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Michael Gerson: Iran, not economy, is next biggest challenge

A specter is haunting the presidential race - and it is not just the economy. It is the specter of a nuclear Iran.

Economic downturns are wrenching, but eventually cyclical. Nuclear proliferation is more difficult to reverse, creating the permanent prospect of massive miscalculation and tragedy. America's next leader may be known to history as the president who had to deal with Iran.

This topic received glancing attention in the second presidential debate. Barack Obama called a nuclear Iran "unacceptable." John McCain said this would raise the prospect of "a second Holocaust." But neither man seriously confronted the choices ahead.

Days earlier, at an event at the Nixon Center, the former chief weapons inspector for the United Nations, David Kay, delivered a bleak assessment of Iranian capabilities and intentions. The Iranian regime, he argues, is about 80 percent of the way toward its nuclear goals - perhaps two to four years from "effective, deployable weapons   Read Full Article...