How to Cover the Iran "Crisis"--Hint: Not Like Iraq

The drumbeat regarding Iran is so familiar--the threats from our side eliciting bluster and deception from the other side, or is it the other way around? And, on the sidelines, in the shadows, emigre groups feeding "intelligence" into the machine. Journalists don't have the elaborate Lessons Learned infrastructure of the military (and what good that does!), but here's a simple key to covering the Iran crisis as it continues to build: follow and question the words "no doubt" whenever an Administration official says them. Google if you will the words "no doubt" and "Cheney", and see what should have been the template for the Democrats' offensive against the pre-Iraq war buildup: Cheney publicly stating repeatedly that there was "no doubt" about things we now know, and some of us knew then (Andrew Willkie, Dr. Brian Jones, Greg Thielmann--Google them, too) there was plenty of doubt about. So when Condi Rice says today:
"But there's no doubt in my mind, that if the Iranians continue down this course, there has to be some course of action by the Security Council." ,
keep a clock on it. When other administration officials profess a lack of doubt, ask your intel friends whether there is any doubt. If they say yes, print it this time.