WB: October Surprise – Moon of Alabama

June 21, 2006

WB: October Surprise

Billmon:

Considering the narrowness of Bush’s margin in the electoral college — a 60,000 vote swing in Ohio, and we’re talking about President Kerry’s failed Iraq War policies right now — it doesn’t seem unreasonable to argue that Osama bin Laden did more to perpetuate Shrub’s reign of error than Karl Rove and the RNC propaganda machine from hell put together.

October Surprise

Posted by b on June 21, 2006 at 16:50 UTC | Permalink

Comments

The GOP spun it into bumpersticker anyway. To wit, “Terrorists agree: Anybody But Bush”.
I guess OBL didn’t want Kerry because… he would have sent even more troops? or because Kerry would have asked a frenchman ‘to be the last man to die for a mistake’?
The ‘OBL for Bush’ presidential election analysis doesn’t make sense when you look at the Democrats’ Iraq war [non-] alternative.

Posted by: gylangirl | Jun 22 2006 2:07 utc | 1

gylangirl- it makes perfect sense when you look at cheney’s “if they’re maybe bad guys, we kill them and let god sort them out” strategy.
the entire world, whether it was perception or not, thought that the dems would not be as catastrophic as the bush administration in ruining this nation’s reputation.
bin Laden has stated he wants to resurrect the Ottoman Empire…create an Islamic state, rather than nation-states.
how can he better win supporters to his cause? With the bush administration…simply b/c Kerry would have been given time to show what he would do differently. and we cannot know what he would have done b/c he never took office.
bush said lots of things when he was running for prez that have been totally overturned by his actions.

Posted by: fauxreal | Jun 22 2006 2:22 utc | 2

@gylangirl
It would not make sense if these were real human beings and genuine interactions that we were observing, no. Why should a devoted fanatic to a cause prefer one particular political party’s response over another… everything else being equal?
Very possibly because ObL ceased to be a real person a long time ago and is now as much a corporate (anti)mascot for the GOP as Mickey Mouse is for Disney. There might be or have been an historical ObL (and if we can believe what’s left of our written history, that individual, along with Gulbadin Helcmatyar, was on the receiving end of quite a bit of arms and money from Bush the Elder when he fought with the mujahadeen in Afghanistan against the Soviets). But the international fugitive supervillian ObL who directs world events while fleeing from cave to cave is pure propaganda.
The blowback for this psyop is twofold; First of all it doesn’t make sense in any narrative fashion and secondly (and more importantly), while the myth of ObL might cause a temporary anti-Islamic/pro-GOP response in some Americans, the same Robin Hood story generates a lot more lasting sympathy amongst non-Americans. In this case, the myth has become a villian in its own right.

Posted by: Monolycus | Jun 22 2006 3:17 utc | 3

gylan girl, i don’t know how closely you looked at kerry, but i felt convinced that once in office he would have pursued very different solutions than bush and his send more troops bravado. reading his diplomatic theory and seeing “going up river” taught me he is a man of integrity and intelligence. i have always believed that he would pursue diplomacy whenever possible and once in office he would be saying all of the things he is saying now. i think he would have made a masterful president. just my two cents.

Posted by: conchita | Jun 22 2006 3:23 utc | 4

I must disagree with conchita. Kerry was beholden to corporate interests, to use an all-too-familiar phrase for it, and so he wouldn’t have ended the war in Iraq. The Democrats are no better than the Republicans when it comes down to those decisions. However: Kerry, being a Democrat, would have been under intense scrutiny — which Bush, as a Republican, is not — because we all know that Democrats are “weak on terror”. So the minor pieces of security which are currently falling apart in the U.S. because Bush is feeding contracts to friends and hoping for another attack to give him a boost in popularity would have been tightened up. And there might even have been an examination of Where The Money Goes, which bin Laden, if he’s still around, or his successors — to say nothing of the Republicans — certainly don’t want. Does anyone seriously doubt that there’s U.S. tax money behind the U.S.’s theatrical enemies? With the threat of economic revelation behind him, Kerry would be at least partially immune to blackmail. No, in order that America might be bled dry as quickly as possible, with no risk of bumps in the road, Bush had to stay in office.

Posted by: The Truth Gets Vicious When You Corner It | Jun 22 2006 4:18 utc | 5

C’mon conchita anybody but bush doesn’t make the anybody a white knight, it just makes him another millionaire determined to fill in the gap between birth and death by ‘wiining the most powerfulest job in the world’.
That the swiftboating worked wasn’t just because of the huge media conspiracy, it worked because elements of the story resonated within the electorate. There were enough vets who had meet assholes such as kerry, but most importantly being competitive for the gig of president under the current peverted and corrupt system, means that by definition the candidate is going to be exactly the sort of asshole that may appeal to rethug voters eager for a spanking, if they were selling the tory message, but would always come across as lying pricks to people who don’t believe the world begins and ends with ‘me me me’, and wimps to those that do if the candidate is trying to push a message of fairness or equity.
It seems the only way to change that paradigm is to step outside what the policians have made the only game in town and which is as crooked as the proverbial dogs hind leg.

Posted by: Anonymous | Jun 22 2006 4:19 utc | 6

Fuck Kerry ask him about his war chest funds…

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Jun 22 2006 4:33 utc | 7

Good thought, Monolycus.

“Very possibly because ObL ceased to be a real person a long time ago and is now as much a corporate (anti)mascot for the GOP as Mickey Mouse is for Disney.”

OBL is an interesting figure, apparently a younger son of a succesful Saudi building contractor. Trained engineer, mujahid and recently in Afghanistan. After that the trail goes cold.
I never followed up the links to alternative translations of the “Bin Laden Tapes” so I can’t say I know one way or the other if Binny is a real guy now or just an actor and a script. I never even read the transcript.
But I do know that this character keeps showing up in the news, at least on cnn.com. He is a comic book character to me. Possibly “based on a ‘`real` story’.”
Now that’s typography. Anyway thanks for the cogent thought.

Posted by: jonku | Jun 22 2006 7:23 utc | 8

Like wise as Monolycus has so clearly expressed:
Reasonable Doubts about the Guilt and Death of the Deceptive “Mr. Zarqawi”
I will be relieved to be mistaken about this deception. The events I have described are truly diabolical and if I am wrong there is that much less evil in the world. And if I am correct?
Then when the perpetrators of this wicked war are finally brought to justice, let us reserve a special place for the architects of this deception.
Let us recall also the now forgotten children slaughtered by the Americans at Haditha and Ishaqi, and the little girl they killed without a second thought, to push them off the front pages, that summer’s evening, June 7, 2006.
This is for them.

Posted by: Uncle $cam | Jun 22 2006 8:26 utc | 9

a man of integrity and intelligence
Good grief.

Posted by: Anonymous | Jun 22 2006 12:18 utc | 10

Don’t get me wrong, Conchita. I voted for Kerry, if only to punish Bush for domestic policies towards women. [Won’t make that mistake again after seeing the Dems surrender the Supreme Court to the religious right.] But I had no illusions that Kerry ever opposed Corporate America’s profitable war.
I just think OBL didn’t care who won the election. After all, he began his jihad during the Clinton administration.

Posted by: gylangirl | Jun 22 2006 14:01 utc | 11

okay, i knew i would be flamed for making statements in support of john kerry, but i will stand by them. i wonder how many here have read his philosophies on diplomacy? and i wonder how many saw george butler’s “going up river”? if the film had been used by his campaign i seriously doubt that the swift boaters would have been as successful. after organizing a free screening of it a few weeks before the election, i wrote a thank you note to george butler for making it possible and was surprised the following sunday when i received a call from him. we spoke for some time and it became clear that he had known john kerry while in vietnam and through the protests and was with him when kerry testified before congress. he told me that kerry had changed some since the 70s, particularly with regard to his concern about how fox would use/distort anything he did or said and consequent choice to keep a lower profile than in earlier years. while butler did not explicitly state it, i got the sense that he felt that kerry was getting bad advice and butler was running into walls in reaching him, but was firmly convinced that he would have made a great president. he said that he knew this when he met kerry 30 years earlier and began filming him then. so long story short, it is obvious that kerry’s campaign could have been run better, but i do not believe it was so poorly run that he lost the election.
had 2000 not been stolen we would not be in iraq or afghanistan. had 2004 not been stolen i believe that kerry would have had the us out already. i know this runs contrary to the chest thumping we heard during the campaign (thanks very much, joe biden) – another shining moment for the demopublicans – but i believe the kerry we are seeing today is the kerry we would have seen as president. he believes in diplomacy first, has stated that he regrets his vote to invade iraq, and opposes the occupation. as a senator, he has been there consistently over the past two years. he lead the battle on alito and opposed roberts. he wasn’t as strong with feingold on censure as i would have liked, but today he, russ, and barbara boxer have introduced legislation to redeploy from iraq within six months or sooner. my point is that he is making an effort to make a difference.
i may be a pollyanna, but i am not so naive as to believe that kerry is completely independent of corporate influence. i wonder if there is a single congressional member who isn’t and yes the system is fucked, but given what we have here i think kerry is one of our exemplar representatives. he is on record as the 11th most liberal voting member of the senate. i looked over the legislation he proposed over the last few years and the bulk of it concerns veteran affairs and benefits, small business, social security, the environment, and education, but there were a few items that made me wonder – relaxed duties on certain audio headphones, loud speakers, tuna, yarns, r-core transformers, golf club driver and fairway heads, and various basketballs and volleyballs. must admit that i have not taken time to read each of these bills, and cannot offer an explanation. however, i do remember the work he did on iran contra and bcci and that is what stands out in my mind.
i watch both kerry and gore these days and see two men who were perhaps not the best candidates but are more presidential than bush is in his sleep. i see strong commitment to the people of this country and concern about how it effects the world. so, in lieu of tearing down the system, i stand by both of them.

Posted by: conchita | Jun 22 2006 14:54 utc | 12

forgot to mention that i am in agreement with billmon that obl influenced the election. but then again, i saw parellels long ago between bush and obl and agreed from the beginning with the grafitti that was stenciled new york not long after 9/11 – BUSH IS A BIN LADEN.

Posted by: conchita | Jun 22 2006 14:58 utc | 13

everything conchita said..

Posted by: byteb | Jun 22 2006 16:43 utc | 14

i thought the bin laden tape we saw prior to the election was as a result of uncles arkin article, specifically targeting the voters and i wonder bid B really cared one way or the other . we have taken our army to the ME, as the thugs so claim it is somehow to our advantage all the ‘terorists ‘ ar econsolidated in iraq, it seems it is us who have provided our fodder in close proximity for any fighting faction w/a beef against us to more accessible vait.
i do not think iraq would be in the shape its in had kerry become president. i cannot claim we wouldn’t be there but the MO would certainly have been different. i believe this war is proceeding along the intended path the designers set up. chaos , failure, civil war, complete breakdown. all part of the neocon plan. without indicating i would in anyway approve of this ‘nation building’ any assemblance of ‘nation building’ would have gone a lot further in terms of any progress towards success. kerrys focus was diplomacy. exit negroponte, exit death squads, exit these chosen puppets, exit the occupation.
as for billmons predictions, i love the squealer thread…
billmon….LUXOR… i will not forget

Posted by: annie | Jun 22 2006 17:02 utc | 15

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