It's just too obvious. This administration always zeroes in on something that supports their military ambitions and then gets tunnel vision.

Remember Iraq? Chalabi? The twisted informant who helped draw the inside plans of the moving vans full of WMDs? We all know now there was little effort to find anyone to rebutt the liars and foxes who were feeding Cheney & Rumsfeld falsehoods in order to win favor, political power, or money.

Now it seems the "we must attack Iran" build-up centered around this laptop.

The discovery led officials to revisit intelligence mined in 2004 and 2005 from the laptop obtained from the Iranian engineer. The documents on that laptop described two programs, termed L-101 and L-102 by the Iranians, describing designs and computer simulations that appeared to be related to weapons work. http://www.nytimes.com/2007/12/06/world/middleeast/06intel.html?_r=1&pag...

Appeared to be?

Information from the laptop became one of the chief pieces of evidence cited in the 2005 intelligence estimate that concluded, “Iran currently is determined to develop nuclear weapons.”

You would think after the last fiasco, the intelligence community would be wary of trusting one source. It's hard to have faith that these guys and gals spent much time trying to debunk the evidence found on the laptop, though some wise agents might not have drunk the Kool-aid.

"Several news organizations have reported that the reversal was prompted in part by intercepts of conversations involving Iranian officials. In an article published on Wednesday, The Los Angeles Times said another main ingredient in the reversal was what it called a journal from an Iranian source that documented decisions to shut down the nuclear program."

But why did it take them so long to realize the laptop and reality just weren't jibing?

One thing is clear about the intelligence we're getting. It is too dependent on spectacular "finds" like the laptop or maps and journals etc. These can be as fake as old pirate treasure maps. It is also dependent on informants. A term that can include people who gave information in order to get money or prisoners who were tortured to the point where they'd admit anything.

What ever happened to CIA agents who were gathering information in the theater of action. Double agents. Spies that spoke the langauge and knew the culture of the enemy. Operatives that could infltrate the enemy's highest ranks.

I haven't heard of one single agent of ours who has infiltrated Al Queda. Somehow I don't think that's because our spy agencies are leakproof. Remember Valerie Plame? Surely some retired old agent would choose to write something about being a double agent. Surely one or two of our covert agents (if we had them) would have been caught by Iran over the years.

It sounds like all we're getting is second hand information from informants or what's contained in confiscated laptops. Not very good sources it turns out.

We need spy boots on the ground. We need intelligent, clever, sophisticated agents who can infiltrate. Where, oh where, is James Bond when we need him?