As early as next week, the House may vote on an Iran War resolution, H. CON. RES. 362, titled, “Expressing the sense of Congress regarding the threat posed to international peace, stability in the Middle East, and the vital national security interests of the United States by Iran’s pursuit of nuclear weapons and regional hegemony, and for other purposes.”
The text includes this disturbing item:
Whereas the November 2007 National Intelligence Estimate reported that Iran was secretly working on the design and manufacture of a nuclear warhead until at least 2003, but that Iran could have enough highly enriched uranium for a nuclear weapon as soon as late 2009;
Now, I remembering hearing that the NIE re Iran’s nuclear program pretty much made plain that there was NO threat from Iran on a nuclear level. So what is the truth here?
Compare the statement in the resolution above to the statement in the actual NIE:
We judge with moderate confidence that the earliest possible date Iran would be technically capable of producing enough HEU for a weapon is late 2009, but that this is very unlikely.
The statement in the resolution is not technically a lie, but it completely misrepresents the NIE statement.
Isn’t there one mainstream journalist curious enough to look inside a resolution to find out what it actually says? It’s not even a long one. And the NIE is only 9 pages, five of which are intro re NIEs. Seriously. What has happened to journalism in this country???