The "new" war plan that Bush announced is based on recommendations by retired army general Jack Keane and Frederick W. Kagan of the American Enterprise Institute. Kagan is a neocon. So instead of listening to his generals, Bush is following the recommendations of a neocon. And you say the necons are no longer influential? Has Cheney, who is the one who really calls the shots, fired his neocon chief of staff David Addington?

Saying that Roberts is crazy in his own field of expertise is going too far. He is a very vocal critic of neoliberalism, although I don't believe he uses that term.

I don't see why you have to be so touchy about perceived implications of "moral equivalence". I was considering Hitler purely as a military strategist—not bringing up his moral qualities—because I think that is the best analogy. We are talking about disastrous overreach here.

When it comes to your smug confidence that the US would "roll right over Iran", you sound like you are in lala land. The US choosing "to implement even a fraction of the mobilization of its resources that Germany did in 1941" is a hypothetical that is completely irrelevant to any realistic discussion. If the US has proven incapable of mobilizing adequately to subdue Iraq, why should one suppose that it would be able to do so in the case of Iran, a much more formidable opponent? The US is involved in two very real wars, and yet is completely incapable of restructuring its military to divert its resources to where they are needed for fighting such wars, because the main purpose of the military is still to provide profits to defense contractors, by buying extremely expensive but useless high-tech weaponry.

It appears that you are both a proud enthusiast of the American empire, and in denial about its decline.

A bomb, H bomb, Minuteman / The names get more attractive / The decisions are made by NATO / The press call it British opinion -- The Three Johns