn...

I'M not crazy. You're the one who's crazy.

"All I wanted was a Pepsi!"

Seriously, the whole idea that Khalid Sheikh Muhammad is like some super-villain or something, and that he has to be kept in Super-Max with Lex Luthor and the Green Arrow forever, would be laughable if it weren't so toxic to our system of laws.

KSM is just one of many dudes we have mightily pissed off. If he's set free, he might very well go start some shit... though I would say the likelihood is that he would be under really intense surveillance for the rest of his life.

Either we have a real legal system or some two-tiered thing: one for the regular folks, and one for the Masters of Evil.