Would they even know or care if they had egg on their faces?

There's no penalty for being wrong, and there's a built-in constituency for Middle East hawks.

Also a built in patronage system. AEI, Brookings, the Hudson Institute, WINEP, etc., will be paying someone to write those articles calling for actions against Muslims/Arabs. These think tank guys will get their articles into the Washington Post, NYT, and go on NPR (National Pentagon Radio) all the time.

The Washington Post, NYT, TNR, the Weekly Standard, WSJ have to have someone fill the niche. The "leave people in other countries alone" niche in the US doesn't get filled.

It is telling that Kevin uses this news as a means of bashing his domestic political enemies, while demonstrating no concern at all about the very grave matter of Iran's nuclear intentions.

It is telling that Kevin uses this news as a means of bashing his domestic political enemies, while demonstrating no concern at all about the very grave matter of Iran's nuclear intentions.

What level of concern would satisfy you? Panic?

Given that both the IAEA and the US intelligence community report that Iran is not presently working on nuclear weapons development suggests that now would be a good time to sit down at a negotiating table with them.

Note that this "new evidence" is from the same old "Laptop of Death" that the US has been shopping around for 3 year...and pretty much laughed at by everyone as an obvious plant.

Funny how according to the IAEA report itself, the US only provided the info to the IAEA a few days before the IAEA was set to release a report that essentially cleared Iran. And note that that the IAEA report refers to these as "alleged studies" and says that it has "no credible information in this regard."

So...is Iran currently working on a nuclear weapon, or on nuclear weapon related systems?

Yes or no.

Sheerakahn - the correct fishing expedition quote is "weapons of mass destruction related program activities" -- such as, walking upright.

What is "funny" (but not that funny) is the selectiveness with which the Bush Administration uses or doesn't use the UN and it's various agencies. Bush sent Colin Powell before the Security Council with his cute little vials of phony anthrax, then ignored the will of the UN when they would not support his preemptive invasion of Iraq. Then, after it turned out Hans Blix was right - that Saddam didn't have WMDs after all, Bush fabricates a false narrative about Hussein kicking out the UN inspectors (which is not true), as a justification for the invasion.

Now, after it became clear that Iran was no longer pursuing a nuclear warhead, Bush and his minions make this information, which they have likely had for months, if not years, available to the IAEA. Talk about a shell game!

el-Baradei should call a press conference in a neutral country and call Bush what he is - a war criminal!

The syllogism goes like this:

Iranians are learning math.
Math could be used to make nukes.
Iranians are learning to make nukes.

What's the problem with Iran developing Nukes...?
Two of their neighbors have Nukes, why wouldn't they want them as deterrance...?

And in the end, What threat do they really pose...?

My understanding is that nuclear weapons leave a pretty unique "fingerprint".
Were one to go off in Haifa or Tel Aviv, it would be pretty clear where it came from. If it originated in Iran, Teheran and it's millions would be dead in fairly short order.
The Mullahs understand this.

It's actually unsecured Soviet-era weapons that are more problematic. Similar situation occurs, and you KNOW it was an old Soviet bomb. You can't nuke Kiev in response, can you...?

I think this nuclear-Iran fear thing is completely overblown.

"Sheerakahn - the correct fishing expedition quote is "weapons of mass destruction related program activities" -- such as, walking upright."

Well, my point was, and still is, to cut through the Bush Administrations continual bullsh*t and just ask a straight up question.
In reality, the more likely answer is no, but I want a straight answer...yes...or...no.
Not, "Well, the mathematical probablities they are currently working on suggests a linkage of unique assurances that the Iranians are currently solving timing issues that will lead to big booms in our cities!" is not an answer.

It's a lot of dust thrown in my eyes to muddle my mind into thinking, "omg, mushroom clouds over American cities, attack attack attack!" and I'm not going to be fooled again.