1) Iran has a covert, underground nuclear enrichment facility, yet knowing this — as the United States apparently has for years — Obama has continued to insist that Iran might have a legitimate need for nuclear power (“Without going into specifics,” Obama said this summer, “what I do believe is that Iran has legitimate energy concerns, legitimate aspirations.”). 2) Iran discovered we were monitoring the facility on Obama’s watch. How did this happen? 3) Obama’s staff notes “They have cheated three times…And they have now been caught three times.” They are so enthralled by their own purported omniscience that they can’t appreciate the fact that Iran is no doubt breaking the rules and not getting caught at least some of the time. I wonder when we will get a new NIE on Iran, given that some (though not all) elements of the administration cling to its conclusions as if they were based on the latest and greatest intelligence on Iran. The report is more than two years old, but if you ask Dennis Blair whether Iran has a nuclear weapons program he will point to that document and say that the IC consensus is no. 4) NBC also reports that “the site is 30 kilometers outside of Qum, Iran’s holy city.” Jennifer Rubin quotes an aide on the Hill: “Apparently, the Iranians forced their hand with the letter earlier in the week to the IAEA–but if Obama knew this for months and did not act with urgency, this is a major debacle.” Of course it’s obvious Obama hasn’t acted with urgency, which is why members of Congress are going to be compelled to push even harder for sanctions. The statement from Cantor:
And another from Mark Kirk:
You have to think leading Dems like Lieberman and Berman will be out with pretty strong statements later today.
