Today's Special Presidential News Conference

Well, if there's one thing George W. Bush wants us to take away from this news conference, it's this:

"Qods Force, Qods Force, Qods Force. Qods Force Qods Force, and by the way Qods Force." Note that I am spelling it the way it ought to be spelled, and not "Cuds Force", which is what Bush is saying.

The man is a fucking broken record. He brings up the name in response to questions that it does not apply to. Questions like "Are you trying to make a case for war with Iran?" that he dodges.

Before I move on, I'd like to point out that this "Qods Force" business is, while probably nonsense, also the precise kind of media manipulation of which this White House is most fond. This technique is simple: Take a phrase, and only translate part of it into English (or just do a bad job: "Chemical" Ali). Bonus points if you can use the letter "q" a lot.

See, "al-Quds" is Arabic for "Jerusalem". Simple. It is a word that exists in English.

Anyway, what Bush is implying, while refusing to explicitly state it (which is where the unending Qods-Forcing comes in) is that Iran is waging war against the United States in Iraq. This he cannot state because he has no proof for it. He has no proof for it because it is not happening. It is not happening because it doesn't make any sense.

Another connection that the Bush Administration fails to make is between the Qods Force and arms smuggling. The five Iranians detained by the US in Irbil (which is in the relatively peaceful Kurdish north) are said by them to be part of the Qods Force, but they have not presented any evidence linking them to the weapons. The only connection, apparently, is that they were both in Iraq at the same time.

The American case is admittedly "an inference based on general assessments", which in this case is their way of saying that they have no proof. In fact, the British troops who have been subject to attacks using the described weapons have now "stopped making any such claim, saying only that the technology matched bomb-making found elsewhere in the Middle East, including Lebanon and Syria." The lack of confidence that even the Americans have in their "case" is demonstrated by their decision this time to entrust the revelation of this absolutely shocking news not to the Secretary of State, as in the Iraqi WMD debacle, but to anonymous, low-level spokesmen. BBC World Service commentators have noted that while the weapons in question may have originated in part in Iran, they were most likely imported to Iraq from Syria or Lebanon. They also pointed out that parts of the devices were made in Taiwan.

Furthermore, it should be pointed out that the majority of "The Insurgency" that is so devoted to attacking Americans has been, and remains, Sunni. Because nobody on television seems to consider it worth noting, let me say again that Iran is Shiite and it is unlikely to to the point of laughability that the Iranian government would want to arm a group whose most likely target is the Shiite community.

And then there's the question of the "Explosively Formed Penetrators", which has overnight become the name of no less than seventy different snotty, political junior high punk bands. That's how great of an expression it is. Sounds nasty. Of course, the "Explosively Formed Penetrator" is a type of weapon that has been in use for at least ninety years. As long as there have been tanks, there have been antitank weapons. The Iranian weapon allegedly used by the insurgents is even a copy of an American weapon from the 1970s. But hey, why say "antitank weapon" when you can say something calculated to scare the fuck out of people?

This is what the President thinks of us, the American people. He believes that we can be easily misled by some sloppy inferences and some spy-novel talk. He believes somehow that the American people will tolerate yet another insane revanchist adventure in the Middle East with an unacceptable cost in American lives and American international credibility in the alleged service of some "nation-building" or "Democracy spreading" project that current experience continues to demonstrate does not work.

But really, if I have to convince anyone, I'm just going to fall back on this, that really makes all I've written so far superfluous:

George W. Bush is a fucking liar. We all know it. He lied about Iraqi WMDs, he lied about his cocaine abuse and his DUI arrests, he lied about his reasons for going to war in the first place. He has no credibility left.

Speaking of lying, it was also amusing to see Bush stand up at that press conference and, talking about North Korea, bald-facedly take credit for China's initiative. That's what the Six-Party Talks are good for, of course. Allowing Bush to take credit for any advances made by any of the other partners in the talks.