The Grey Lady's November Surprise (Dean Barnett on the NYT)

You see kids – this is what happens when your worldview gets hopelessly narrow.

In its semi-annual November surprise, the New York Times “reveals” that the Bush administration put documents on the web that showed that Iraq was quite far along in its quest for nuclear weapons. Naturally, that’s not the focus of the story. The focus of the story is the cursed incompetence of the Bush administration, the Republican Party, and even right-wing media-types (like me!) who wanted the documents released.

But the takeaway from the story for normal people won’t be that conservatives both inside and outside the administration are all a bunch of blithering incompetents. Besides, Andrew Sullivan’s vote had already been pretty much sewed up. The “news” in the story is how far along Saddam was in his bid to acquire the ultimate WMD. While that’s an old story to many of us, it’s heartening to see the Times splash it all over this morning’s front page and in so doing refresh the nation’s memory regarding the most disputed causus belli of the current war.

The Times lengthy reportage pounds the theme that some of the documents could give potential malefactors like those nice Mullahs in Iran a shortcut to nuclear weaponry. The Times quotes a predictably unnamed diplomat fretting, “It’s a cookbook. If you had this, it would short-circuit a lot of things.”

Let’s just posit for the sake of argument that the Times’ huge exposé is news-breaking of the first order and is no way, shape or form a maladroit effort at electioneering. Let’s assume that the Times really does think that this information being posted on the web made the world a vastly more dangerous place.

If that’s the case, why did the Times wait until just last night to confront the government with this information even though the Times dates the concerns of experts to “recent weeks”? One would think the Times’ heartfelt patriotism would have compelled the paper to bring its concerns to the government immediately rather than hold off until four days before an election.

Giggle. Read the Times’ story closely and you’ll hear yet another death rattle from the lumbering carcass of the mainstream media.

See this parody of the NY Times newsroom after releasing the November surprise:

November 3, 2006
NYTimes: Bush told truth! Saddam a true threat! Yellowcake!

**************************A leadin******************************

So, the NY Times twirls its mustache and writes:

Stupid Evil Bush Reveals Saddam’s Nuke Plans, and He was Only a Year Away from Having Nukes and….and….

Times Peon #1: HOLY CRAP, Mr. Keller, did we just validate everything Dick Cheney and Colin Powell and stupid evil George Bush said to the UN? When we’re spilling secrets, we’re not supposed to do that!

Keller: OMG, WE DID! We DID validate these scheming nazi theocon bastards!!!

Times Peon #2: And…and…and what about Joe Wilson and Valerie Plame and those sixteen words Bush said…you know, the impeachable 16 words about the Brit intelligence and the Yellowcake! Jim Geraghty at TKS says we might have freaking validated that story, too!

Keller: Ohhhhhh crap! And freaking bloggers! Okay, let’s spin this, baby, spin it! All hands on deck! Turn this ship around! Call Chris Matthews! Call MoDo - no, wait, don’t call her, she’ll make it worse by pretending to be Emma Peel, or something - call Bob Herbert! He’s a wiz at shifting the rudder! Spin, spin! Call Olbermann!

Peon #3: Aye, Aye, captain! Uh, sir, Olbermann is chewing floorboard and Matthews is crying, again. Should we call Judith Miller, sir?

See link for the complete parody.....it is well done!!!!!!!

Privately, I think Iran ALREADY has nuclear weapons, already sitting on selected Shaab-3 missiles ... and are merely "baiting" Isreal to attack with a long, outrageous parade of diplomatic-military provocations.

4 January 1994
US Undersecretary for International Security Lynn Davis says that Iranian nuclear procurement is "inconsistent with any rational civil nuclear program." The CIA has concluded that Iran's nuclear program is in its "infancy stage," but that Iran could possess nuclear weapons by the year 2000.
—Security Affairs, April-May 1994, p. 3; Jack Kelley, "Nuclear Program in the works/US firms many have helped supply parts," USA Today January 4, 1994; in Lexis-Nexis, < http://www.lexis-nexis.com/>, 13 February 1994.

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