Fred Thompson's comments "the stupidest thing I've heard yet in the presidential campaign."

[Enrique]

http://www.thenation.com/blogs/campaignmatters?bid=45&pid=257596

NEOCONS SPIN IRAN ...The National Estimate Intelligence Estimate on Iran was a potentially earth-shattering rebuke of the Bush Administration, a pre-emptive strike by the nation's military and intelligence community to avoid a next war.

But the neoconservative contenders for president and their acolytes aren't interpreting things that way. All the see is a bunch of wimpy intelligence-types who are not to be trusted. If anything, they say, as John Bolton did, that the NIE is a reason to get "tougher" with Iran!

"The accuracy of the latest NIE on Iran should be received with a good deal of skepticism," said Fred Thompson, who was supposed to be the neocon's favored candidate, until his spectacularly underwhelming entrance into the race. "Our intelligence community has often underestimated the intentions of adversaries, including Saddam Hussein's Iraq and North Korea."

Um, Mr. Thompson, I know you're getting up there in age, but our intelligence community, manipulated by the Bush Administration, drastically overstated Saddam's supposed WMDs and the "imminent threat" he posed.

When I received Thompson's email, I was on the phone with Peter Galbraith, a noted expert on Iraq who recently published an excellent article on Iran in the New York Review of Books. Galbraith called Thompson's comments "the stupidest thing I've heard yet in the presidential campaign."

(...)

[jefferson_dem]

1. That's the talking point all the neocon(ish) bastards are working with - -

The NIE is inaccurate. Shammity, Limpballs and all the other hate radio jocks were parroting that nonsense yesterday.

[Kutjara]

2. I saw a book in Borders yesterday that was all about...

...how this vast left wing conspiracy has infested "all departments of government" (including the CIA and Justice Department) with one goal in mind: to attack and undermine His Georgeness.

I can't remember the title or who it was by (it was a new hardcover release), because I dropped the thing straight back on the table when I realized it was just more neocon drool. The author was some "respected journalist" whose other books were called something like "Why Everyone Brown is Evil," "Why Thermonuclear War is Totally Cool," and "George W. Bush is God and Anyone Who Disagrees Should be Executed."

So the NIE, you see, is all part of a left-wing plot. I blame Bill Clinton, personally.

[NewJeffCT]

5. you know us leftists

we've always been attracted to careers in the CIA... it's full of commie-pinko treehugging dope-smoking hippies

SDS - really a front organization for the CIA, eventually evolved into Brewster-Jennings.

[Kutjara]

8. I always suspected that.

I mean, what better place for a bunch of stoner hippies to hide in plain sight than right at the center of the intelligence community? Nobody would think to look there.

Those lefties are cunning. Stoned, but cunning.

[Algorem]

3. "dumb as hell" Fred Thompson

[Alter Ego]

7. He was dumb enough to eat moose chili

so this doesn't surprise me.

Hell, Thompson has a legacy of protecting crooked sonsabitches in the White House--he was on the Watergate commission Sam Ervin headed, and was one of the only ones that believed it was just a case of "the young guys tryin' ta impress the old guys".

[rodeodance]

4. our intell community Repuked Cheney et all and now Bolton wants Congress

to investigate them.

ha ha

[NewJeffCT]

6. A local radio host pointed out that the NIE

was influenced by a group in the State Department - the same group that was right on Iraq and their lack of WMD.

[Toots]

9. Actually the Intelligence Agency did not support Bush* on Iraq and that is why

the Bush* Cabal established their very own Intelligence Agency within the Administration made up mostly of Wolfowitz and Pearle.

[UTUSN]

10. Uh, there's been plenty of stupid stuff -- creationist crap, zenophobia, anti-immigrant hysteria ...

not to mention cravenness, cowardice in not taking stands, pandering...