“I just think that’s just dead wrong. I think the biggest threat the United States faces today is the possibility of another 9/11 with a nuclear weapon or a biological agent of some kind. And I think al Qaeda is out there — even as we meet — trying to do that. You have to consider it as a war. You have to consider it as something we may have to deal with tomorrow. You don’t want the vice president of the United States running around saying, ‘Oh, it’s not likely going to happen.’”

The Daily Telegraph was right to name Cheney America’s most influential conservative in its recent ranking of the top 100. He was the first opposition figure of weight to seriously dent Barack Obama on national security issues when he unleashed a ferocious attack on the president’s policies last May in a major speech at The American Enterprise Institute. The speech was significant, because it sparked a largely successful counter-offensive against the Obama administration’s weak-kneed counter-terror strategy and dominated media coverage just after Obama gave a far less impressive address on the same issue across town at The National Archives.

via Dick Cheney – Obama’s worst nightmare – Telegraph Blogs.

Iranian laws about the Web are purposely kept vague. Ahmed Batebi, the dissident who recently escaped Tehran after eight years in prison, told me that “The regime can arrest people and bloggers for any reason precisely because the laws are not clear.”

A journalist in the city of Yazd recently reported several cases of bloggers being shut down or involved in lawsuits due to readers’ comments. And on Nov. 14, local Iranian press reported that a new police unit was formed to fight “insults and the spreading of lies” on the Internet—another phrase which effectively bans any criticism of the regime.

It’s hard to believe in light of this Internet repression, but Iran’s president is himself a blogger. “Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s Personal Memos” is the place where he goes to vent and stay in touch with the common folk. He says he allots himself 15 minutes a week to write on his blog, but admits that at times he exceeds this limit.

via David Keyes: Ahmadinejad, the Blogger – WSJ.com.