Earlier today, in one of my rare moments of lucidity, tucked somewhere in the confines of the comments over on Goblin Queen, I wrote, "[T]here comes a point where one cannot support a war one would otherwise support, because the heads of state leading the war and the reconstruction are shady, unscrupulous fuck-wits who have not articulated solid reasons for a war that one should have no problem making a case for, and who have shown an inability to stick with situations long enough to make winning a war any better than not fighting it at all right now." It's certainly kind of cheeky to quote yourself, I know, but I was feeling as though I over-stated my case a bit -- you know, that maybe "fuck-wit" was going a bit too far; or that "unscrupulous" was maybe unfounded. These were my thoughts as I ate my toasted cheese and soup, until I read that many of the UN inspectors feel the exact same way! You remember them, don't you, those inept do-gooders who can't find the nuclear weapons and what-not that the U.S. continually insists is there and, occasionally, even goes out of its way to kindly point out. What're they up to these days, you think?

U.N. sources have told CBS News that American tips have lead to one dead end after another.

Example: satellite photographs purporting to show new research buildings at Iraqi nuclear sites. When the U.N. went into the new buildings they found "nothing."

Example: Saddam's presidential palaces, where the inspectors went with specific coordinates supplied by the U.S. on where to look for incriminating evidence. Again, they found "nothing."

Example: Interviews with scientists about the aluminum tubes the U.S. says Iraq has imported for enriching uranium, but which the Iraqis say are for making rockets. Given the size and specification of the tubes, the U.N. calls the "Iraqi alibi air tight."

[. . .]

So frustrated have the inspectors become that one source has referred to the U.S. intelligence they've been getting as "garbage after garbage after garbage." In fact, Phillips [the reporter] says the source used another cruder word. [ed. Fuckwit?] The inspectors find themselves caught between the Iraqis, who are masters at the weapons-hiding shell game, and the United States, whose intelligence they've found to be circumstantial, outdated or just plain wrong.

This is, of course, proof that inspections (versus, say, U.S. intelligence) are ineffective, and, because they're so ineffective, provide, in their own special kind of way, as clear a warrant for war as one could possibly need. *Sigh*

(Via Atrios)