White House declares Iran war 'over,' can't say when it stopped striking Iran.

…(cont) On August 31st — I have this because somebody printed it — the president told a reporter, after Iran and the United States traded strikes, "We're going to hit them hard. There will be a response." That's a promise of more, not less.

Three weeks later, in Iowa, two members of Congress from his own party were on record saying the war was squeezing their farmers at the pump. That's a different kind of cost, paid at the register, not read about.

On September 26th, the president confirmed, himself, that he had turned down a peace proposal from Iran. "They made a proposal, but I rejected it," he said. I wrote that one down twice because I didn't believe it the first time, and the second time it looked the same.

On October 23rd, in Florida, he was asked about a possible strike that weekend. He said he didn't know anything about it. Then he got on stage and said there might be "another little epic fury." I don't know what that means exactly. I know it's not "no."

On October 28th, in Lubbock, Texas, he told a crowd, "You'll see Iran in a couple of weeks, if you don't mind." That's a date, more or less. Not a secret one.

Somewhere in that same stretch, the price tag on the whole operation kept moving. The Congressional Budget Office had it near forty billion. The Pentagon's own figure, separately, was forty-two billion as of August. By October 28th — the Lubbock night — the Pentagon's own figure had gone to forty-seven billion. Nobody itemized what moved.

Then came the vote itself. The night before Americans went to the polls, the United States struck Qeshm Island. The Pentagon called it defensive.

And by the day after, reporters had found something: the White House had kept striking Iran for weeks without reporting it. So how many of those weeks show up anywhere in a transcript from the podium?

Which is the part I keep circling, the way you circle a lot looking for a space you know is there. Because somewhere in the last several weeks, in public, the president said the war had ended. That's not my phrase — that's the phrase on the page I can't find, that everyone else seems to have a copy of.

Iran's not treating it as ended either. Their negotiators called the American response to the latest proposal "not convincing," the same week Tehran's own officials were reportedly stalling, hoping the midterms would cost the president a win before any settlement. In Tehran, clerics and officials have started making the case, out loud, for a bomb the country had pledged, years back, not to build. That's reporting, this week, on people saying it.

Here's my demonstration, and then I'll let you go. You know the toll plaza, the light that turns green and says PAID. Mine does, each time. Then the statement comes three weeks later with charges on days I don't remember driving — tolls I paid, that the system is also still running a meter on. Both things are true about the same four seconds at the gate.

The car needs a fan belt, my cigar's gone out twice writing this, and none of that is the point.

Excuse me — before you go. I still haven't found the itemized part of that dry-cleaning receipt, the part between drop-off and the PAID stamp. I'm asking: is the war over?