Willya WORK with us here, already?!

Shorter Robert Gates:

"Goddamnit, give us a reason to BOMB your asses already!

MANAMA, Bahrain (CNN) -- U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates has called on the international community to step up pressure on Iran to vow not to develop nuclear weapons, suspend uranium enrichment and open up its nuclear facilities for inspection.

Gates' address to a Gulf states' security conference Saturday came a day after Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told reporters at a NATO meeting in Belgium that the United States will continue to push for a new U.N. resolution to pressure Iran to halt its nuclear program.

That's right, halt the nuclear program that has NOTHING to do with nuclear weapons, hasn't had anything to do with weapons since 2003, and possibly has had nothing to do with them period. But hey, it's got the word "nuclear" in it, so it's SCARY!

Gates sarcastically noted that Iran celebrated the U.S. intelligence community's recent report -- the National Intelligence Estimate -- that said Iran suspended its nuclear weapons program in 2003. He said it marks a "watershed" that "Iran has, for the first time, embraced as valid an assessment of the United States intelligence community -- on Iran's nuclear weapons program."

He said "since that government now acknowledges the quality of American intelligence assessments, I assume that it also will embrace as valid American intelligence assessments" that Iran is funding and training of militia groups in Iraq; deploying lethal weapons and technology to both Iraq and Afghanistan; supporting terrorist organizations -- like Hezbollah and Hamas -- that have murdered thousands of innocent civilians; and continued research and development of medium-range ballistic missiles that can carry weapons of mass destruction.

"In reality, you cannot pick and choose only the conclusions you like of this National Intelligence Estimate," Gates said.

Why the hell not? It's the kind of thing Bush has pioneered over the last seven years.

Meanwhile, over in Land Of A Thousand Dunces, "Insanity and Colmes" has Yosemite Bolton on to discuss the NIE (ooh, now THERE'S an impartial source!) and, mirable dictu, he says "DO NOT WANT":

BOLTON: Well, I think it would be, really, assuming the president was colossally foolish, if he really knew what this was going to say, to be saying things like about World War III. I think he was as blindsided by this report as many members of Congress who were briefed by the intelligence community last week and not told about this so-called suspension.

"assuming the president was colossally foolish"? Lord knows you couldn't do THAT.


HANNITY: One of the things that really stuck out and what you were writing here, talking about the mullahs in Iran. And you talk about it twice in the piece.

And that is that we have a problem interpreting what they are about and what their intentions really are, and you also say what their motives and objectives are.

BOLTON: That to me is the worst part of this intelligence estimate. They, they — It is policy masquerading as intelligence analysis, because they conclude if we just had more diplomatic engagement with the mullahs we would affect their behavior. There's no basis for that.

Ah, well! Negotiations can't POSSIBLY work; therefore the military option is the only one we can take! Heads we win, tails they lose! Whee!

And I see "Dr." Bolton has finally gotten that degree in nuclear physics:

BOLTON: To either get fuel to power reactors or to have nuclear weapons, you need enriched uranium. Different levels, but you need to enrich uranium. So every intelligence analyst would tell you, the long pole in the tent, in assessing how long it takes to get weapons, is enriching uranium...

HANNITY: And if they have that...

BOLTON: They're still doing it, building up an inventory.

Mind you, of course, there's a slight difference between enriching uranium to use in power production and to use in weapons. Power generation requires purity of (I believe) around 3%, which the Iranians claim to have achieved; weapons require around 98% purity, which they're still years away from. But hey, enrichment is enrichment, so bombs away!