Pardon my bitternes

Don't get me wrong. I am glad ole' Saddam has moved down in the world. I am happy at how photogenic his sons actually are.

So I am happy the US went to war against Iraq. But I have no illusion as to why it did. In this article, the BBC goes into some detail about the workings and background of Bechtel, perhaps the worlds largest construction company.
Bechtel is also a major player in "The Secret War Against the Jews". And they are not on the side of the Good Guys. Bechtel is on the side of the money. And where's the money?

Bechtel estimates the cost of bringing the power system alone up to Middle East standards at $15bn - higher than the UN estimate of $12bn.

US$ 15bn. 15.000.000.000 US dollar. And that's just "bringing the power system up to Middle East standards", whatever that may be.

Just about everything ever built larger than a garden shed in Saudi Arabia was built by Bechtel. Same for the other oil kingdoms around the Gulf.

Bechtel will do whatever it takes to aquire assignments from the Arabs. And the Arabs aren't that fussy. All you have to do is be a proven Jew-hater.
So how does Bechtels belligerence towards Israel become relevant (after all, it's only a construction company, albeit the biggest one on earth)? Enter the revolving door between the US State department and US heavy industry. The borders between US foreign policy and US commercial interests are hazy at best. State Department employees change jobs back and forth between companies like Bechtel, Aramco, Halliburton. The interests of these people do not change with their employment. There is nothing to gain by being even neutral towards (let alone biased in favour of) Israel. There is everything to be gained by being an enemy of Israel. It pays. Big time.

Am I now part of the conspiracy crowd? I guess in one sense I always was: Since the 1920's, oil and the development of the Arab world that was enabled by it has ruled world politics. All other interests pale by comparison. And the owners of the oil are the deadliest enemies the Jews have.

When you bring things down to their essentials, it is not so hard to see why things happen. Especially if those things meticulously follow a pattern.

And David Frum asks:

WHERE WAS IRAN?

Lovely speech by the president to the UN – but a question. What happened to the Iran paragraph? Just three days ago, the Iranian government formally defied the International Atomic Energy Authority. Breaking promises made as recently as October 2003, Iran will continue to move to enrich uranium – a process that can only be intended for weapons.

By its own rules, the IAEA is now bound to lay the problem before the Security Council. It is perfectly possible of course that the IAEA may shrug the matter off. But to give the agency its due, current director Muhammad el Baradei seems made of tougher stuff than his Swedish predecessor, Hans Blix. But whether el Baradei does his duty or not, this problem will be arriving at the Security Council very shortly.

Please read.

Again: Nuclear Iran

In Iranian Tales, Michael Ledeen sheds a bit more light on Iranian society. I don't need more convincing that the only nukes Iran should have should be detonated over Tehran and Busher at ground zero, but here is some extra evidence anyway:

When people ask me why the Iranian people so hate the regime, I begin telling them stories like these, because no list of adjectives, no amount of statistics on social misery, child prostitution, unemployment, corruption of the elite, or drug addiction can convey the horror of this murderous tyranny. If a mullah is caught committing an act that would automatically lead to the death penalty for an ordinary citizen, the problem is "fixed" by a sex-change operation on his partner. But even the son of a counselor to the president can be "vanished" without any accountability.

Can you imagine these creatures with atomic bombs? And yet the U.N. issues yet another "deadline" for the end of November, the European Union preens itself on its avoidance of conflict, even with evil, the president speaks bravely but does nothing to support freedom in Iran, and his challenger lets it be known that, if elected, he will offer the mullahs the same misguided nuclear deal that has already failed in North Korea.

And the "stories like these" are fun reading. Just keep in mind that what Iran has in store for the world in general, and Israel in particular, is not fun.