Fool them twice...

For reasons not apparent, U.S. Democratic Senators are asking the Bush administration to serve up a new batch of thoroughly-cooked intelligence on Iran:

Five Democrats, headed by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada, wrote to Bush requesting a new National Intelligence Estimate, or NIE, while the United States is involved in an international diplomatic effort to get Iran to curb its nuclear ambitions.

The Democrats want an NIE, the intelligence community's most authoritative written judgment, to address several points including Iran's nuclear program and its military and defense capabilities.

Now, an NIE would surely be a rather useful tool if there was any reason to think it would be even remotely believable. But based on the indications that Bush has done nothing but further politicize U.S. intelligence in the time since the Iraq intelligence fiasco, there's no reason to think that a new NIE will be worth the paper it's printed on. And by suggesting the process, Reid and company are simply inviting Bushco to strongarm the U.S. into yet another ill-founded war.