While we're (rightly) concerned with the election, the dynamic is ready to change. Bush has his pretext, one just has to wonder about the date.
The GOP candidates who are actually beloved by the insiders in their party--Thompson, Giuliani, Romney, and (though perhaps less so) McCain, are repeating a mantra that doesn't seem to make sense right now: beating a war drum when all the polls suggest the electorate is concerned about the economy.
Are they dumb? Poorly advised? Unsophisticated about election year dynamics? Seems unlikely, yes?
Consider this quote from one of the right's favorite news sources:
President Bush warned Iran of "serious consequences" if it meddles again with U.S. warships in the Persian Gulf, opening a Mideast peacemaking mission Wednesday on an ominous note.
So, this highly suspicious incident Sunday, disavowed by Iran, backed up with sketchy video, is the windup. The next sketchy incident appears ready to go. "Serious consequences" for a nation he already regards as a "dangerous threat?" The pitch is another incident--with serious consequences.
One may recognize this as neocon-speak--a "dangerous threat" must be anticipated, confronted, and neutralized.
So, what? Next time--making the rash assumption that Sunday played out the way the US is claiming it did--Iranian speedboats-of-doom get too close, the USS Whichever turns its machine guns on them, incident over?
Consider the calculations that are already in place, from The Timesonline:
Alexis Debat, director of terrorism and national security at the Nixon Center, said last week that US military planners were not preparing for “pinprick strikes” against Iran’s nuclear facilities. “They’re about taking out the entire Iranian military,” he said.
Debat was speaking at a meeting organised by The National Interest, a conservative foreign policy journal. He told The Sunday Times that the US military had concluded: “Whether you go for pinprick strikes or all-out military action, the reaction from the Iranians will be the same.” It was, he added, a “very legitimate strategic calculus”.
As Naomi Klein wrote in her brilliant "Shock Doctrine," the idea of a shock--a foreign policy tactic beloved by the neocons--is to create a blank slate that allows a fresh dynamic to form. The shock is ready to go. Along with shocking the mideast, it is ready to shock the electorate and the campaign. A wartime footing is the only way the GOP can have any hope of leveraging a shot at winning the next campaign.
The pretext is there--for those who are looking, a warning and prediction is already writ large in the rhetoric of the administration. The "serious consequences" of the next "incident" will not be a "pin-prick," but "WWIII," (or IV, depending on which neocon is ranting).
Oh yes, I'm an anonymous left-y blogger promoting a conspiracy theory with little to prove it besides connecting the dots. Please, please, please--tell me I'm wrong.
But please, don't allow the election to distract us from this issue. Demand the candidates speak out on it. And remind everyone who will listen--this president remains an extremely dangerous man.