Reporting on Iran by the numbers.

Imagine the mayor of your city or town calls a live press conference to announce a costly program to exterminate all the sewer crocodiles that live in the cities sewer system as per that old urban legend.  With budgets running very tight in this tough economy, with vital services being drastically cut back all throughout city government, the Mayor announces that he is setting aside several million dollars to exterminate crocodiles in the city sewer system that don't exist and never have.

Now imagine, that instead of running a headline the next day like "Unbalanced Mayor calls for war on crocs that don't exist" the most trusted city newspaper of record runs one that reads "Mayor calls for war on sewer crocs" and not once in the whole story is it even hinted that this Mayor's claims are baseless, absurd, and not to mention insane. 

That, almost without exaggeration, describes nearly all reporting on Iran and the "nuclear" issue in the United States.  Our Federal government makes not only wholly unsubstantiated claims about Iran's nuclear program but ones that are contradicted by ample available evidence (even some of it coming from the federal government itself!) and our press repeats these claims with nary a challenge as to their veracity.

Just about every single newspaper wire story on Iran and the nuclear issue is a veritable garden of lies of omission, purposeful misrepresentations, and unsubstantiated allegations ripe to be impeached but left unchallenged in any meaningful way.  These stories are so far removed from any sort of minimal journalistic ethics or standards that they may as well be written by the Pentagon.

And so it is with this AP News story from yesterday which is unextraordinary in the scope of its lies. 

First however, there is an unintentional extra dimension to these stories that exposes just how insanely narcissistic our culture has become.  Besides their contemptible failure to challenge anything said by the government or military whatsoever (a government and military that has lied repeatedly, flagrantly, and deliberately about foreign policy for years) these stories convey a political and military elite almost pathologically incapable of even minimal human empathy toward those whom they perceive to be their enemies.

Take this quote from Mike Mullen, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, on the consequences of a first strike on Iran:

"I worry a great deal about the response of a country that gets struck," said Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. "It is a really important place to not go, if we can not go there in any way, shape or form."

He worries?  What does he worry about?  Is he actually worried that if the United States bombs Iran in an unprovoked first strike act of aggression against the quite legal advanced scientific facilities that are the pride of the Iranian people regardless of political affiliation that Iran might defend itself and retaliate in some form?  He is "worried" about this?  What lies beneath this frightening "worry" about Iranian retaliation that any normal person would assume as a matter course?  What is behind this emotional retardation among our elite?  The ideology of American exceptionalism.  Any other country wouldn't "worry" about being hit back by a country they attacked unprovoked- they would assume it.  But Admiral Mullen is so steeped in the narcissistic cult of American exceptionalism - that holds all actions of the United States to be pure of heart and of noble intention that he has trouble even imagining a country the US bombs even getting mad enough at us to strike back- since we are so good and all- and just acting out of pure goodness.  Does the admiral believe that?  Maybe, maybe not- but he surely knows most Americans believe in it.

It is a "really important place" not to go- striking a country in an unprovoked act of first strike aggression- since they may, for some weird reason- actually want to strike us back?  Breathtaking.

The next paragraphs of this "news article" sets the false premise for the rest of the story, that Iran desires to obtain a nuclear bomb. 

Iran is perhaps one to three years away from getting the bomb, leaving a small and shrinking opening for diplomacy to avert what he said could be a dangerous nuclear arms race in the Middle East, Mullen said.

"I think the time window is closing."

Mullen said President Barack Obama's diplomatic outreach to Iran holds promise, despite political upheaval and deadly protests following Iran's disputed presidential election.

Obama told The Associated Press last week that persuading Iran to forgo nuclear weapons has been made more difficult by the Iranian government's handling of claims that President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad stole re-election.

Now, there is no evidence for the claim that Iran is one to three years away from getting a bomb.  None.  Mullen has not a shred.  In fact, all available evidence suggests that Iran doesn't have a nuclear weapons program at all.  Among this evidence which includes every IAEA inspection report, is also the US government's own CIA which said flat out that Iran does not have a nuclear weapons program back in 2006 (which all Presidential candidates never acknowledged and simply went on pretending Iran's nuclear weapon program was an established fact and our media allowed them to do so wholly unchallenged).

Is the admiral challenged in his statement?  Of course not.  He could say the sky in Iran is made of cream cheese and our press would pass it along as fact.

And it isn't like Iranian leaders are running around loudly proclaiming their desire to get nuclear weapons.  They are not meally mouthed in their denials which can't get any more clear or emphatic than a fatwa issued against them by their Supreme Leader.

This fine example of American stenography masquerading as journalism then tells us that Obama's attempts to persuade Iran to forgo its nuclear weapon program are made harder by the recent election violence and political crackdown in Iran.  Yes.  It is hard to persuade someone to give up something for which you have no evidence they are engaging in and that they deny doing in the first place.  But no matter.  This "news" story can't be bothered with actually telling us that Obama's assumptions of an Iranian nuclear weapon program are wholly baseless.  This is a lie of omission so gaping as to be a purposeful and deliberate lie.  What little evidence they have of an Iranian nuclear weapon program, on the rare occasion when a high US official making these claims against Iran is asked to produce any, is itself in hot dispute as to its veracity and origins.

Imagine yourself in Iran's position.  You have a legal nuclear research program, supposedly guaranteed under international treaty, being called a nuclear weapons program by the most powerful country in the world which has no evidence that it is such whatsoever- but this doesn't stop ALL of its major politicians from talking like this program is established fact.  And this is the starting off point from which Iran is expected to engage in talks with the US?  No matter how many IAEA reports come out saying Iran's program is not a bomb making program, no matter ow many leaks from within the US government's own intelligence services that say Iran doesn't have such a weapons program- US leaders talk (and their media passes along unchallenged) as if this program is established fact.  And Iran is supposed to come to the table with such people? 

This is what we call "bad faith" folks.  The US doesn't want to engage Iran in talks at all.  For Iran to even sit down with the US it has to admit to doing what it says it isn't doing, and for which all evidence suggests they are not doing.  Why does the US oligarchy and its media do this?  Because they are acting in bad faith and don't want "talks" with Iran.  They don't even actually care if Iran has a nuke weapons program or not when it comes right down to it.  They just want a reason to keep hostility with Iran at a low boil, like they did with Iraq for a decade over WMDS Saddam Hussein got rid of in the early 90's- (and that they KNEW he got rid of by the way), until the political climate is ripe for war with Iran.  If it takes a decade, it takes a decade.  Thus the bogus assumption of an Iranian nuclear weapon program among all of our powerhouse political cast and mainstream media.

There is quite literally nothing Iran's current government or even future "reform" government can do to mollify or appease the United States short of resigning their posts, inviting in US military forces to occupy their country and install a puppet government, and delivering themselves to CIA custody in Guantanamo Bay. 

Iran passes an IAEA inspection- yet again?  Our media concentrates on a tiny quibble on old documents and holds that up as evidence of Iranian "intransigence".  Iran agrees to protocols not even required by the Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaty?  They are not good enough and followed up with even more absurd demands and then when these voluntary inspection protocols are then dropped- that is seized upon as more "evidence" of Iranian duplicity by our government and media and actually used to get illegal sanctions put upon them!  Yes, Iran's failure to continue a voluntary extra inspection routine not required under treaty or any agreement was used by the United States to get sanctions put on Iran! 

And Iran is expected to engage in "talks" with such a government?  Iran is expected to engage in talks with a country that has a press that does nothing more than pass along unsubstantiated allegations against it day in and day out?

In fairness, I should leave you with what the AP considers "balance" in one of these stories on Iran.  The very last paragraph we get this:

Iran claims its fast-track nuclear development project is intended only for the peaceful production of electricity.

But they can't even let that one rote Iranian denial stand alone, as if Iran's government were the only authority disputing US allegations and there existed no evidence that the US charges were false.  They feel the nervous need to add on this as the final sentence:

Mullen, like other U.S. officials, said he is sure Iran intends to develop weapons and is working hard and fast to do so.

That is the journalistic equivalent of a tell.