It seems to me that the choices the US faces are the following:

Do nothing, stumble along, protesting, in a passive and ineffective manner about the Administration’s looming Iran adventure. We see the storm clouds gathering. We hear the drumbeats, as you articulate, for attacks on Iran. We see, because it is hard to hear them, the weak voice of protest against said policy on the part of the Dems. Phrases like ‘well, its true we can’t take anything off the table but for right now, at this moment, I am not for striking at Iran’ are the kind of thing the AEI boys eat up. It would be different if one, just one, of the Dems running for Pres said, out loud, ‘oh yes we CAN take it off the table….so long as there are 150k American troops in Iraq whose supply lines run through Shia’held territory’ and then go on to explain exactly how, after striking Iran, those supply lines will protected from Iranian inspired attacks. Why have the Dems not spell out the threat here? Do we now have so little regard for our troops? Or do we still have such arrogance as to think we can’t have a major, and I mean major, military calamity on our hands? We can go this route, as we have, for the past 4 years, uncomfortable, with our great leader’s plans, but, for the most part, keeping those doubts to ourselves, and suffering our fate. I mean, after all, maybe he won’t attack Iran.

Or we can declare war on the good damn corrupt, and incompetent, bunch of them by seeking to impeach them both. Whatever the damn odds are of success, and whatever the cost, down the road, of seeking to impeach an administration during a time of war. Oh, there will be howls of protest that will go on for generations. No doubt. This will be a war for control of the nation. The stakes will be very high, win or lose. However, perhaps, perhaps, we can tie their hands up here in a fight.

Me? I prefer option two. I want to see these bastards hauled away. I don’t want to see a scenario in which our troops in Iraq are surrounded and under supplied in the wake of an attack on Iran. And the call goes out for the entire nation to gear up for WWIII. To be fought from Pakistan to, at least, Morocco.

Posted by: jonst at July 10, 2007 10:44 AM | Permalink to this comment

I think that there is a significant element in Iran that actually wants a US attack, because such an attack would (as Jonst suggests) lead to attacks on US forces in Iraq that will literally chase up out of that country -- and that would be quite the feather in the caps of the Ayatollahs.

What really frightens me is that the current administration is so irresposible. Political reality dictates that by the fall of 2008, there will be only 50,000 US troops left in Iraq -- and they will be in "fortified" positions. Attacking Iran would become the ultimate October surprise -- an event "necessitated" by Iran's signficiantly enhanced influence in Iraq as US troop levels dwindle, and a propoaganda campaign by the neo-con establishment that exploits the "threat" that this increase influence represents.

Bush will sell the attack as "not leaving unfinished business" for his successor -- but Bush's actual (if subconscious) motivation will be to shift blame for his failure in Iraq to his successor, who will be confronting a debacle that will make Dien Bien Phu and our final retreat from Vietnam look good by comparison.

Posted by: p_lukasiak at July 10, 2007 12:07 PM | Permalink to this comment

While nobody ever has gone broke underestimating the competence of this administration, I just don't think even thy are mad enough for an Iran invasion. There's a small problem with logistics, bases, and having sufficient manpower for an operation. I guess they could do a 90s style useless air attack, and mess things up that way, but the Bushies have generally scorned Clinton era tactics, as they prefer to make their mistakes on a grand scale.

I guess I don't fear Iran because a maneuver like that will likely get both the Commander in Chief and Bush impeached in record time and I imagine a president Pelosi would not have too much trouble turning those two over for a War Crimes tribunal.

Posted by: Appalled Moderate at July 10, 2007 01:54 PM | Permalink to this comment