2004: A Bush Odyssey

There are plenty of other places to get the hard news about everything that's happened over the past couple of days and weeks. I've covered some things here - until I got so busy today. But the title of this post suggests that something more is happening now. Something that bodes ill for our country - in many ways - but, perhaps, something good as well.

If you remember the movie "2001: A Space Odyssey," you'll remember that each major turn of events in the evolution of humans was presaged by the perfect alignment of the moon, planets and that mysterious obelisk. In 2004 I think that a series of events are coming together; a series of very ominous events, strange events. The turning point, I think, was Bush's AWOL story gaining a little traction in the mainstream press; spurred on by lots of activity in the blogosphere. Then came the Madrid bombing. Yesterday (their time) was the Israeli assassination of the spiritual leader of Hamas, Sheik Ahmed Yassim. All this week, but especially today was Richard Clarke's book on how BushCo. totally bungled national security after 9-11 by monomaniacally concentrating on Iraq to the dangerous exclusion of al Qaeda.

These four events could plausibly be the beginning of the end for Bush and his neo-con cabal of puppetmasters.

The AWOL stories and the Madrid bombing have been dissected ad nauseum. But they are arrows to the heart of Bush's personal credibility and his abilities in foreign affairs. The Israeli assassination of Yassim, whether done with advanced US knowledge or not, widens the scope of potential terrorists operating against us; not exactly a stellar endorsement for his prowess in the war on terror. The Clarke story is potentially the story that brings down Bush's government.

That's no hyperbole. Bush has built his entire first term on his supposed heroic response to 9-11 and he's trying - on the backs of dead firefighters - to cinch his reelection on the same basis. Clarke, having worked for both Clinton and Bush, I think has a cachet that someone who only worked for the previous administration could never have. Some of the stories coming out of his book - at least the ones I've heard on the news - are stories that I would never have believed had they come from a blog. And yet, in retrospect, they fit so well with what we've learned about Bush and his minions since 2000. The speed and viciousness of the administration's response indicates that Clarke clearly hit a nerve.

Like the alignment of the planets in 2001 presaged a major change in human history, this alignment of events in 2004 could foreshadow the fall of the Bush empire.

My hope is that they don't also foretell of terrible events in our near future. If BushCo. bungles the events of the next couple of months as badly as they have the last couple of years, we could be in for some very bad times...