So says the latest National Intelligence Estimate according to the New York Times. I like Atrios’s headline better: “CIA To Dick Cheney: Suck. On. This.”

This brings up a something that’s concerned me about how Cheney and Bush have manipulated intelligence over these past 7 years. Specifically, it’s hard to avoid looking at this NIE as anything but a political football rather than a real government report. At the very least, this administration has been so clumsy and heavy handed about enforcing ideological orthodoxy in everything from intelligence reports to Fish & Wildlife studies that it’s entirely within the realm of possibility that the departments themselves might rebel.

In other words, do the writers of the NIE feel pressure to make claims less “flexible” to spin? Do they have to exaggerate certainty toward the status quo based on how they know the White House will likely spin the results of their work?

I’m not claiming this happened here. I’m just pointing out how pernicious interference can be. It’s similar to the concerns about torture, for example. Once you go down this road of messing with the nominal independence of agency reports, can you trust what information you get out of them in the future?

Don’t get me wrong. If this assessment is true, and this pulls back the crazies like Joe Lieberman from their all-war-all-the-time footing, then great. As with anything that seems too good to be true, though, I think it’s healthy to be skeptical. I hope the process is uncorrupted enough to produce good estimates.

Update: As always, I should leave stuff like this to the professional bloggers. Kevin Drum rounds up more background, including tying together some of the history here. Apparently, this estimate was held up for almost a year because of this conclusion. See my point above…

Update 2: Kevin Drum makes the money point in his followup:

This NIE was apparently finished a year ago, and its basic parameters were almost certainly common knowledge in the White House well before that. This means that all the leaks, all the World War III stuff, all the blustering about the IAEA — all of it was approved for public consumption after Cheney/Bush/Rice/etc. knew perfectly well it was mostly baseless.

Yes, exactly. It’s not an exaggeration to say that this story is the most important foreign policy revelation right now because it lays bare both the consensus of our intelligence agencies as well as the complete and utter bullshit being fed to us by our elected leaders. Oh, and Joe Lieberman is a bigger fool than previously realized.

Update 3: Kevin Drum stays on this story, passing on this bit from Matthew Yglesias. Drum’s follow on conclusion is actually better, so read both. The money point:

And now we can add to that one more thing: in the aftermath of our lightning victory in Iraq, Iran really was feeling some pressure and was willing to talk to us about halting their bomb program — and possibly cooperating in other areas as well.

…

But like Matt says, the Bushies couldn’t take yes for an answer. So we are where we are.

Again, skepticism is the order of the day. This is one NIE after years of war cheerleaders telling us otherwise. The implications, however, of this NIE being accurate or even mostly accurate as these things go is, well, stunning and outrageous.

I’ll let the video speak for itself.

So, watch the video, and then if you’re Iran, or any other country, imagine how you would interpret the stupidity involved. It’s a minor point, and I’m not claiming Iran is benevolent, but we should be accurate about our criticisms. Credibility matters.

The guy is so caught up in his own self-importance that he doesn’t even stop to understand what he, himself, is saying. This is a man who broke every promise he made to Democrats in CT during the last election. He has not taken one action to shorten the length of the war and has gone as far as spreading Republican propaganda from this administration about “progress” in Iraq. Now, he’s calling for bombing Iran which is fundamentally nuts.

It’s a crazy, crazy proposition, what Sen. Lieberman is calling for. Historical parallels abound. For example, when we were helping the Mujahideen in Afghanistan, what would a Soviet bombing run on our bases in Europe have accomplished? It would’ve made Americans more determined to defeat the Soviets and more likely to participate in the local conflict. A bombing run like that didn’t happen because the consequences and subsequent escalation would’ve outstripped it’s utility.

Sen. Lieberman is making these wild claims because he believes there won’t be any negative consequences of bombing Iranian bases in Iranian sovereign territory. Whether this is out of some macho appreciation of our military strength or a failure to recognize basic geopolitical reality is unclear, but it’s clear his judgement is flawed. He has no mention of the cost, and his appreciation of the consequences is weak at best:

“So what I’m saying is, if we knock out a base of theirs, if we have to do that, at which they’re training these terrorists, yes, they may respond. But look, they’re already on the move against us, and they’re killing people as a result of it. I hope this is not necessary.”

All of these comes at a time when the Iranian economy may be killing itself anyway, and where the repressive regime is beginning to further crack down on the local populace. These things could be used to drive a wedge in Iranian internal politics, to help boost the voices of those sympathetic with the interests of peace in the region. All Liebermans brash, uninformed, and fundamentally ignorant comments do is strengthen the position of the hard liners in the Iranian government.

There’s also this. When you’re on the side of Dick Cheney instead of Condoleezza Rice on any debate, you’re in the wrong, especially when it comes to a consideration of using force. What about Cheney’s demonstrated judgement in the last 6 years would leave you with any confidence? For that matter, what of Lieberman’s demonstrated judgement would inspire confidence at all?

What else can you say about someone who wants to open up a third front in the Middle East. It’s not like we’re handling Afghanistan and Iraq well. This cartoon pretty much sums up Joe Lieberman:

That’s from Bob Englehart’s blog post today. Found via My Left Nutmeg, which has other reaction to Joe Lieberman’s comments.

I used to have some respect for Bill Kristol. He’s clearly a partisan, but at least he seemed to follow some principles. Most importantly, he was able to admit some mistakes when asked tough questions. His Daily Show appearances were pretty good.

So, when I see him saying that the people of Iran would overthrow the government with the “right use of targeted military force.”

History is unkind to this view, and our experiences in Iraq should be a reminder about the unpredictability of these benevolent invasions. Totalitarian regimes so terribly corrupt and corrode civil institutions and the rule of law so much that without the regime, there’s only rot. In Iraq, the regime only maintained order with unbridled force and fear. Once that was removed, the country fell apart.

Even more frightening is that Kristol, like so many before the Iraq war, simply justifies his position with nothing specific to Iran or the Iranian people. We’re given the same “all people want to be free” nonsense that could apply to any country anywhere. He says nothing about Iran while advocating (once again) stepping in with force to make Iranians see how bad their regime is.

How ridiculous is that? Why does this type of punditry get media coverage?

I made the point in 2003 that neither the President or supporters like Kristol made an affirmative case for war. Playing on fears and uncertainty isn’t making an affirmative case. Kristol and his ilk should be talking about what war will do. For example, is there an active resistance movement? What populations will be disenfranchised by the toppling of the regime (and are divisions ethnic)? What about Iranian culture or society would lead them to focus on the regime rather than outside aggressors, as the U.S. would undoubtedly be painted? What’s the postwar plan?

Or maybe I should ask, do you have a postwar plan?

If you’re going to advocate using military force, putting our soldiers in harms way and putting some number of innocent civilians in harms way, you should be required to answer these sorts of questions. War isn’t the same as advocating tax cuts or abortion policy. Lazy punditry shouldn’t be acceptable here.

(found the Think Progress piece via Atrios)

If you’ve been following the news at all, you know that Iran is the next, great threat to our nation. You might argue that it was a greater threat in 2002 than Iraq, but we can leave that aside for now. The Bush administration has one response to any identified threat (real or imaginary): military force. Since they’ve pretty much screwed up diplomacy at every level, I’m not really sure what else they’re really able to do. Since our military is taxed right now occupying a country, the administration is considering various military strikes. According to Sy Hersh and later confirmed by the Washington Post, those plans include a large scale bombing effort that could include nuclear tactical weapons (bunker buster nukes).

While Bush has been categorically denying plans for airstrikes in Iran, remember that he was doing the same about Iraq in late 2002. We’ve since found out that planning started in earnest before diplomacy had been given a chance, and that the diplomacy was shaped around a military timeline first. In other words, the administration never really tried to consider another solution to the problem of Iraq. Military first, military last. Diplomacy is really just about getting basing and airspace rights.

Our prestige has suffered internationally. More nations are skeptical of claims by the Administration on any front. The latest Pew survey of global opinion (6/2005) shows that U.S. image is still negative, though it is up from the recent lows. From another report (3/2004), people in other countries view Iraq as a mistake:

These notions are not shared elsewhere. Majorities in Germany, Turkey and France – and half of the British and Russians – believe the conflict in Iraq undermined the war on terrorism. At least half the respondents in the eight other countries view the U.S. as less trustworthy as a consequence of the war. For the most part, even U.S. military prowess is not seen in a better light as a result of the war in Iraq.

On the domestic front, we’re not doing much to improve that image. An editorial in the NYTimes, How to Lose the Brain Race, expresses concern about the immigration debate hurting our long term economic growth. Looking at the current proposals on the table, the op-ed makes a case for maintaining foreign student inflows:

Senator Feinstein insisted that the bill call for some fees for foreign students applying to study at American colleges and universities to be doubled, and also demanded that agribusiness get the right to 1.5 million low-wage foreign guest workers over five years. Combined, the two proposals sent a message to the rest of the world: send us your brawn, not your brains.

…

In making immigration laws, Congress caters to cheap-labor industries like agribusiness and sweatshop manufacturing while shortchanging the high-tech, high-wage industries on which the future of the American economy depends.

Both of these things are related because they influence each other. One simply needs to take a look at Indians to understand this. A February report about world opinion shows that Indians are the only foreign populace to view Bush favorably. Their explanation of why is telling:

America remains a land of opportunity for many Indians. Asked where they would recommend that a young person move in order to lead a good life, a 38% plurality of Indians choose the United States. This finding may seem a weak endorsement, given America’s longstanding image as a hopeful new world for immigrants; however, in no other country does even a plurality recommend the U.S. to the hypothetical young person searching for a better life. In other countries, Australia, Canada, Great Britain, and Germany are all more popular choices. After India, Poland has the second largest share of respondents recommending the United States - and only one-in-five Poles (19%) suggests America as a destination.

What we choose to do with Iran and what we choose to do with immigration will define this country for the next century. With Iran, if we go the nuclear route and attack yet another country, that will hurt our image abroad even more. Billmon has an excellent piece exploring what the world might look like if the U.S. uses tactical nukes. It’s not nuclear winter or mutually assured destruction, but the annihilation of our image abroad.

With immigration, we could change one of the hallmarks of this country. We need bright people, no matter where they hail from, to create businesses and bring ideas here. The more research that happens at American universities, the stronger our nation becomes. Fanning the flames of xenophobia will only hurt our country in the long run. Pandering to low wage industries will do the same.

We stand at a crossroads. This administration wins support by playing to peoples’ fears on globalization, terrorism, and immigration. It’s no wonder that folks are responding. When your leaders tell you, “Look how scary this is. Thank God you have us to protect you,” of course people will begin to give in to that fear. Every time they have taken a principled stand (the rare times they do), they’ve quickly folded the moment their polls start heading south on Iraq or on corruption issues.