Farhad, You need to disaggregate: there is the argument regarding consequences and utility of striking Iran.and there is the sales job offered as rationale for those strikes. I have been very clear and consistent on the former. Here, I express my sense of how this administration may well sell such strikes. You want to distinguish between the two, especially in a republic like the U.S.

Reconstructing the Iraq reconstruction America's debate about bringing our troops home from Iraq is largely consummated -- at least for this presidency. Thanks to Army Gen. David Petraeus' reasonably successful appearances before Congress earlier this month, that rhetorical argument has shifted to the presidential campaign. The actual details of our long-term drawdown will be hashed out within the Pentagon and Central Command as both struggle with the challenges of troop burnout and threatened military strikes against Iran. As for Iraq itself, we collectively enter a strategic space where it's possible to chart real progress across three mini-states surrounding a dysfunctional capital. Now, instead of trying to rebuild Iraq as a unified whole, we face the more manageable challenges of connecting the Kurds, Sunni and Shia -- in that order -- to the global economy. It'll be mostly oil, but at least they've all got some.