15 August 2007

Cheney and Bush to tighten the screws on Iran

Fat Man, Little Boy and Turd Blossom are a trio no more.

With Karl Rove now out of the way, a reinvigorated Vice President Cheney is now free to strong-arm President Bush into the next aggressive buildup phase to seemingly inevitable war with Iran.

The New York Times reports that the White House "is preparing to declare that Iran's Revolutionary Guard Corps is a foreign terrorist organization," according to the dreaded unnamed "senior administration officials," i.e., Cheney and minions.

"If imposed," writes Helene Cooper for the Times, "the declaration would signal a more confrontational turn in the administration's approach to Iran and would be the first time that the United States has added the armed forces of any sovereign government to its list of terrorist organizations."

Secretary of State Rice, Cooper continues, "has warned of the move in recent conversations" with her counterparts in Europe. Rice says delayed efforts to pin more sanctions on Iran "was leaving the administration with little choice but unilateral action."

Does Rove's sudden exit, so close to the end of Bush's final term, have something to do with arguments in the Oval Office over Iran strategy? Writes Cooper, "[I]n recent months, there has been resurgent debate within the administration about whether the diplomatic path is working, with aides to Vice President Dick Cheney said to be among those pushing for greater consideration of military options."

For his part, Rove had nothing to say about Iran in a "fiery" hour-long interview with The Politico's Mike Allen, just a day after his announcement. Instead, he heaped praise on his soon-to-be ex-boss, insisting with a straight face, "[H]istory will judge him kindly. I look at what he has done. In a time of war, he has utterly transformed the foreign policy of the United States. We take the economy today for granted because it's so darned good. This is a guy who has overseen big changes."

Evidently Rove has taken up heavy drinking.

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