Actually, according to the Congressional Investigations by Riegle and Gonzales, the Anthrax was weapons-grade and was in fact used in Saddam's weapons program. SO why were we handing out anthrax to Saddam? Was there a sudden anthrax-shortage?

You said: "As the article states, the Germans and Brits supplied the bulk of his non-Soviet weapons"

 We don't have to have handing him US-made weapons to be guilty of arming him - don't resort to sophistry and denial. When we weren't arming him directly, we financed his purchases & we encouraged others to sell the stuff to him. Read Teicher's affidavit (which incidentally was later sealed by the Reagan administration.)

You said: "but I can understand why we did not want Iran to defeat Iraq."

Considering that IRaq started the war this is a ridiculous statement. So you're saying it was OK to be complicit in mass murder as long as it served our interests? Do other countries get to exercise that excuse too, or just the US?

As for the 2003 peace proposal see Gareth Porter's Burnt Offerings article the The American Prospect:
http://www.prospect.org/web/page.ww?section=root&name=ViewPrint&articleId=11539

Note that Iran has made repeated efforts and compromise offers on the nuclear issue which have been dismissed without any consideration by the US:

"[N]ow we know, thanks to documents posted by the Arms Control Association on its website that contrary to the usual rightwing propaganda, that Iran has no serious intent of negotiating over its nuclear program, Iran has devised at least five proposals which included provisions designed to assure the international community that its nuclear activities are exclusively for peaceful purposes, rather than nuclear weapons (See: http://www.armscontrol.org/factsheets/Iran_Nuclear_Proposals.asp ) " .

And also see this:

Since August 2004, Iran has made eight far-reaching proposals. What's more, Iran throughout this period adopted extensive and costly confidence- building measures, including a voluntary suspension of its rightful enrichment activities for two years, to ensure the success of negotiations.

Over the course of negotiations, Iran volunteered to do the following within a balanced package:

1- Present the new atomic agency protocol on intrusive inspections to the Parliament for ratification, and to continue to put it in place pending ratification;

2- Permit the continuous on-site presence of IAEA inspectors at conversion and enrichment facilities;

3- Introduce legislation to permanently ban the development, stockpiling and use of nuclear weapons;

4- Cooperate on export controls to prevent unauthorized access to nuclear material;

5- Refrain from reprocessing or producing plutonium;

6- Limit the enrichment of nuclear materials so that they are suitable for energy production but not for weaponry;

7- Immediately convert all enriched uranium to fuel rods, thereby precluding the possibility of further enrichment;

8- Limit the enrichment program to meet the contingency fuel requirements of Iran's power reactors and future light-water reactors;

9- Begin putting in place the least contentious aspects of the enrichment program, like research and development, in order to assure the world of our intentions;

10- Accept foreign partners, both public and private, in our uranium enrichment program.

11- Iran has recently suggested the establishment of regional consortiums on fuel-cycle development that would be jointly owned and operated by countries possessing the technology and placed under atomic agency safeguards.

Here's a good summary from American Prospect

In the spring of 2003, the Islamic Republic of Iran not only proposed to negotiate with the Bush administration on its nuclear program and its support for terrorists but also offered concrete concessions that went very far toward meeting U.S. concerns.

[...]

As the United States was beginning its military occupation of Iraq in April, the Iranians were at work on a bold and concrete proposal to negotiate with the United States on the full range of issues in the U.S.-Iran conflict. Iran's then-ambassador to France, Sadegh Kharrazi, the nephew of then-Foreign Minister Kamal Kharrazi, drafted the document, which was approved by the highest authorities in the Iranian system, including the Supreme National Security Council and Supreme Leader Khamenei himself, according to a letter accompanying the document from the Swiss ambassador in Tehran, Tim Guldimann, who served as an intermediary. Parsi says senior Iranian national security officials confirmed in interviews in August 2004 that Khamenei was "directly involved in the document."

The proposal, a copy of which is in the author's possession, offered a dramatic set of specific policy concessions Tehran was prepared to make in the framework of an overall bargain on its nuclear program, its policy toward Israel, and al-Qaeda. It also proposed the establishment of three parallel working groups to negotiate "road maps" on the three main areas of contention -- weapons of mass destruction, "terrorism and regional security," and "economic cooperation."

The document was sent to Washington just in time for a meeting between Iran's U.N. Ambassador Javad Zarif and Khalilzad in Geneva on May 2, 2003. One copy arrived at the State Department by fax, and a second copy was taken to State in person by an American intermediary, according to a source who has discussed the letter with the intermediary.

The proposal offered "decisive action against any terrorists (above all, al-Qaeda) in Iranian territory" and "full cooperation and exchange of all relevant information." It also indicated, however, that Iran wanted from the United States the "pursuit of anti-Iranian terrorists, above all MKO" -- the Iranian acronym for the Mujihedeen e Khalq (MEK), which had fought alongside Iraqi troops in the war against Iran and was on the U.S. list of terrorist organizations -- "and support for repatriation of their members in Iraq" as well as actions against the organization in the United States.

At the May 2 meeting in Geneva, a separate proposal involving exchange of information about al-Qaeda detainees and the MEK was spelled out by Ambassador Zarif. According to Leverett, Zarif informed Khalilzad that Iran would hand over the names of senior al-Qaeda cadres detained in Iran in return for the names of the MEK cadres and troops who had been captured by U.S. forces in Iraq.

To meet the U.S. concern about an Iranian nuclear weapons program, the document offered to accept much tighter controls by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in exchange for "full access to peaceful nuclear technology." It proposed "full transparency for security [assurance] that there are no Iranian endeavors to develop or possess WMD" and "full cooperation with IAEA based on Iranian adoption of all relevant instruments (93+2 and all further IAEA protocols)." That was a reference to new IAEA protocols that would guarantee the IAEA access to any facility, whether declared or undeclared, on short notice -- something Iran had been urged to adopt but was resisting in the hope of getting something in return. The adoption of those protocols would have made it significantly more difficult for Iran to carry on a secret nuclear program without the risk of being caught.

The Iranian proposal also offered a sweeping reorientation of Iranian policy toward Israel. In the past, Iran had attacked those Arab governments that had supported the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, and Tehran had supported armed groups that opposed it. But the document offered "acceptance of the Arab League Beirut declaration (Saudi initiative, two-states approach)." The March 2002 declaration had embraced the land-for-peace principle and a comprehensive peace with Israel in return for Israel's withdrawal to 1967 lines. That position would have aligned Iran's policy with that of the moderate Arab regimes.

The document also offered a "stop of any material support to Palestinian opposition groups (Hamas, Jihad, etc.) from Iranian territory" and "pressure on these organizations to stop violent actions against civilians within borders of 1967." Finally it proposed "action on Hizbollah to become a mere political organization within Lebanon." That package of proposals was a clear bid for removal of Iran from the list of state sponsors of terrorism.

A conservative is a man with two perfectly good legs who, however, has never learned how to walk forward. Franklin D. Roosevelt

Next, remember that the whole reason why they could ship anything to Iraq was because the Reagan Administration REMOVED IRaq from the list of terrorist nations so as to permit these transfers.

Next, remember that it was US funding and political cover that allowd Saddam to obtain these and many more items.

Next, remember that the US covered up for Saddam. In fact remember that according to the National Security Archives declassified documents, Rumsfeld was specifically sent to tell Saddam not to take any official complains about chemical weapons too seriously.

Do some of your own research before jumping to conclusions.

Zahra Kazemi wasn't killed by Hezbollah.
WHich if of course sad but if you're so worried about the death of journalists, perhaps you should consider equally the ones who are shot regularly by the US-armed and financed Israelis (who are armed with REAL nuclear, chemical and biological weapons) or the journalists who were intentionally targetted and bombed by the US during the conflict in Serbia:
http://www.antiwar.com/orig/oneill.php?articleid=8161

IF all you have to say is that the Iranain gov't does bad things, then people in glass houses shouldn't throw stones. After all, who armed and financed the Latin American nun-raping death squads who were responsbile for atrocities such as the massacre at El Mazote, Iran?  (See http://www.hrw.org/reports/pdfs/e/elsalvdr/elsalv923.pdf )

241 US Marines vs. 120,000 Iranians killed as a result of US-backed Iraqi aggression and 298 Iranian CIVILIANS killed when the US Navy shot down an Iranian CIVILIAN airliner INSIDE IRANIAN AIRSPACE then lied about it and tried to cover it up. (http://alt-f4.org/img/seaoflies.html)

Oh lets not forget the fellows who were killed and tortured by the CIA-trained and US backed Iranian secret police under the Shah....