It has been in a slow, steady freefall for some years now, and that fall is likely to continue now for the foreseeable future.

The “enforcers” have been deployed to help slow the free fall… I wonder how much weaker the dollar would be if it wasn’t the world’s reserve currency?

And it’s not like he even needed to negotiate the settlement with the North Koreans. The nuke they set off was so weak we could barely confirm it as a nuclear explosion. After that Kim Jong-il almost immediately sent out his negotiators, indicating that the test was a massive failure, and considering the state of North Korea’s economy it’s unlikely he had the capability to improve his program or build more. Basically, we could have just sat back, kept our mouths shut and let his society collapse on its own. Now we’re propping them up with foreign aid because Bush thinks Kim Jong-il might someday be a threat to us. Utterly ridiculous.

http://forums.greenvilleonline.com/viewtopic.php?p=56008&highlight=#56008

In domestic politics, it’s always a good idea to follow the money.

That’s right… follow the money… Iran is a terrorist threat to the US Dollar for accepting other currencies for their oil, just like Saddam…

http://furl.net/item.jsp?id=7437761

Remember, War is a Racket…

I just see it as something we can’t do much about at this point. We can write about it and express our unhappiness, but ultimately Bush doesn’t pay much attention to dissenting viewpoints (particularly on blogs) and he’s going to do whatever he wants to do…same as he generally has since he became president. He bothers me too, but all we can really do is wait out the storm.

I’m just not very comfortable. I don’t want a parliamentary system, but this is one of those times where I would like to vote “no confidence” and be done with it. He was so unbelievably wrong on the biggest decisions he faced. I just can’t trust him on anything. 15 months is a long f@#$ing time.

During Iraq our position was not yet solidified in western Afghanistan. Ismail Khan still controlled Herat, he had the largest army in the country, he didn’t like us and he kept us out of his region. That changed in 2004 and we now have a sizeable military presence directly on Iran’s eastern border, so we don’t necessarily need three carrier groups. So if we see a second (or third) carrier group steam into the Persian Gulf it’s probably time to get nervous. But not until then…I just don’t see it happening at this point unless Bush has just gone completely off the rails mentally.

The airbases in Iraq would be problematic because the Iraqi government would certainly be opposed (since most of the leadership has close ties to SCIRI). Iran would also likely consider it an act of war by Iraq, so it’s not going to happen…same with our airbases in Kuwait, the Kuwaitis don’t want to provoke a war with Iran when they’re so geographically close. Turkey, Saudi Arabia, and pretty much every other nation in the Gulf would have to grant us flyover rights for us to attack from Europe. The airbases in Afghanistan and the central Asian republics would be similarly problematic (especially since Afghanistan has trade relations with Iran). The only way it would be feasible is by carrier group and you’d probably need two to pull it off (because of the probable Iranian counterstrike). So until the U.S. moves a second carrier group there, it’s probably unlikely that we’ll attack.

There’s always the nuclear first-strike option, of course, but I’d like to think that the Joint Chiefs would threaten to resign if it came to that…and I don’t think Gates would approve either. He’s from the realist school of foreign relations and he’s never been reported to have a good repoir with Bush, Jr. Plus, the Soviet Union has already explicitly told the U.S. not to consider a war with Iran. I think that Bush and Cheney would love to do it, but I don’t think the repercussions are going to allow them to. So it’s all about watching the carrier groups.

Even two carrier groups is probably just a threat, not evidence of an attack.

During Iraq and Afghanistan there were at least three, and I think at one point for, carrier battle groups within striking range.