THERE ARE SOME PROBLEMS BESIDES THE ECONOMY – AT 7:08 P.M. ET:  Iran will loom larger and larger as the months progress and the country's nuclear sophistication increases.  Even a former UN inspector is going public with his concerns:

(Reuters) - Iran has stockpiled enough low-enriched uranium for 1-2 nuclear arms but it would not make sense for it to cross the bomb-making threshold with only this amount, a former top U.N. nuclear official was quoted as saying.

In unusual public remarks about Iran's disputed nuclear programme Olli Heinonen, the former chief of U.N. nuclear inspections worldwide, told Le Monde newspaper that Iran's uranium reserve still represented a "threat."

Until he stepped down earlier this month for personal reasons, Heinonen was deputy director-general of the International Atomic Energy Agency and head of its nuclear safeguards department, which verifies that countries' nuclear programmes are not being diverted for military use.

A no-nonsense Finn, he was one of the U.N. agency's leading experts on Iran, which denies Western suspicions that its nuclear programme is aimed at making bombs despite intelligence indications to the contrary, which he investigated for years.

In the interview published on Thursday, Heinonen said the Islamic Republic now possessed three tonnes of low-enriched uranium, material which can be used to fuel nuclear power plants, or form the core of a bomb if refined much further.

COMMENT:  Remember the 2007 U.S. report that said Iran had given up its weapons program?  Remember all those cheery estimates that it couldn't have the bomb until, say, 2015?  Apparently, revision is in order.

We have made no progress with Iran.  Think where they might be a year from now.

August 26, 2010