I know nothing, this is just a feeling

For the last few months, I've had a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach about one of two things happening during the election season:

1) That Bush will dump Cheney from the ticket in order to plug the holes in the boat; or
2) That we'll have our very own October Surprise (new and improved for 2004!).

Now the Cheney thing could go either way. It could backfire spectacularly and cause voter confidence in Bush to plummet further than it already has. Short of him enticing John McCain into the VEEP slot, I don't think it could do anything but backfire, although this administration has broken all the rules (and laws) when it comes to politics and governance so what would normally apply with anyone else probably doesn't with these assholes. Still, I figure besides the fact that Cheney's the real power in this administration and Bush seems unable to fire anyone no matter how royally they fuck up, Cheney just knows where too many of the bodies are buried for Bush to realistically dump him. So basically, I'm with Kos on this one. Still have a bad feeling about it, but on the scale of probability, I'd say this one continues to move further and further down my list of worries.

As for an October Surprise, this could just be Democrat paranoia morphing into full-blown conspiracy theory. God knows we have every reason to think Bush & Co. would pull such a stunt. However, with this article over at TNR about the thumbscrews tightening on the Pakistanis, paranoia about an October Surprise (or in this case, July) isn't looking so crazy anymore. (Whether they're onto something in this article or they're being fed a bunch of nonsense, only time is going to tell, but we've got no reason to doubt these reporters' credibility at this point.)

So let's say the surprise comes sometime between now and the election...what happens? Well, no matter what it's going to put the Dems in a tough spot. There's a good chance that they could expose such a ploy for exactly what it is, although that assumes, of course, that the Dems will finally grow the backbone they apparently lost sometime around 9/11, that the media won't continue to report GOP press releases as news, and that the electorate is finally properly suspicious of just about anything this Administration does anymore. I'm not betting on any of those things, but we'll see. On the probability scale, still pretty high up there.

But since waking up this morning to the latest nebulous warning about a terrorist attack "sometime, somewhere", I've now got a third thing that's causing this feeling in the pit of my stomach and no, it's not that chalupa I had for lunch.

So the big secret meeting this morning was bogus, I get that. Oh, I'm sure there's increased chatter and alla that, but talk about announcing the obvious. And with no more detail than they're giving, this is any different that the unseen, unknown possibility of attack that hangs over us every day...how, exactly?

No, what worries me is the very real possibility of assassination. With the addition of Edwards, and the pathetic nature of the attacks against him so far, it's clear the the GOP is desperate. Kerry and Edwards are really looking like they're gonna stick it to the Bush ticket at this point and I don't think that's just the my oh-so-obvious bias talking. Bush is managing to sink himself without any help from us (although he'd sink faster if our side was doing its job, but I'll take what I can get) and despite a media that has no concept of investigative journalism or objective reporting.

Now, I'm not saying they would ever contemplate assassination as a means to keeping the White House -- I'm not Oliver Stone, after all -- but the temptation to fuck with our elections has got to be too strong for Al Quaida to resist and what better way than to knock off one or both of the challenger candidates that would most likely cause a lot of headache for your terrorist organization were they to be elected? You keep the guy who's been such a boon to your recruitment efforts, and cripple him further than he's already crippled himself with suspicions that he had something to do with his opponent's death(s) OR, that he didn't do enough to prevent it/them. It dovetails nicely with Al Quaida's goals of bringing down the American infidels and might very well cause a national crisis that makes 9/11 look like a lovely September day in comparison.

I hope this is just me worrying for no reason. Everyone (and by that I mean my friends and family -- my husband is the only one who agreed with me throughout) thought I was insane in 2000 when I was worrying that it was gonna be so close it'd be messy (though even I didn't worry to the extent of the Florida mess). They said I was overreacting about Bush, that he wasn't the evil incarnate that I worried he'd be. And after 9/11 no one could understand why I didn't think Junior was all that. Except for, again, my husband, who was just as distrustful as I was about the man.

The thing is, I didn't want to be right about any of that. Why I was, I have no idea -- it's not like I've got some special insight no one else does, and I don't pretened to know shit about shit -- but being right about it doesn't make me feel any better. I WANT to be worrying about this for no reason. Seriously. I really, really don't want to be right about this. I'm probably not -- what the hell do I know about politics or terrorism or whatever? Exactly squat, that's what.

Just the same, please don't let me be right about this.