One For The Road?

Middle East analyst and blogger Juan Cole reports on credible rumors of an effort by the Vice President's office to stir up a significant minority is support of going to war with Iran, on top of the war with Iraq, starting the week after Labor Day 2007.

What the hell? The President is a lame duck, so from his perspective, why shouldn't he start one more war in his last sixteen months in office against a country he proclaimed to be evil when he started the job? He's already secured regime change in both of Iran's biggest neighbors . . . he probably sees it as a manifest destiny thing at this point.

My first response is, "with what Army?" We have no ground troops to spare for an invasion of Iran, given that we already have troops overtaxed trying to maintain wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and other foreign deployments in places like South Korea on top of those deployments. Of course, the United States does have an Air Force and a Navy that are not overtaxed. Stranger things have happened, and the Democrats who control Congress are notoriously spineless. So, such an effort, if it does manifest, isn't necessarily dead on arrival, as it should be. If I were an oil futures trader, it would be enough to make me want to lock in relatively low prices now before this possibility manifests more seriously.