Been busy with family visiting, so I am glad to see pitts has taken up the posting slack. I'll kick a few bits out there Larry King style before I have to go to Hawaii for work. I hate that. Bloggers in Honolulu holla! I'll buy you a drink on my expense account.

Israel knocked off Rantisi. That is a good thing, coming after Yassin's death. My guess is the next leader of Hamas will not be so vocal about how happy he would be to be killed by an Israeli missile. (Ha! Debka says "Supreme Hamas leader Mashaal tells Gaza group to elect new leader at once but keep his name secret." I bet!) For you Palestinians who say this is Bush's doing, bring it. You talked a lot of smack after Yassin was blown to bits, and then thought better of it real quick. Give me a reason.

Speaking of reasons, now that Arafat's complicity in the murder of Americans in Gaza is public knowledge, he must be defecating masonry.

The press was complaining that Bush answered "you'll find out" to the question at the press conference about the plan for transition to Iraqi sovereignty. Now the plan is out. Kerry is mad that the UN is playing a large role in that. I really don't get that guy.

So now that Air America is having money problems this early in the game, are all the outlets that were drooling over their startup reporting it, or is that blogosphere only?

This is definitely blogosphere only - I've seen it in a couple other places but Instapundit gets the link because he needs the traffic:

Al-Qaeda-linked terrorists planned a chemical attack on Jordan's spy headquarters that could have killed 20,000 people, officials have said. Earlier this week King Abdullah said a massive attack had been thwarted by a series of arrests, but named no target.

Now unnamed officials say the suspects have confessed to plotting to detonate a chemical bomb on the Amman HQ of the Intelligence Services.

The plot was reportedly hatched by al-Qaeda suspect Abu-Musab al-Zarqawi.

Hmmm. A planned WMD terror attack on a US ally, by Zarqawi no less, and it isn't making news? And Newsmax is the only outlet that says the chemicals came from Syria? Seems like someone would be on this?

ASV shutting the doors, kinda? Kinda scary that that was Michele with drugs.

"We knew that Bush is the enemy of God, the enemy of Islam and Muslims. America declared war against God. Sharon declared war against God and God declared war against America, Bush and Sharon." Rantisi

Okay, would the next Islamic extremist please open your mouth and go for a drive, please?

PJ O'Rourke has a good one

He is an admittedly biased observer, but I think the story still shows the utter lack of intestinal fortitude that Kerry has. Which is strange for a war hero, right?

Money quote

"Now, with benefit of hindsight, I think I can tell you why Kerry didn't do so. He was caught in Kerry-ish calculation--an ambitious young senator on his first important bipartisan delegation with its delicate mission of neutrality. Cory Aquino was very popular. But so was President Reagan. Which way to have it? Why, have it both ways! So Kerry was firmly behind Pash Commit of Flips to Dem, up to a point. Just as today Kerry is brave sailor/bold war protester; foe of Saddam/friend of Hans Blix; political underdog/entitled nominee; big government liberal/corporate tax-cutting conservative; rider of Harleys/marrier of Heinz; and, incidentally, still a real jerk."

Debra Burlingame (Sister to one of the pilots killed on 9/11) was on Larry King Live last night. (I just happened upon it surfing, I don't watch it)

And she just stuck it to the reporters, Gorelick, and the 9/11 panel. And she was furious, barely controlled. And all Larry wanted to do was shut her up.

*Transcript*

KING: Debra, why not apparent -- I remember from last night. Why no apparent anger over what happened to your brother? BURLINGAME: Well, I don't know how you got that impression. I have a lot of anger about what happened to my brother. He was murdered. He was brutally murdered in the cockpit of his airplane and...

KING: I mean no anger at any mistakes made by the administration, obviously anger at the people who killed him but anger when you learn about misconnections, CIA not talking to FBI, FBI misconnecting, anger or frustration over that.

BURLINGAME: Well, I have to tell you I had some anger tonight listening to reporters ask this president if he felt responsible, if he wants to apologize, if he, you know, can he admit mistakes? I actually am tired of seeing this president get beat up repeatedly daily by the commission's questions, partisan questions, and by the media that breathlessly reports them.

I got to tell you I read this report. This is the first 9/11 Commission report that was done by the Senate Select and House. This has a lot of really interesting information and here's a dot to connect for Jamie Gorelick who wrote the regulations on FISA warrants and what the threshold was that those agents in Minnesota had to pass to look into Moussaoui's belongings.

Jamie Gorelick, who has asked some of the toughest questions of Dr. Rice from her perch on that commission, she wrote those regulations and, as a result of them, the onerous burdens she put on the agency, the FBI agents that were desperately trying to crack that briefcase that Moussaoui was carrying, they were not able to find that there were numbers.

There were letters in there signed by the man who owned the condominium where Khalid Almihdar and Nawaf al-Hamzi were seen in Kuala Lumpur in Malaysia. Those are the two gentlemen who did, in fact, crack open the door of my brother's cockpit and murder him in cold blood. That letter was in there.

KING: What do you have there?

BURLINGAME: I'll tell you, wait Larry.

KING: So, you have anger. I got -- we're running out of time. You have anger at her?

BURLINGAME: I have anger at her because she has asked very partisan questions and she was part...

KING: But she was interpreting the law though wasn't she? That was her job.

BURLINGAME: She was creating guidelines and she made them extra hard because the Clinton administration was itself allergic to making mistakes.

KING: Who do you...

BURLINGAME: And took pains to make sure that suspicious people would not be offended by warrants.

*END*

Yeah, try to talk around that Larry, you schmuck. (Actually the whole thing has nuggets of wisdom)

And I think W is knocking all these hard balls out of the park. He's smacking down the "some people say" questions. Vietnam? You are sending the wrong message to the troops and our enemies. Apologize? UBL is responsible. And he just laid down a great one - some people say that if people are brown skinned or Muslim that they can't handle freedom - I reject that.

To this day, I still turn to watch a press conference with Bush with trepidation. He hates it, and so do I.

Jay Rosen has a fascinating take (Hat tip, Instapundit)

Will be back with thoughts afterwords.

*Afterward*

No home runs hit, and no deadly blows struck

No talk or questions about Iran.

Why does he give the time to the Jerks like John King, David Gregory, and that rude moron from NPR? Ed from the LA Times is a butthead too.

I neither want nor expect an apology for 9/11. (Especially of the self-serving Clarke variety) I expect action!

Would you admit a mistake? Me neither.

As the article above stated, enough with the prior spin.

June 30 seems to be firm, no more waffling there.

However, I am disappointed about no Iran, although as Bush said, he will give Abizaid all the troops he needs to do the job.

That's about all for now.

*Further Thoughts*

Damn, I am being very negative lately. Could be coming up on graduating law school, taking the Bar, and still not having a job for after law school that is making me a trifle cranky.

Anyhow, some things were quite good. I think Bush nailed the Vietnam analogy, as well as the apology stuff. I think he nailed the pre 9/11. I also think he demonstrated to the world at large that the USA will not be leaving Iraq while he remains in office.

However, once again Iran intrudes. Why are we sending Armitage over there? That guy is a yutz.

I've been saying for a while that there is no political argument so poisionous that Democrats won't use it against President Bush. But I am simply astounded at how many Democrats are out there saying that the President should have known that 9/11 was about to happen because young Arab males were in flight school.

Do these people listen to themselves? Aren't they the ones saying we can't investigate young Arab males differently now, after 9/11?

Constant refrain: are they that stupid, or do they think we are that stupid?

pittspilot seems to be getting a feeling, too - but a different one than the one I am getting. It seems to me that things are coming to a head - that the events of the last month or so are leading to a sea change. Perhaps a widening of the war, to now include explicitly Iran and Syria. Something that definitely puts us on the offensive in the GWOT. pitts sees the opposite - that the world is shying away from this fight, and that may have repercussions on our own will, if we really are all alone in the fight.

I try to remain optimistic, and some days it can be a bit forced. That the State Department says we don't have any evidence that Iran is involved in Iraq right now is more than disheartening - it is a bit frightening. A question I heard asked by talker Glenn Beck on his show to day was "what will the next commission be asking 'what did we know and when did we know it' about?" Will we be suddenly surprised to find that we are at war with Iran?

Allah is on it, pointing to sources who are pointing out the obvious - Iran is a problem that we should not, cannot ignore. Certainly what is in the public domain makes it seem like we are ignoring it. Maybe Bob Kerrey could spend some time looking into it.

What helps the optimism be a bit less forced, though, is that I have been hearing from various places that stuff not in the public domain is a very different story. The President promised us in this war that some victories we would never even know about. I think perhaps we should be pulling back the covers on some of those.

I took a friend to BWI airport today to fly to Kuwait and then work his way back up north to his job in the CPA. He tells me good things. He has kind of a narrow view of what is going on, related to his particular work, but he says that for the most part, that what they are doing in Baghdad is going well. He made it seem that at least at CPA, they understood that Syrians and Iranians are a big part of the problem. I don't know what State's purpose in saying stupid stuff is, but I guess they have to stick to what they do best.

In the end, I still remain optimistic that we are winning, that what we are doing is working. That it isn't everything we'd like to see is disappointing, but I guess not all that surprising. The Presidential election is what throws a big wrench into it all, and I think that Iran and Syria are trying to force things to meet their timetable, not ours. The political jockeying of the 9/11 commission is painful to watch, and I expect that the political haymaking on the war hasn't even begun in earnest. An open conflict with Iran and Syria will no doubt be painted as a desperate measure by the White House to divert the public's attention, and there is a ready constituency to buy that line. And the Department of State's line will be a part of the argument used against it.

See why I say sometimes it is a bit forced? If the President doesn't mention Iran in tomorrow's press conference, or waves off a question about their participation, it will be considerably more forced. But then again, if the press asks about it, I will be surprised, too.

PS: Over at Belmont Club, Wretchard calls it a "meeting engagement" between US and Iranian forces. He sees it as a widening war, but can't tell if he thinks this is good or bad.

Here is what CNN thinks

Foxnews

MSNBC

Drudge

Nope, no one seems to have the same story as belmont club

WRETCHARD properly credits Michael Ledeen for spotting this a year ago.

This scenario is very worrying. Tom Clancy spotted the plausibility of this scenario in his book, Executive Orders. It seems clear that Iran has had designs on Iraq for a very long time. As Wretchard lays out, it may be acting on these designs. And I hope that the Administration is aware of this threat and is acting on it. However, I think the Administration is severely handicapped in its ability to deal with the situation. What can they do?

1) Seal the Border? This would require extensive troops, far more then we could muster at this point. I would have thought that infrastructure would have been in place from Saddam's time, but that does not appear to be the case.

2) Directly invade or attack Iran? I don't think that the political will is there. Nor is the political impetus. Nor is the military muscle available. Plus we have the internal political insurgency inside of Iran attempting to overthrow the Mullahs.

3) Support the internal insurgency? Iran has been quiet over the last few weeks. It is impossible to tell how the insurgency is coming along. My feel is that the insurgency has run out of steam, and will require some period to re-ignite. How we ignite it is the open question.

Hanging over the whole situation is the ugly cloud of nuclear proliferation. I honestly expect to wake up any morning now to the news that Iran has detonated a test nuke in the middle of its desert. Then what? It seems clear that the Administration has given up on trying to stop this from happening, only making tepid arguments for bringing Iranian censureship to the UNSC. Can't really say that I blame them. What can they do to stop it?

However, if Iran detonates a nuke, I think the situation in Iraq gets very dicey. In fact, the whole Middle East situation, from the Israel to Syria to Lebanon to Turkey becomes massively problematic. Israel, for obvious reasons, cannot live under the shadow of nuclear armed Iran able to hit it. They are going to have to do something, although what that something is, is anybody's guess.

To me, this is the headline. I do not care that Al Yankovic's parents died. I do not care about that blast in Mexico. I do not care about Haitians or the Bin Laden memo. I do not care who wins the apprentice show, nor do I care (for the first time) who wins the Stanley Cup. I care about taking care of the Iranian problem. It is the most pressing problem, and I see no easy solutions.

And this is not reassuring either.