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I suppose, but then again...what more can he say about Iraq that he and his talking points parrots haven't already said several times over the years and in past SOTU speeches?
Word was on the morning news programs that Bush will not focus much time on Iraq. He's supposed to focus mainly on domestic issues such as immigration and energy.
Weak Sauce if it's true.
I suppose, but then again...what more can he say about Iraq that he and his talking points parrots haven't already said several times over the years and in past SOTU speeches?
Domestic issues are the other "bear". He's hated at home, too. Nothing he speaks about will provide a soft place to land. How many more republicans will leap off the bush wagon after tonight?
I don't think there are many left to jump off. Well, except maybe for a few misinformed Insannity listeners.
Obviously timed for dramatic effect on the day of the SOU speech (if the repugnant, toneless noises dubya makes can be called "speech"):
========================
January 23, 2007
U.S. Warns Iran to Back Down
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
Filed at 3:25 p.m. ET
DUBAI, United Arab Emirates (AP) -- A second U.S. aircraft carrier strike group now steaming toward the Middle East is Washington's way of warning Iran to back down in its attempts to dominate the region, a top U.S. diplomat said here Tuesday.
Nicholas Burns, U.S. undersecretary of state for political affairs, ruled out direct negotiations with Iran and said a rapprochement between Washington and Tehran was ''not possible'' until Iran halts uranium enrichment.
''The Middle East isn't a region to be dominated by Iran. The Gulf isn't a body of water to be controlled by Iran. That's why we've seen the United States station two carrier battle groups in the region,'' Burns said in an address to the Dubai-based Gulf Research Center, an influential think-tank.
''Iran is going to have to understand that the United States will protect its interests if Iran seeks to confront us,'' Burns continued.
Iran is in a standoff with the West over its defiance of U.N. demands to halt uranium enrichment, which can produce fuel for both nuclear energy and nuclear weapons. Iran says its atomic program is aimed solely at generating energy, but the United States and some of its allies suspect it is geared toward making weapons. The U.N. imposed limited sanctions on Iran last month.
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad accused the United States Tuesday of stirring up conflict between rival Muslim sects to maintain U.S. influence in the Middle East.
''The U.S. intends to cause insecurity and dispute and weaken independent governments in the region to continue with its dominance over the Middle East and achieve its arrogant goals,'' Ahmadinejad said during a meeting with Syrian Foreign Minister Walid Moallem.
''The U.S. and Zionist regime have a conspiracy to stir up conflict between Shiite and Sunni Muslims in order to plunder the wealth of the regional nations,'' the president said, according to the state-run Islamic Republic News Agency, or IRNA.
Ahmadinejad said last week that Iran is ''ready for anything'' in its confrontation with the United States.
Iran conducted missile tests on Monday, the first of five days of military maneuvers southeast of Tehran. The Islamic republic also barred 38 inspectors from the U.N. nuclear watchdog -- the International Atomic Energy Agency, prompting fears that it was seeking to restrict access to its facilities.
''This is obviously not a sign of goodwill, nor a sign of willingness to cooperate with the international community,'' French Foreign Ministry spokesman Jean-Baptiste Mattei told reporters Tuesday.
Ali Larijani, Iran's top nuclear negotiator, said Tuesday that the decision had been misintepreted and that there had been no change in Iran's cooperation with the IAEA.
''The issue is not the way the media has reflected it,'' Larijani was reported as saying by IRNA.
U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates has said the U.S. buildup in the Gulf was intended to impress on Iran that the four-year war in Iraq has not made America vulnerable.
The American aircraft carrier USS John C. Stennis and several accompanying ships are heading toward the Gulf to join an aircraft carrier group already in the region, the USS Dwight D. Eisenhower. The Stennis is expected to arrive in late February.
The Stennis's arrival in the Middle East will mark the first time since the U.S.-led Iraq invasion in 2003 that the United States has had two carrier battle groups in the region.
The U.S. Navy said Tuesday that the minesweeper USS Gladiator arrived in the Persian Gulf, one of six such ships -- four American, two British -- now plying the Gulf for anti-ship mines. U.S. officials have long said Iran was likely to block busy Gulf shipping lanes in a conflict.
Some among the audience of Dubai-based diplomats and analysts complained that American wars in the Middle East were already threatening the region's stability and asked Burns to sort out Iraq and the Israel-Palestinian conflict before turning attention to Iran.
''What we are not interested in is another war in the region,'' Mohammed al-Naqbi, who heads the Gulf Negotiations Center, told Burns. ''Iraq is your problem, not the problem of the Arabs. You destroyed a country that had ins utions. You handed that country to Iran. Now you are crying to Europe and the Arabs to help you out of this mess.''
Oh goody...
Yahoo NewsWASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. contingency planning for military action against
Iran's nuclear program goes beyond limited strikes and would effectively unleash a war against the country, a former U.S. intelligence analyst said on Friday.
"I've seen some of the planning ... You're not talking about a surgical strike," said Wayne White, who was a top Middle East analyst for the State Department's bureau of intelligence and research until March 2005.
"You're talking about a war against Iran" that likely would destabilize the Middle East for years, White told the Middle East Policy Council, a Washington think tank....
The attack may also be timed to *avoid* a radiological disaster. Iran's Bushehr nuclear reactor is scheduled to beging initial fueling in March and begin operation in September 2007.If they want to avoid contaminating the Persian Gulf with reactor fuel and/or fission products, they have to take it out soon.
It's no coincidence that all the 'surge forces' and the Stennis Strike Group are supposed to arrive in the Persian Gulf by March. Russia is to supply fuel to Iran's nuclear power plant in March 2007.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch...
Bush's Iraq Plan - Goading Iran into War Analysis
by Trita Parsi
January 15, 2007
ZmagWASHINGTON, Jan 12 (IPS) - President George W. Bush's address on Iraq Wednesday night was less about Iraq than about its eastern neighbour, Iran. There was little new about the U.S.'s strategy in Iraq, but on Iran, the president spelled out a plan that appears to be aimed at goading Iran into war with the U.S.
While Washington speculated whether the president would accept or reject the Iraq Study Group's recommendations, few predicted that he would do the opposite of what James Baker and Lee Hamilton advised. Rather than withdrawing troops from Iraq, Bush ordered an augmentation of troop levels. Rather than talking to Iran and Syria, Bush virtually declared war on these states. And rather than pressuring Israel to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, the administration is fuelling the factional war in Gaza by arming and training Fatah against Hamas.
Several recent developments and statements indicate that the administration is ever more seriously eyeing war with Iran. On Wednesday, Bush made the starkest accusations yet against the rulers in Tehran, alleging that the clerics were "providing material support for attacks on American troops."
While promising to "disrupt the attacks on our forces" and "seek out and destroy the networks providing advanced weaponry and training to our enemies in Iraq," he made no mention of the flow of arms and funds to Sunni insurgents and al Qaeda from Jordan and Saudi Arabia
Bush to call for 20 percent reduction in gasoline usage
CNNWASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Bush will call for a 20 percent reduction of gasoline usage over the next 10 years in his State of the Union Address Tuesday night, a senior Administration official tells CNN.
By decreasing gasoline usage among consumers, the president will say it's in the nation's security interest increase the supply of the government's Strategic Petroleum Reserve -- the nation's oil supply that is only tapped in crises.
The president will also push for more renewable and alternative energy sources -- initiatives he has pushed previously.
CNN has also learned the president will call for a balanced budget by 2012 and advocate several measures to accomplish this including a decrease of pet projects by members of Congress.
Predictably, ABC News can't wait to bend over and take it in the arse.
"Bush to Offer Bold Energy Plan"
To little, too late.
60 minutes of preempted crap
Setting the record straight....
Scant evidence found of Iran-Iraq arms link
U.S. warnings of advanced weaponry crossing the border are overstated, critics say.
BAQUBAH, IRAQLA Times— If there is anywhere Iran could easily stir up trouble in Iraq, it would be in Diyala, a rugged province along the border between the two nations.
...
But even here, evidence of Iranian involvement in Iraq's troubles is limited. U.S. troops have found mortars and an ank mines with Iranian markings dated 2006, said U.S. Army Col. David W. Sutherland, who oversees the province. But there has been little sign of more advanced weaponry crossing the border, and no Iranian agents have been found.
In his speech this month outlining the new U.S. strategy in Iraq, President Bush promised to "seek out and destroy" Iranian networks that he said were providing "advanced weaponry and training to our enemies." He is expected to strike a similar note in tonight's State of the Union speech.
...
For all the aggressive rhetoric, however, the Bush administration has provided scant evidence to support these claims. Nor have reporters traveling with U.S. troops seen extensive signs of Iranian involvement. During a recent sweep through a stronghold of Sunni insurgents here, a single Iranian machine gun turned up among dozens of arms caches U.S. troops uncovered. British officials have similarly accused Iran of meddling in Iraqi affairs, but say they have not found Iranian-made weapons in areas they patrol.
...
Few doubt that Iran is seeking to extend its influence in Iraq. But the groups in Iraq that have received the most Iranian support are not those that have led attacks against U.S. forces. Instead, they are nominal U.S. allies.
Not that the chicken-hawks will let facts get in the way of a SOTU...
Here's all Bush the Lesser needs to say:
"The State of the Union is Crap. I and my minions made it that way. off if you don't like it because once I've made my mind up ain't nothin' gonna change. You wouldn't want me to be a flip-flopper now, would you?"
"Thank you. The next 29 minutes of commercials come to you courtesy of the fine folks at Halliburton, Exxon/Mobil, and the like. Since I got nothin' to say I figger they might as well use the time. Besides, they always tell me what to do anyway."
It took two dudes to announce the president?
time to jack it
no one boo'd
god do they have to clap after every thing?
yeah.. these images are too sharp
Cheney looks like he has indigestion or something.
I can't get over the vacant expressions of almost everyone in attendance. They look bored.
Mutombo is there.
I wasn't... I really think so.
I can't get over the hideous expressions of almost every photo of yourself you've posted. You look like electrocuted genitalia.
It's wonderful to see Dikembe Mutombo gain as much recognition as possible for all of the great things he does for those who are less fortunate than he is.
I love how the country gets credit for producing heroic actions now. I hate speeches like that.
well...at least it was relatively short for a SOTU.
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