[Maédhros]

What? Could you restate that in a less garbled fashion?

Ok, there is this theory that I have seen in this thread that it seems that they could be more rings than the 20 that I know of. (9 for the humans, 3 elves, 7 dwarves and 1 of Sauron).
I do not seem to recall that there were other rings besides those (at least magic rings made by the Elves in Eregion). Do you or anyone else has any proof to the contrary, that there could be other lesser rings which didn't have gems in them that could have the similar description as Sauron's ring?

As I said earlier on in this thread, Gandalf did the best that he could in light of his circumstances and the information available to him at the time. But he was only human (or, rather, subject to human frailties). So, while he undoubtedly had great wisdom, he was not above making mistakes. He may well have been guilty of an error of judgment in not taking more concerted action to identify the nature of the Ring earlier, but I would not equate this with incomptence or inadequacy. Perhaps he would have done things differently with the benefit of hindsight, but he chose the course of action which seemed the best to him at the time.

hindsight: Perception of the significance and nature of events after they have occurred.

Lets see if hindsight was needed:
1. Gandalf felt uneasy about Bilbo's ring.
2. Gandalf knew that both rings had similar descriptions 11 years after Bilbo returned to the Shire in the White council discussion.
3. Gandalf while in that council mistrusted Saruman as to not tell him about Bilbo's ring but was satisfied about his conclusions that the ring could not be found.
4. In a world where gut feelings are as important of more important than common sense then was Gandalf not following his feeling odd?
5. If they were only 20 rings, what was the probability that Bilbo's ring was Sauron's? P=1/20, now knowing about the ones of the Ring wraiths and the 3 Elven ones, we have P=1/8, yet in his visit to Dol Guldur, he could at least discount one of those 7 dwarven rings. P=1/7.
With all those facts, do you really think that one needed hindsight at that point? Wow. With that information, it did not warrant an inmediate research about his ring?

In any event, if failure to take an early course of action that would have prevented much suffering equates to incompetence, then Eru was the most incompetent of all. He was able to intervene to oppose Sauron, for example by "arranging" for Bilbo to find the Ring and, of course, by giving Gollum a little "nudge" at Sammath Naur. So why didn't he just intervene by having Sauron drop the Ring in the fire just after he had forged it? Talk about incompetence!

The difference is that while Eru can see the events from an outside perspective (being God) he probably knows that the things that will happen there will be readressed at a later time eg. Arda remade.
While the Istari had an insiders perspective in ME that they were the enemies of Sauron and I believe that if they could accomplish their mission 50 years earlier, it would have saved some suffering in the world.