Like I don't know about this, Matt. Well, I do. These people are desperadoes. Get it? They will do any fucking thing that will keep their ass out of the gaol. Get it?

It's already started (the constitutional part, that is):

The United States is a signatory to and has duly ratified the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations and the Convention on Consular Relations. Though, the people in diplomatic hot water right now are the Iraqis - for not protecting the "inviolabilty of the consular premisies". As far as I can tell, these treaties are also in force for Iraq and Iran.

United States Constitution, Article VI

..and all treaties made, or which shall be made, under the authority of the United States, shall be the supreme law of the land...

Treaties in Force
    MULTILATERAL TREATIES AND
    OTHER AGREEMENTS

   DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS
    Vienna convention on diplomatic relations.
    Done at Vienna April 18, 1961; entered into
    force April 24, 1964; for the United States December
    13, 1972.
    23 UST 3227; TIAS 7502; 500 UNTS 95.

   CONSULS
    Convention on consular relations. Done at Vienna
    April 24, 1963; entered into force March
    19, 1967; for the United States December 24,
    1969.
    21 UST 77; TIAS 6820; 596 UNTS 261.

VIENNA CONVENTION ON DIPLOMATIC RELATIONS AND OPTIONAL PROTOCOLS
    DONE AT VIENNA, ON 18 APRIL 1961

   Article 22

      1. The premises of the mission shall be inviolable. The agents of the receiving State may not enter them, except with the consent of the head of the mission.

      2. The receiving State is under a special duty to take all appropriate steps to protect the premises of the mission against any intrusion or damage and to prevent any disturbance of the peace of the mission or impairment of its dignity.

      3. The premises of the mission, their furnishings and other property thereon and the means of transport of the mission shall be immune from search, requisition, attachment or execution.

   Article 24

   The archives and documents of the mission shall be inviolable at any time and wherever they may be.

   Article 29

   The person of a diplomatic agent shall be inviolable. He shall not be liable to any form of arrest or detention. The receiving State shall treat him with due respect and shall take all appropriate steps to prevent any attack on his person, freedom or dignity.

VIENNA CONVENTION ON CONSULAR RELATIONS AND OPTIONAL PROTOCOLS

   DONE AT VIENNA, ON 24 APRIL 1963

   Article 31
                  INVIOLABILITY OF THE CONSULAR PREMISES

      1. Consular premises shall be inviolable to the extent provided in this Article.

      2. The authorities of the receiving State shall not enter that part of the consular premises which is used exclusively for the purpose of the work of the consular post except with the consent of the head of the consular post or of his designee or of the head of the diplomatic mission of the sending State. The consent of the head of the consular post may, however, be assumed in case of fire or other disaster requiring prompt protective action.

      3. Subject to the provisions of paragraph 2 of this Article, the receiving State is under a special duty to take all appropriate steps to protect the consular premises against any intrusion or damage and to prevent any disturbance of the peace of the consular post or impairment of its dignity.

      4. The consular premises, their furnishings, the property of the consular post and its means of transport shall be immune from any form of requisition for purposes of national defence or public utility. If expropriation is necessary for such purposes, all possible steps shall be taken to avoid impeding the performance of consular functions, and prompt, adequate and effective compensation shall be paid to the sending State.

   Article 33
          INVIOLABILITY OF THE CONSULAR ARCHIVES AND DOCUMENTS

   The consular archives and documents shall be inviolable at all times and wherever they may be.

         Article 41
                PERSONAL INVIOLABILITY OF CONSULAR OFFICERS

      1. Consular officers shall not be liable to arrest or detention pending trial, except in the case of a grave crime and pursuant to a decision by the competent judicial authority.

      2. Except in the case specified in paragraph 1 of this Article, consular officers shall not be committed to prison or liable to any other form of restriction on their personal freedom save in execution of a judicial decision of final effect.

      3. If criminal proceedings are instituted against a consular officer, he must appear before the competent authorities. Nevertheless, the proceedings shall be conducted with the respect due to him by reason of his official position and, except in the case specified in paragraph 1 of this Article, in a manner which will hamper the exercise of consular functions as little as possible. When, in the circumstances mentioned in paragraph 1 of this Article, it has become necessary to detain a consular officer, the proceedings against him shall be instituted with the minimum of delay.

Condi may have some 'splainin' to do.

Also posted as a comment on Kos

A case of internet viral fever I suspect.

Bush Jr and Republicans lost Congress. A significant portion of Republicans do not support Bush Jr's Iraq War/Middle East policy. Bush Jr has little public support.  US military has spoken out against Bush Jr via the retired Iraqi commanders.

Bush Jr is not going to be starting any secret wars, the entire power structure has turned against him. His ship is sinking and no one in the Pentagon or CIA is going down with him.

I fail to see how you can assume that Bush and Cheney have suddenly become sane.

Now if your argument had included the fact that any move against Iran will find Israel reeling under a rain of Hezbollah rocket attacks...

You would get my attention.

Junior is liable to do anything...anything at all. Cheney might be restrained by the Saudis; he being a sockpuppet for the folks whom the Saudis partner with here in the U.S. and elsewhere around the world but I wouldn't hold my breath there either.

Just be ready to walk to work when the Straits of Hormuz close.

And...

I wouldn't look to any happy homecoming for troops currently stationed in Iraq.
.

I think we got pretty lucky after the Iran embassy thing.  If I were in charge of Iran and was feeling nervous about American military action against my nation, I would have probably been set off by the embassy situation.  I would have rapidly deployed my standing army to invade Iraq and overrun American forces there.  The trouble is that such an action might work in the short term.

American forces are scattered around the country and somewhat concentrated toward the west, so far as I know.  They are not dug in against the kind of force that Iran would deploy, as they are focused on dealing with insurgents and other irregular fighters.  Also, if given the choice between supporting Americans and Iranians, I think that most of the Shia in the eastern half of the country would side with the Iranians.

American naval forces are stuck in a low-maneuver situation and are highly vulnerable to missile fire and suicide boats.  While the American navy, with its might and competency, may prevail, it would be at a high cost.  Gulf state allies may help the Americans, too.

I think that the Iranians could probably overrun the eastern half of Iraq pretty quickly, and it would be a blood-bath.  American forces are primarily deployed in urban areas, meaning urban warfare with a hostile populace.  American forces would kill more than they would lose, but I think that overwhelming numbers would eventually win out.

I think that it would be a bad long-term strategy for Iran, though, because Arab states would likely throw in with the Americans fearing an even greater ethnic purging of Sunnis.  However, the public opinion of the United States in the region makes this issue somewhat in the air.

I am glad that cooler heads prevailed in Iran.  The embassy action could have been like the Black Hands and the Archduke Ferdinand, escalating a powder keg into a full blown regional war.

"If Bush is escalating our military conflict into Iran and Syria, he and Cheney must be removed from office."
  Bush should have been impeached at least a year ago on continual and repeated FISA violations alone, and there are strong arguments that he should have been impeached prior to that for numerous other reasons. Were he not the U.S. President, and he were prosecuted for his crimes, he'd likely get a record sentence (the FISA violations alone likely would put his maximum sentence well beyond a 1,000 years). There is no "if"; Bush should be impeached.

I am unconvinced that Cheney needs to be impeached. I am unclear as to what crimes he's committed that rise to the level of impeachment.

While I do not hope for a Constitutional crisis, I am not worried about one either. Bush has no reservoir of support; not among the voters, not among the big business, and most important, not in the armed forces.

If he attempted a South-American type coup (I can't believe I'm saying this ) he would just have some diehard Republicans, and some neo-con keyboard jockeys to back him up. In the end, Bush is a uniter with a transformational presidency.

I doubt his motivations, but at this stage a good move from any ally is still a good thing.  While Biden has a long way to go, this is a damned good first step IF he follows through.

We can't be far from impeachment now if the Republicans are testing the waters on throwing Bush under the bus.  

I saw Lindsey Graham jumping on the "fuck Bush" bandwagon today.  That's a bad sign for Bush, because Graham is generally considered the pre-eminent legal scholar among the GOPers.  It's a strong sign that the GOP is laying the legal groundwork for supporting an impeachment, rather than opposing it, should Bush try to take America further into shark-infested waters.

Clark has been warning us about this.  His concern that we were about to go into Iran, posted recently on huffingtonpost, was largely ignored in favor of concentrating on the question of whether he was casting aspersions on New York Jews.

The problem is that Bush, Cheney, and the whole White House seem to be absolutely determined to do this. They have lost a big war, so they need to double down. The biggest issue with any war is that, unless you hold virtually all the cards, the outcome is totally unpredictable. It is far from inconceivable, for example, that Russia and China could be drawn into it. Or that they could simply cease trading with us. The way Congress has responded thus far is just as troubling, as they act as if the administration can be trusted with anything. The US media system has committed collective treason here. This is a very bad scene.

In your statement regarding bush, you state that he has sent secret orders  - and that if true, he and cheney should be removed.

at first reading of your statement i frankly found it odd, to see you say that we as a country should go after both the potus and the veep + however + this is in fact, entirely true.

if we have a president who has to read a teleprompter, to tell us he sent 10,000 men and 4 billion dollars worth of military hardware somewhere then its a point of fact that the president is being strung along

is big dick cheney the puppetmaster?

a woman president would fix this, she's already done wonders with congress.

Iran and or Syria should trigger impeachment proceedings. We have more than enough stuff right now go preemptive on them. Just force them out of office ahead of time for the reasons their own doctrine sets down.

I agree that Iran will not escalate anything, since it is not in their interest to do so.  They are hurting us enough by destabilizing Iraq with their armed and trained militias.  A war with the U.S. will be hard on us, but they will be obliterated and Bush might even go nuclear.

But that does not mean Bush will not attack Iran.  Despite not having much political support, if you beat the drums long and hard enough, a wisp of a smoking gun, such as a few Iranian soldiers being caught fighting American troops amongst the militia, will be enough to garner enough political support for an attack.

That is why we must turn on the PR machine and blast Bush now.  Whatever shreds of support he has must be destroyed, and any efforts to provocate Iran must be exposed before they actually work. Never underestimate these guys.  It may seem like an overreaction, but we must kill this idea of attacking Iran before it grows.

I have a post on how to message this at my site - www.progressivemovement.net.

Cudos to Biden for taking the opening salvo.