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"Human history becomes more and more a race between education and catastrophe."
--H.G. Wells
Late last summer, during some of the discussions about the upcoming democratic presidential primary, I remember a few friends on DU saying that they would not vote for one candidate if they were the party’s nominee. At that time, I suggested that people might do well to focus on which candidate or candidates they were comfortable supporting, but to nor "rule out" any of the democrats who were in the primary contest.
The reason that I gave was that circumstances could – and very likely would – change in regard to the Bush-Cheney administration’s focus on Iran. I said that events involving the neoconservatives’ obsession with Iran could change the way we all view the 2008 election. And although the results of a comprehensive National Intelligence Estimate at the end of the 2007 indicated the claims that Iran posed a nuclear threat to the Middle East were as false as the Iraq yellow cake claims, we should not underestimate the administration’s desire to overthrow the government of Iran.
In the past week, I noted that the timing of the "Condi Rice for VP" business seemed to be timed with the derailment of the "neocon/AIPAC espionage" case, in which Rice and other Bush administration officials had been subpoenaed to testify about the leaking of classified information about Iran to intelligence operatives from another Middle Eastern country.
This week, during General Petraeus’s testimony to Capital Hill, the discussion included numerous references to the US’s difficulty in Iraq being tied to Iran. This was followed by reports that another Middle Eastern country believed that Iran was attempting to acquire the ability to produce nuclear weapons. Today, the president, in addressing the nation, claimed that the two gravest threats to US national security were al Qaeda and Iran.
At very least, there is a coordinated campaign taking place, which is attempting to convince the public that the war of occupation in Iraq is making us more secure, and that our continued safety requires that we elect John McCain. There is also an attempt to move McCain to the right, by the neoconservatives and others associated with the Cheney wing of the republican party. This includes pressure to get McCain to pick someone they are promoting for the vice president.
And there is also a possibility that those neoconservative and Cheneyites believe that their window of opportunity to create a conflict with Iran is closing. It is unlikely that they would believe that either Barack Obama or Hillary Clinton will be as likely to be influenced by their opinions as would John McCain.
Democrats need to move beyond the divisions that have the potential to fracture our party this summer, and lead to a defeat in the fall. It should be obvious what we are up against, and the true costs to be paid if we do lose.
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