"A day after the Associated Press dropped the bombshell news..."

"... that Robert Levinson, officially America’s longest-held hostage, was working for the CIA when he went missing in Iran in 2007, the reverberations were being felt across political and intelligence circles."

[O]ne by one, media organisations disclosed they had known about the story for years, but had acceded to government requests not to publish it....

Ali Alizadeh, a London-based seasoned Iranian analyst and commentator, said... “The admission that he was indeed working for the CIA somehow legitimises Iranian claims in recent years that Americans had been involved inside Iran and gives some credibility to Iran... This is why I believe it might open ways for his release if he is in fact still alive.”

... “Since the mid-90s, the agency has recognized that having analysts more involved in operational decisions and choices is a good thing, and enhances the finished product,” said Vicki Divoll, a former CIA lawyer. “However, if analysts get too far out in front, without the training necessary to successfully run operations, this could backfire. And a debacle such as this, if true, may set back internal agency co-operation 20 years."

"This first step will create time and space over the next six months..."

"...  for more negotiations to fully address our comprehensive concerns about the Iranian program, and because of this agreement, Iran cannot use negotiations as cover to advance its program."

Said Barack Obama.

ADDED: John Bolton (U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, 2005-06) in The Weekly Standard: "Abject Surrender by the United States/What does Israel do now?"

Even modest constraints, easily and rapidly reversible, do not change that fundamental political and operational reality....

Israel... must make the extremely difficult judgment whether it will stand by as Iran maneuvers effortlessly around a feckless and weak White House, bolstering its economic situation while still making progress on the nuclear front....

[I]n truth, an Israeli military strike is the only way to avoid Tehran’s otherwise inevitable march to nuclear weapons, and the proliferation that will surely follow....

Thanks, Iran!

At least Iran is coming to distract us from the domestic clusterfuck.

"For Many Iranians, 'Death To America' Are Just Words."

NPR assures.

Just words?! Hey, don't tell me words don't matter!



It's just by chance that the old Obama "just words" speech came to mind there. Pure coincidence that it comes the day after all that talk about Rand Paul and plagiarism. But this was the speech where he lifted his best lines from Deval Patrick.

Just words!

Putin "cares about power and he cares about keeping Bashar al-Assad in power."

"Assad is the key link in the anti-Western Shiite crescent stretching from Tehran through Damascus and Beirut to the Mediterranean — on which sits Tartus, Russia’s only military base outside the former Soviet Union. This axis frontally challenges the pro-American Sunni Arab Middle East (Jordan, Yemen, the Gulf Arabs, even the North African states), already terrified at the imminent emergence of a nuclear Iran."

That's Krauthammer's matter-of-fact invitation to Americans take the old Sunni-Shiite division to heart as the continuation of the old-but-less-old Cold War. The column is called "The fruits of epic incompetence," blaming Obama and Kerry for giving Putin the opening:

Assad, far from receiving punishment of any kind, goes from monster to peace partner. Putin bestrides the world stage, playing dealmaker. He’s welcomed by America as a constructive partner....

And Obama gets to slink away from a Syrian debacle of his own making.

Elsewhere in The Washington Post, Ezra Klein puts the pro-Obama gloss on same facts:

A lot of people have wondered why Russia and Syria seem to be working to throw the Obama administration a lifeline. But the answer is clear: Assad only cares about his chemical weapons insofar as they help keep him in power. Sacrificing them to end the threat the U.S. poses to his regime is more than worth it to him.

"They think they know where the targets are, they think they know how to hit it with enough force but not too much force, they think they know how the Russian and the Iranians will react."

"We cannot determine all this. On some level, we’re assuming the reaction from Russia and Iraq and Syria will be zero: We’ll carry out this attacks, and there’ll be no response. This is a bit of a sensitive subject, but the administration has been honest that they have no smoking gun that the attack was ordered by Assad. The evidence of his involvement is circumstantial. We’re two years into a civil war that he’s winning. The Russians and Iranians have told him not to use chemical weapons. Hezbollah has told him not to use chemical weapons because their fighters are at risk. So he’s winning, there’s scant and circumstantial evidence that he ordered the attack. Why are we gaming out his incentives when we don’t know he ordered it?"

Says Alan Grayson, a Democratic congressman from Florida, in an interview with Ezra Klein (who's been doing some excellent interviews lately).

"The fact is that Obama is the only president we have."

"We can’t abdicate our position in the world for the next three years. So Republicans will have to resist the temptation to weaken him when the cost is weakening the country. A party that for at least two generations has held high the banner of American leadership and strength should not cast a vote that obviously risks a damaging erosion of this country’s stature and credibility abroad."

 From Bill Kristol's explanation of why "yes" is the correct answer for Republicans.

"Iran foreign minister Zarif tweets happy Jewish new year."

Reports BBC.com:

He then had a response from Christine Pelosi, the daughter of Nancy Pelosi, Minority Leader of the US House of Representatives, who said: "Thanks. The new year would be even sweeter if you would end Iran's Holocaust denial, sir."

He replied: "Iran never denied it. The man who was perceived to be denying it is now gone. Happy New Year."

BUT: "Iran Plots Revenge, U.S. Says/Officials Say Intercepted Message to Militants Orders Reprisals in Iraq if Syria Hit."

"This victory is a victory for wisdom, moderation and maturity... over extremism."

Said Hassan Rouhani, the President-elect of Iran:

But he also urged the world to "acknowledge the rights" of Iran.... "The nations who tout democracy and open dialogue should speak to the Iranian people with respect and recognise the rights of the Islamic republic."

Crowds in Tehran are chanting: "Long live reform, long live Rouhani."

"Moderate cleric Hassan Rohani took a commanding lead over conservative rivals in Iran's presidential election..."

"... partial vote counts showed on Saturday, in what could be the makings of a surprise victory over favored hardliners."

7.8 earthquake in Iran.

Epicenter near Khash, close to the border with Pakistan.

"Ahmadinejad: Iran already a nuclear state..."

"... but has no intention of launching attack on Israel."

The reason for saying that is incompletely aligned with its being true.

ADDED: There are 2 statements, and the reason for saying either one of them is incompletely aligned with its being true. One or both could be true. One or both could be false. Let's call "Iran already a nuclear state" statement A, and "Iran has no intention of launching attack on Israel" statement B:

Which is most likely?
	Both A and B are true.
	Both A and B are false.
	A is false but B is true.
	A is true but B is false.
pollcode.com free polls

"Am I going to die today? Just give me a percentage."

Senator Mark Kirk tells about his stroke. (The percentage the doctor gave him — in the ambulance — was 98% in favor of not dying.)

I was in my hospital bed when the waves came and I began to lose control of my body and mind. Unbelievable, I thought. I’m only 52. I didn’t even know anyone who’d had a stroke.

More than a week later, I regained a confused consciousness in the intensive care unit. I knew I was lying in a bed. I thought someone was sharing the bed with me, but it was my own leg. I vaguely remember a party the ICU staff had for the Super Bowl and the smell of the food they brought.

Later:

I regarded my left leg as a lifeless appendage. Mike kept insisting that it would bear weight. The moment I realized that it would, and that I could swing it from my hip and propel myself forward, was the breakthrough revelation of my rehabilitation.

IN THE COMMENTS: Someone snarks: "Show me when this paper has done a similar story for a Republican. *crickets*" — only to be told that Kirk is a Republican. I blogged this item without remembering Kirk's party affiliation or caring enough to check. But when the subject came up in the comments, I did check, went to Kirk's website, and saw his statement, released yesterday, rejecting Chuck Hagel as Secretary of Defense:

During yesterday's confirmation hearing, Senator Hagel instinctively called the Iranian government both elected and legitimate.  He initially offered strong support for containment of Iran, rather than President Obama's stated policy of preventing an Iranian nuclear breakout.  He could not clearly explain his past opposition to unilateral sanctions against Iran – opposition as recent as 2008.  And at no time did he state his position on whether the European Union should formally designate Iran's terror proxy, Hezbollah, as a terrorist organization – a critical step to cut off the flow of funds to a group responsible for the murders of some 280 American citizens.

The statement is illustrated with the chilling photograph of "Neda Agha-Soltan who was killed during 2009 Iranian election protests."



Am I going to die today? Just give me a percentage.

Iran sends a monkey into space.

And — it says — "returning its shipment intact."

In 2010, Iran successfully sent a rat, turtle and worms into space. But an attempt to send a monkey up in a rocket failed in 2011.

Did this new monkey return alive and in good shape? Can't tell from "shipment intact" (which may be a translation).

Quite aside from concerns about the monkey, Iran's space program may be part of developing a delivery system for a nuclear bomb.