I still don't believe that bombing Iran will be carried out by the Pentagon, because I don't think the Pentagon is fratricidal.  The people in the Pentagon must know that an attack on Iran will unleash the missiles against the U.S. missile and radar bases in Iraq, including the mega air installation at Balad.  The Pentagon may be willing to sacrifice as many of the national guard IED targets as it has, but its engineers, technicians and mission specialists are another matter. Never mind all their precious equipment.

Frankly, I've been thinking for a while that Sy Hersh has been co-opted by the Pentagon propaganda machine.  He started writing about the air war over Iraq, which has indeed been stepped up and whose missiles and bombs are, by general accounts, responsible for about twenty percent of the one million dead, and then, all of a sudden he was distracted with stories about bombs for Iran.  It's almost as if somebody said, "if Sy's interested in bombs, let's give him something to write about bombing Iran." 

That story serves two purposes.  It pulls the covers back over what they don't want us to know about the planes being dispatched from Balad Airbase (every five minutes) alone and it sends a warning to Iran not to even think about going after the elite troops on the bases--our very own hostage sitting ducks.

However, that Senator Clinton is now touting legislation to prohibit something that's not permitted anyway is worrisome.  One suspects that, like so many Republicans and the Bush Administration in particular, Senator Clinton does not understand that the federal government is, by design, prohibited from engaging in any activity that hasn't been specifically permitted in the law.  As I've pointed out several times, Justice Kennedy in his disquisition on the rule of law laid it out clearly.  We have a "limited government" because the law specifies what the agents of government may and must do--nothing less and nothing more.  Which is why, for example, the use of funds appropriated for a retaliatory military action against Afghanistan (when the hijackers were reputedly directed) for planning the invasion of Iraq was clearly unlawful and, probably, the first impeachable offense, since the redirection of funds must have had Presidential approval.

Promising to accomplish something that doesn't need to be done is almost as bad as promising something that can't be accomplished.  Both strategies are designed as a palliative or pacifier and attest to a certain arrogance which we really don't need any more of.  And then there's the problem, in this case, that in prohibiting something that isn't permitted in the first place, it's suggested that what's not permitted actually is.

It's a growing question in my mind how much of the pre-planning for the invasion of Iraq, which was obviously carried out during the Clinton Administration, the former First Lady was privy to.  While she could plausibly claim that she was ignorant of the deception perpetrated by the Bush Administration when she supported the authorization to use force against Iraq, both her reluctance to admit that her reasoning at the time was mistaken and her continued reluctance to agree to a total withdrawal of American forces and the dismantling of the bases, suggest that she was cognizant of the plan to set up U.S. military bases in Iraq, aimed at the long-term "containment" of Russia and China, and still considers it a good plan.

What I don't know is why the U.S. bases in Kuwait, Qatar and Yemen aren't considered sufficient for the so-called Southern Command.  Is the thinking that because Turkey seems to be getting cold feet about having U.S. nuclear missiles based within it's borders, some comparable location (along the same latitude) needs to be set up?  (That might explain Governor Richardson's suggestion that he would send that super diplomat, Richard Holbrooke, to deal with the Turks.  Since Turkey's refusal to permit the invasion force going to Iraq to transit its lands is water under the bridge, it seems likely that the continued presence of the ICBMs is a concern--and ironic, considering that U.S. missiles in Turkey were the proximate cause of the Cuban Missile Crisis).  And then, of course, there's the prospect of North and South Korea settling their differences and coming to a consensus that the American forces stationed there have outlived their welcome.  Since we are good guests and leave whenever our hosts request it, it would seem that dismantling the bases in Korea and not setting up any new ones further south is also in the cards.  Finally, the return of Diego Garcia to its owners will call a halt to our use of the island for refueling aircraft maintenance, but Balad hardly seems a suitable replacement.  Not to mention that while Russia and China might be OK with a few missiles planted in Turkey, the consolidation of U.S. military assets on the plains of Iraq has to be considered in a different category altogether.  Which is probably why Russia has announced the resumption of regular strategic patrols by its bombers.

Do we really want our military assets wiped out "over there"?

Of course, our main problem is that all of this war planning is classified as top secret and our representatives in Congress are pledged not to mention it.  It's all done in the "national interest."  But, really, in whose interest is it for the Pentagon to be fomenting conflicts around the globe?  We've been assuming that our "defense industries" are behind it, but now it turns out that military production is also being outsourced to countries that can turn from friend to enemy on a dime.  While the military-industrial complex looked to be our last outpost of manufacturing real, albeit useless, things, it now turns out that the dismantling of that industrial enterprise was simply delayed.  For what purpose? 

Why is it that most of our manufacturing has been moved overseas?  What I'm thinking is that there are two main reason, both involving the desire to evade what our country has been evolving towards--i.e. a nation where individual equality is "job one" and preserving the natural environment from being destroyed by hazardous materials and waste is "job two."  And, oddly enough, "job one" is much more complex than it seems because, in promoting individual rights the role of government as the purview of the elite is considerably diminished.  Which is why I would argue that, although we are properly outraged and astonished at the audacity of the Bush Administration claim to executive autonomy, they're actually in push-back mode; trying to return to how things used to be, before the civil rights achievements of the 'sixties and 'seventies, when governments enjoyed what is commonly known as "sovereign immunity."  That's their holy grail--the status quo ante, when public officials could not be questioned about their disposition of public funds and assets for the enjoyment of family and friends.  That we now refer to such officials as beholden to cronies and corrupt is actually a sign of progress.  What the neo-cons want to return to is a time when such favoritism was the norm.

What the new con men are after is government of, by and for the elite.  And, if they can't get it at home, they'll take their marbles and play the game elsewhere.  Which is why we should make every effort to wish them farewell, even as we make sure that the marbles stay here.  Perhaps the biggest mistake of the last two decades was letting American enterprise decamp overseas, taking their assets and corporate identities with them and leaving all the responsibilities that come with the status of being a United States corporation (fair wages, safe working conditions, environmental protection and obligations to retirees) behind.  And, of course, it was during the Clinton Administration that this global privatization of profit and socialization of costs really took off.

Perhaps we were all taken by surprise and didn't know what the con men had up their sleeves.  But, we know better now and it's got to end.  Just as the behavior of our agents of government should meet the same high standards, regardless of where they happen to be (the Constitution makes no distinction between American and foreign persons, for example), United States corporations need to operate according to the same standards at home and overseas.  After all, that's what our commitment to equality demands.  It also demands that we not attack people or nations to dominate them.