Bling Bling in the ATL

Its feeling a bit like the run-up to the Iraq war, with journalists and foreign diplomats leaking all over the place, telling us its war. Going through the motions of UN diplomacy, blowing up fears about missiles and nukes in Iran... I think we're going to war again. Certainly we can't expect that the Bush administration has learned anything from their mistakes in Iraq and Afghanistan. If theres one thing I've learned in 5 years, its that GWB will never fail to kick it up a notch and astonish with the destructive audacity of his bad ideas.

From the New Yorker:

One former defense official, who still deals with sensitive issues for the Bush Administration, told me that the military planning was premised on a belief that “a sustained bombing campaign in Iran will humiliate the religious leadership and lead the public to rise up and overthrow the government.” He added, “I was shocked when I heard it, and asked myself, ‘What are they smoking?’ ”

and this...

Speaking of President Bush, the House member said, “The most worrisome thing is that this guy has a messianic vision.”

Its not all scaremongering about Madman-In-Chief, although there is an extensive section on how the white house refuses to rule out the 'nuclear' option, and why, in the absence of intelligence (gee, ex covert spy Valerie Plame and company would come in handy right about now) they might need nukes. The rest of the article is pretty informative - tactical discussions with pentagon folks, regional politics, etc. Good article, peppered with testimonies like this from various well placed sources.

And if you're not all that interested in Iran, I'd recommend a read just for the fact that it'll get you good and pissed off. If you're anything like me, theres nothing like a maddening news article. And, according to Seed magazine, theres a good chance you, too, use the news for anger management...

"According to a separate study published in Human Communications Research, people intentionally seek out certain types of news stories in order to enter or sustain a certain emotional state, thereby using media's effects for their own purposes.

"There has been a lot of research about how people use the media to optimize their mood," said Silvia Knobloch-Westerwick, a co-author of the paper and assistant professor of communications at The Ohio State University. "Our idea was that often times you're not just trying to optimize your mood, you're trying to adjust it in preparation for anticipated situations."

More here. Fun stuff. I had no idea that the discipline of Political Psychology even existed. Maybe I should get a PhD in it.