SPECIAL EDITORIAL

[This Special Editorial is presented with the sole intent of allowing the reader to examine, in some detail, capsule viewpoints on the performance of the present occupiers of the White House. Also an insight on a possible war with Iran - from three perspectives: general world opinion and both pro and con American opinion.]

On War with Iran

No sane person wants it to come about, but the handful that do are in the Bush administration; or have the ear of those in power in the White House. And they are determined to bring this nightmare about before the administration leaves office in less than 15 months. Quite simply, it's their last chance to do the insane thing they have campaigned for since this administration took office seven years ago. They desperately want to go to war with Iran - regardless of the cost in lives and funds.

Therefore, breaking with tradition I am inserting into the special editorial, in its entirety, a recent editorial from a German publican, Der Spigel. I will post no conclusions other than to say that it does represent the general attitude of a multitude of governments and citizens around the world. You judge for yourself.

White House Leak: Cheney's Plan for Iran Attack Starts With Israeli Missile Strike

By Gregor Peter Schmitz and Cordula Meyer - Der Spigel

October 26, 2007

(Translated from the German by Christopher Sultan; Note - there has been no editorializing of the 'guest piece' from a foreign source. It has been left intact, including spelling errors of difference due to translation from a foreign language. We did this to insure that there will be no claims that we in any way tampered with its original state.)

US Vice President Dick Cheney -- the power behind the throne, the eminence grise, the man with the (very) occasional grandfatherly smile -- is notorious for his propensity for secretiveness and behind-the-scenes manipulation. He's capable of anything, say friends as well as enemies. Given this reputation, it's no big surprise that Cheney has already asked for a backroom analysis of how a war with Iran might begin.

In the scenario concocted by Cheney's strategists, Washington's first step would be to convince Israel to fire missiles at Iran's uranium enrichment plant in Natanz. Tehran would retaliate with its own strike, providing the US with an excuse to attack military targets and nuclear facilities in Iran.

This information was leaked by an official close to the vice president. Cheney himself hasn't denied engaging in such war games. For years, in fact, he's been open about his opinion that an attack on Iran, a member of US President George W. Bush's "Axis of Evil," is inevitable.

Given these not-too-secret designs, Democrats and Republicans alike have wondered what to make of the still mysterious Israeli bombing run in Syria on Sept. 6. Was it part of an existing war plan? A test run, perhaps? For days after the attack, one question dominated conversation at Washington receptions: How great is the risk of war, really?

Grandiose Plans, East and West

In the September strike, Israeli bombers were likely targeting a nuclear reactor under construction, parts of which are alleged to have come from North Korea. It is possible that key secretaries in the Bush cabinet even tried to stop Israel. To this day, the administration has neither confirmed nor commented on the attack.

Nevertheless, in Washington, Israel's strike against Syria has revived the specter of war with Iran. For the neoconservatives it could represent a glimmer of hope that the grandiose dream of a democratic Middle East has not yet been buried in the ashes of Iraq. But for realists in the corridors of the State Department and the Pentagon, military action against Iran is a nightmare they have sought to avert by asking a simple question: "What then?"

The Israeli strike, or something like it, could easily mark the beginning of the "World War III," which President Bush warned against last week. With his usual apocalyptic rhetoric, he said Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad could lead the region to a new world war if his nation builds a nuclear bomb.

Conditions do look ripe for disaster. Iran continues to acquire and develop the fundamental prerequisites for a nuclear weapon. The mullah regime receives support -- at least moral support, if not technology -- from a newly strengthened Russia, which these days reaches for every chance to provoke the United States. President Vladimir Putin's own (self-described) "grandiose plan" to restore Russia's armed forces includes a nuclear buildup. The war in Iraq continues to drag on without an end in sight or even an opportunity for US troops to withdraw in a way that doesn't smack of retreat. In Afghanistan, NATO troops are struggling to prevent a return of the Taliban and al-Qaida terrorists. The Palestinian conflict could still reignite on any front.

In Washington, Bush has 15 months left in office. He may have few successes to show for himself, but he's already thinking of his legacy. Bush says he wants diplomacy to settle the nuclear dispute with Tehran, and hopes international pressure will finally convince Ahmadinejad to come to his senses. Nevertheless, the way pressure has been building in Washington, preparations for war could be underway.

In late September, the US Senate voted to declare the 125,000-man Iranian Revolutionary Guard a terrorist organization. High-ranking US generals have accused Iran of waging a "proxy war" against the United States through its support of Shiite militias in Iraq. And strategists at the Pentagon, apparently at Cheney's request, have developed detailed plans for an attack against Tehran.

Instead of the previous scenario of a large-scale bombardment of the country's many nuclear facilities, the current emphasis is, once again, on so-called surgical strikes, primarily against the quarters of the Revolutionary Guards. This sort of attack would be less massive than a major strike against Iran's nuclear facilities.

Conservative think tanks and pundits who sense this could be their last chance to implement their agenda in the Middle East have supported and disseminated such plans in the press. Despite America's many failures in Iraq, these hawks have urged the weakened president to act now, accusing him of having lost sight of his principal agenda and no longer daring to apply his own doctrine of pre-emptive strikes.

Sheer Lunacy?

The notion of war with Iran has spilled over into other circles, too. Last Monday Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic Speaker of the US House of Representatives, made it clear that the president would first need Congressional approval to launch an attack. Meanwhile, Republican candidates for the White House have debated whether they would even allow such details to get in their way. Former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney said he would consult his attorneys to determine whether the US Constitution does, in fact, require a president to ask for Congressional approval before going to war. Vietnam veteran John McCain said war with Iran was "maybe closer to reality than we are discussing tonight."

Democratic frontrunner Hillary Clinton has also adopted a hawkish stance, voting in favor of the Senate measure to classify the Revolutionary Guard as a terrorist organization. Her rivals criticized Clinton for giving the administration a blank check to go to war.

The US military is building a base in Iraq less than 10 kilometers (about six miles) from Iran's border. The facility, known as Combat Outpost Shocker, is meant for American soldiers preventing Iranian weapons from being smuggled into Iraq. But it's also rumored that Bush authorized US intelligence agencies in April to run sabotage missions against the mullah regime on Iranian soil.

Gary Sick is an expert on Iran who served as a military adviser under three presidents. He believes that such preparations mark a significant shift in the government's strategy. "Since August," says Sick, "the emphasis is no longer on the Iranian nuclear threat," but on Iran's support for terrorism in Iraq. "This is a complete change and is potentially dangerous."

It would be relatively easy for Bush to prove that Tehran, by supporting insurgents in Iraq, is responsible for the deaths of American soldiers. It might be harder to prove that Iran's nuclear plans pose an immediate threat to the world. Besides, the nuclear argument is reminiscent of an embarrassing precedent, when the Bush administration used the claim that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction -- which he didn't -- as a reason to invade Iraq. Even if the evidence against Tehran proves to be more damning, the American public will find it difficult to swallow this argument again.

The forces urging a diplomatic resolution also look stronger than they were before Iraq. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice wants the next step to be a third round of even tighter sanctions against Iran in the UN Security Council. Rice has powerful allies at the Pentagon: Defense Secretary Robert Gates and Admiral William Fallon, head of US Central Command, which is responsible for American forces throughout the region.

Rice and her cohorts all favor diplomacy, partly because they know the military is under strain. After four years in Iraq and Afghanistan, the US lacks manpower for another major war, especially one against a relatively well-prepared adversary. "For many senior people at the Pentagon, the CIA and the State Department, a war would be sheer lunacy," says security expert Sick.

Bruce Riedel, a former CIA officer and now a Middle East expert at the Brookings Institution, agrees. A war against Tehran would be "a disaster for the entire world," says Riedel, who worries about a "battlefield extending from the Mediterranean to the Indian subcontinent." Nevertheless, he believes there is a "realistic risk of a military conflict," because both sides look willing to carry things to the brink.

On the one hand, says Riedel, Iran is playing with fire, challenging the West by sending weapons to Shiite insurgents in Iraq. On the other hand, hotheads in Washington are by no means powerless. Although many neoconservative hawks have left the Bush administration, Cheney remains their reliable partner. "The vice president is the closest adviser to the president, and a dominant figure," says Riedel. "One shouldn't underestimate how much power he still wields."

'Is it 1938 Again?'

Russian President Vladimir Putin's visit to Tehran last week also played into the hands of hardliners in Washington, who read it as proof that Putin isn't serious about joining the West's effort to convince Tehran to abandon its drive for a nuclear weapon. Moreover, the countries bordering the Caspian Sea, including Central Asian nations Washington has courted energetically in recent years, have said they would not allow a war against Tehran to be launched from their territory.

Cheney derives much of his support from hawks outside the administration who fear their days are as numbered as the President's. "The neocons see Iran as their last chance to prove something," says analyst Riedel. This aim is reflected in their tone. Conservative columnist Norman Podhoretz, for example -- a father figure to all neocons -- wrote in the Wall Street Journal that he "hopes and prays" that Bush will finally bomb Iran. Podhoretz sees the United States engaged in a global war against "Islamofascism," a conflict he defines as World War IV, and he likens Iran to Nazi Germany. "Is it 1938 again?" he asks in a speech he repeats regularly at conferences.

Podhoretz is by no means an eccentric outsider. He now serves as a senior foreign-policy adviser to Republican presidential candidate Rudolph Giuliani. President Bush has also met with Podhoretz at the White House to hear his opinions.

Nevertheless, most experts in Washington warn against attacking Tehran. They assume the Iranians would retaliate. "It would be foolish to believe surgical strikes will be enough," says Riedel, who believes that precision attacks would quickly escalate to war.

Former presidential adviser Sick thinks Iran would strike back with terrorist attacks. "The generals of the Revolutionary Guard have had several years to think about asymmetrical warfare," says Sick. "They probably have a few rather interesting ideas."

According to Sick, detonating well-placed bombs at oil terminals in the Persian Gulf would be enough to wreak havoc. "Insurance costs would skyrocket, causing oil prices to triple and triggering a global recession," Sick warns. "The economic consequences would be enormous, far greater than anything we have experienced with Iraq so far."

Because the catastrophic consequences of an attack on Iran are obvious, many in Washington have a fairly benign take on the current round of saber rattling. They believe the sheer dread of war is being used to bolster diplomatic efforts to solve the crisis and encourage hesitant members of the United Nations Security Council to take more decisive action. The Security Council, this argument goes, will be more likely to approve tighter sanctions if it believes that war is the only alternative.

The Bush Presidency from the View of the Loyalist 23-26 Percent

In our attempt to be as completely fair as possible in our political editorial policy, we are printing (as sent) an e-mail we recently received from an anonymous source. However, we have confirmed that it is one that has been making its way around the Internet as of late. After studying it we came to the conclusion that it does, indeed appear to speak for the feelings and attitudes of that 23-26 percent of hardened Bush supporters who voice continued support for the present administration. Therefore, to allow for the fair judgement of our readers, as with the foreign editorial, we are publishing this missive intact as received without any editorial corrections. And to give voice to both sides of this controversy, at the end is our version of that same e-mail edited as a rebuttal.

As His Loyalists See It: If Bush resigned today, this is what his speech would be...

Normally, I start these things out by saying "My Fellow Americans. "Not doing it this time. If the polls are any indication, I don't know who more than half of you are anymore. I do know something terrible has happened, and that you're really not fellow Americans any longer.

I'll cut right to the chase here: I quit. Now before anyone gets all in a lather about me quitting to avoid impeachment, or to avoid prosecution or something, let me assure you: There's been no breaking of laws or impeachable offenses in this office.

The reason I'm quitting is simple. I'm fed up with you people. I'm fed up because you have no understanding of what's really going on in the world. Or of what's going on in this once-great nation of ours. And the majority of you are too damned lazy to do your homework and figure it out.

Let's start local. You've been sold a bill of goods by politicians and the news media. Polls show that the majority of you think the economy is in the tank. And that's despite record numbers of homeowners, including record numbers of MINORITY homeowners. And while we're mentioning minorities, I'll point out that minority business ownership is at an all-time high. Our unemployment rate is as low as it ever was during the Clinton administration. I've mentioned all those things before, but it doesn't seem to have sunk in..

Despite the shock to our economy of 9/11, the stock market has rebounded to record levels and more Americans than ever a re participating in these markets. Meanwhile, all you can do is whine about gas prices, and most of you are too damn stupid to realize that gas prices are high because there's increased demand in other parts of the world, and because a small handful of noisy idiots are more worried about polar bears and beach front property than your economic security.

We face real threats in the world. Don't give me this "blood for oil" thing. If I were trading blood for oil I would've already seized Iraq's oil fields and let the rest of the country go to hell. And don't give me this 'Bush Lied; People Died' crap either. If I were the liar you morons take me for, I could've easily had chemical weapons planted in Iraq so they could be 'discovered.' Instead, I owned up to the fact that the intelligence was faulty.

Let me remind you that the rest of the world thought Saddam had the goods, same as me. Let me also remind you that regime change in Iraq was official US policy before I came into office. Some guy named 'Clinton' established that policy. Bet you didn't know that, did you?

You idiots need to understand that we face a unique enemy. Back during the cold war, there were two major competing political and economic models squaring off. We won that war, but we did so because fundamentally, the Communists wanted to survive, just as we do. We were simply able to out spend and out-tech them.

That's not the case this time. The soldiers of our new enemy don't care if they survive. In fact, they want to d die. That'd be fine, as long as they weren't also committed to taking as many of you with them as they can. But they are. They want to kill you, and the bastards are all over the globe.

You should be grateful that they haven't gotten any more of us here in the United States since September 11. But you're not. That's because you've got no idea how hard a small number of intelligence, military, law enforcement, and homeland security people have worked to make sure of that. When this whole mess started, I warned you that this would be a long and difficult fight. I'm disappointed how many of you people think a long and difficult fight amounts to a single season of 'Survivor.'

Instead, you've grown impatient. You're incapable of seeing things through the long lens of history, the way our enemies do. You think that wars should last a few months, a few years, tops.

Making matters worse, you actively support those who help the enemy. Every time you buy the New York Times, every time you send a donation to a cut-and-run Democrat's political campaign, well, dang it, you might just as well Fed Ex a grenade launcher to a Jihadist. It amounts to the same thing.

In this day and age, it's easy enough to find the truth. It's all over the Internet. It just isn't on the pages of the New York Times or on NBC News. But even if it were, I doubt you'd be any smarter. Most of you would rather watch American Idol.

I could say more about your expectations that the government will always be there to bail you out, even if you're too stupid to leave a city that's below sea level and has a hurricane approaching.

I could say more about your insane belief that government, not your own wallet, is where the money comes from. But I've come to the conclusion that were I to do so, it would sail right over your heads.

So I quit. I'm going back to Crawford. I've got an energy-efficient house down there (Al Gore could only dream) and the capability to be fully self-sufficient. No one ever heard of Crawford before I got elected, and as soon as I'm done here pretty much no one will ever hear of it again. Maybe I'll be lucky enough to die of old age before the last pillars of America fall.

Oh, and by the way, Cheney's quitting too. That means Pelosi is your new President. You asked for it. Watch what she does carefully, because I still have a glimmer of hope that there are just enough of you remaining who are smart enough to turn this thing around in 2008.

So that's it. God bless what's left of America. Some of you know what I mean. The rest of you, kiss off.

The following is how we at The Conservative Independent reflect on the same issue - President George W. Bush's 'possible' resignation speech:

In the Editor's Opinion: What Bush's farewell speech "should" be if he resigned today...

"My fellow Americans, I am today handing in my resignation to be effective at the end of January 1, 2008. Yes, I have finally come to my senses and realized that I have inflicted enough damage upon this land that I love so. Therefore, I humbly apologize for all that I have done. A litany of the error of my ways are as follows:

I have tried to convince the American public that when they lost their jobs due to some of my policies, and when the job figures returned to double figures, it was a trick of 'smoke and mirrors.' So many of you lost your jobs paying sometimes as much as $50,000 or more with benefits and pensions, and they were replaced with jobs paying $17,000 to $25,000 - and no benefits or pensions.

This required most of you, against your will, to become two wage earners per family - to make up the difference; or to become employed as one wage earner doing two jobs. So yes, there were indeed created 600,000 thousand new jobs created under my watch, but they were being done by 300,000 people. So I apologize for the imposed inhumanity of bringing the employment syndrome of 'duel low income' jobs to so many of you. But try to see it my way: just about everybody is working. It's just that they have to work twice as hard and twice as long for about half as much, to keep us completive with the rest of the world in the new global economy. So please forgive me.

I apologize for turning a $750 Billion budget surplus into a $550 Billion deficit - and growing, but I really needed the money for other useful programs and projects. And I didn't want to spend it on paying back that 'wasteful' Social Security so many working Americans depend on as my predecessor had planned. After all, as I saw it at the time, the wealthy needed help too.

I apologize to you for allowing the pharmaceutical Industry to 'virtually write' - on the floor of the Congress before the vote - the new Medicaid drugs bill; which also effectively choked off less expensive drugs from across the border in Canada - made by these same companies. This was again 'smoke and mirrors', since it exposed the majority you - especially seniors - to the infamous 'donut-hole' in the payment plan - one that assumed you either got miraculously better or dropped dead while waiting during the interim - before coverage resumed.

I apologize to you for giving a major tax cut to the wealthiest 1.5 percent of the country, while only sprinkling a few measly bucks to the rest of you for show: I think they call this the 'trickle-down' theory. And yes, I am now well aware that absolutely none of the neediest got wet during the process - not even monetarily damp I'm told. Sorry!

I apologize for starting the 'No Child Left Behind' program as a highly touted campaign promise, then deliberately underfunding it so that it had to fail when the cash strapped states were burdened with its expensive upkeep.

I apologize for taking every opportunity to use disasters like Katrina, and to employ staged town meetings as photo op's, limited to those who support me and my programs, but restricted - by armed Secret Service force - from any of the taxpaying American public who didn't.

I apologize to all of you for my relentless pursuit of the 'destruction of the American Middle Class', and to the Middle Class itself: or to how ever many of them are left.

I apologize to the Lower and Middle Income groups, minorities included, who were allowed under my administration to achieve home ownership - again via 'smoke and mirrors.' Unfortunately, many of you are about to lose those homes to foreclosures. I was warned many times by Alan Greenspan and others, to rein in the rampant sub prime mortgage industry. But I was reluctant to do so because they were heavy contributors to my presidential campaigns.

I also apologize for allowing my party, with the collusion of the banking and credit industry, to savage the bankruptcy laws. And I understand that because of the changes I allowed the industry to make in crafting a new law, many of those lower and middle income Americans with financially crushing student loans from Sallie Mae, ARM mortgages and impossible to meet medical expenses can no longer gain relief through the courts.

I apologize for allowing the opposite disposition of relief for major corporations and the airline industry. Doing so allowed them to ease out of retirement and other pension obligations, leaving many of their employees either destitute or with inadequately funded retirement and medical insurance packages. Which to be fair and honest, also allowed them to shield the pensions and compensations plans of their corporate officers from the same fate.

I apologize for the incredible and deadly mess I made of the Katrina Hurricane disaster, by placing a thoroughly incompetent and unqualified political appointee in charge of FEMA. And also for disintegrating that agency from the efficient one my father made it into after the Hurricane Andrew disaster, a trend continued by President Clinton who honed the agency into a model of disaster response by placing the highly skilled James Lee Witt in charge as its head.

I also apologize for doing absolutely nothing to stem the flow of illegal immigrants into the United States from all countries, especially the virtual 'invasion' from Mexico and Latin America. But you see, the corporate agricultural and fast-food concerns wanted as much cheap labor as they could get, and they too were heavy contributors to my campaign coffers.

I apologize for brutally slashing the budget and staff of the U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, leaving that vital government agency with only 'one' person to check product safety of imported children's toys in a 40 billion dollar industry undergoing massive recalls; all to satisfy the campaign promises and demands of its corporate leaders.

I apologize for awarding no-bid multi billion dollar taxpayer funded contracts to my corporate political backers, as well as the close friends and associates of Vice President Cheney.

I apologize for virtually all but eliminating the long held principle of Habeas Corpus, a key foundation of our Constitution and Bill of rights, from the American legal system. As a result, no American is safe in the courts anymore.

I apologize for starting a 'totally' unnecessary war against a country that didn't attack us with phony, trumped up and cherry-picked intelligence - just so the vice president and his friends in the oil industry could get at the Iraq oil fields. I also apologize for allowing Osama bin Laden to get away at Bora Bora in Afghanistan - when we 'definitely' had him - just so I could divert our forces toward Iraq.

Most of all, I apologize for wastefully sacrificing the lives of almost 4000 Americans to date, allowing the brutalizing in combat of 85,000 others, and an uncountable number of Iraqi men, women and children in the process. And for being the first president in a time of war to have never attended a single military funeral.

However, since I have made this mess both militarily and economically, and since the GAO and other responsible government departments estimate that before we can get out of these conflicts, the cost is likely to soar to an estimated 2.4 Trillion dollars, what's a few more lives or bucks in the bargain? In for a penny, in for a pound as they say. And since I don't like to leave a job undone, on the way out I will be attacking Iran - and let the chips, oil prices, bodies, and the whole damn Middle East fall where they may. History and my God will judge me.

Thank you all for having me as your president.

George W. Bush

Your comments - The voices of our readers

Dear CI, I have been reading your site for the last year with a great deal of humor. You're a good writer, but I have always thought your viewpoints were a bit nieve. However, as of late I have come to change my mind dramatically. In fact, so has my wife. She now reads all you write. And I will give you credit. You have been almost dead on on a number of events before they hapened. You were the first we ever ran across that said Pakistan was the real danger not Iran. This editorial is great. It is in your face honest and I like and respect that. Keep it up and we will keep reading. K. Williams, Hopewell, VA Dear CI, Every time I read your editorials I am prepared to be angry. But this time I say hooray. At last someone actually says what I have been saying all along. These queer people want to damm much. Enough is enough. I am going to email this editorial to every one I know. D. Raymond, Albany, NY