War on Iran still a concern

Bernhard of Moon of Alabama has an interesting post regarding concerns about an upcoming war on Iran, quoting Zbigniew Brzezinski in an interview published in Mother Jones:

I wonder who knows that Al Qaeda in one of the strategic documents actually has said that an American-Iranian collision would be of great strategic benefit to Al Qaeda's cause. So here is a party that might even have an interest in provoking such a collision.

... and Leon Hadar, a research fellow with the Cato Institute:

Iran will hold parliamentary elections on March 14, 2008, and you don't have to be an expert in Iranian politics to figure out that the political parties associated with President Ahmadinejad who has been under attack at home for his mismanagement of the country's economy could benefit politically from rising tensions with between Tehran and Washington.

Read all about that here.

Hardly better news from Matthew Rothschild dissecting Bush's State of the Union address the other day, in particular as it relates to Iran:

I’m betting that Bush will try to come to the American people once more before his term is up and declare that forces trained by Iran have attacked our troops in Iraq, and that he therefore is going after them.

Listen to his words: “Above all, know this,” Bush warned. “America will confront those who threaten our troops. We will stand by our allies, and we will defend our vital interests in the Persian Gulf.”

Even more ominous was Bush’s line, “Our message to the people of Iran is clear: We have no quarrel with you.”

As Robert Fisk has pointed out, this is the mantra that Presidents use whenever they are about to attack another country.

It is an imperial tic, a ritual throat-clearing before the war-making, the rattle of the snake before the lashing bite.- Link