This Is the Way It Ends: Attack on Iran May Be Imminent

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/5/12/231715/792

Probably one of the most real accounts of the fallout of an attack on Iran:

<snippit>
Apocalypse

Day six.

Oil prices approach $180 per barrel on world markets. Major losses on world stock markets have accelerated into a freefall. The Dow Jones has lost 4000 points since the war began. The slide of the US dollar, underway since the start of hostilities, is also beginning to pick up steam, threatening to become a collapse.

Gasoline prices in the United States have reached $8.00 per gallon in some areas, despite optimistic statements from President Bush that energy disruptions will be temporary. Long lines continue at gas stations. Schools and businesses are beginning to close or run on reduced hours. Employees are having more and more trouble getting to work. Shipments of critical goods and supplies are drying up as gasoline prices begin to hamper the trucking industry. And now, for the first time, reports come in of panic buying at supermarkets around the country. What had been temporary open spaces on shelves, thanks to trucking delays, have now sparked a mass run on food. Transportation bottlenecks, and the explosion of costs in petroleum derivates used for manufacturing, have ignited an inflationary explosion in consumer goods across the board.

And then, late in the morning, cable news broadcasts flash the first reports of terrorist attacks inside the United States. At 11:00 a.m. local time, in Phoenix, Arizona, an unknown number of gunmen open fire with automatic weapons and grenades on crowds of shoppers in the Paradise Valley shopping mall. Minutes later, reports come in of rocket-propelled grenades fired at traffic along widely scattered sections of Interstate 44 in Missouri. As TV images show police and SWAT teams deploying along I-44 and surrounding the Paradise Valley mall, eyewitnesses report two jumbo jets exploding in the skies over Chicago's O'Hare International Airport, the apparent victims of shoulder-fired anti-aircraft missiles. For the second time in American history, the Federal Aviation administration orders all civilian air traffic in the United States grounded. Television networks in the United States give the attacks wall-to-wall coverage, virtually ignoring the escalating world energy crisis and the ongoing war in the Middle East. As the day goes on, rumors fly of additional attacks or planned attacks. Workers leave their jobs by the millions. Schools, businesses, and government agencies begin to shut down. Traffic clogs the nation's highways as the mass exodus gets underway. And it gets worse. In Atlanta, snipers with high-powered rifles open fire on motorists stranded in their cars. The gunmen continue to fire as terrified citizens flee their vehicles. Late in the afternoon two suicide bombers detonate home made explosives at restaurants in Dallas and Pittsburgh. The final toll from the day's attacks is 673 people dead. Experts speculate that the attacks were carried out by members of the Iranian secret service, long known to exceed Al Qaeda in their levels of training and their capacity to carry out terrorist strikes. None of the operations of this day came anywhere close to 9/11 in their sophistication or spectacle, but the net effect was, if anything, far worse. Multiple soft targets in the heartland of America have been attacked with impunity. The American public gets the message: no one is safe.

By the end of the day, world oil prices pass $200 per barrel. Governments around the planet order all financial markets closed amidst a monetary and economic implosion unprecedented in history.

The war continues. US Central Command maintains round the clock bombardment of Iranian targets. Israeli forces drive deeper into Lebanon amidst sporadic Hezbollah missile strikes on Israeli cities. An Iranian Shahab missile strikes the northern end of Saudi Arabia's Ghawar oil field, inflicting heavy damage on a number of drilling rigs. Saudi security forces fight pitched battles with Iranian paramilitary forces and pro-Al Qaeda insurgents in dozens of locations around the kingdom. The Saudi Foreign Minister denies rumors that members of the royal family are evacuating the country.

An Iranian Sunburn missile strikes a second American naval vessel, the guided missile cruiser USS Lake Champlain. Sixty-eight US personnel are killed but the ship remains afloat.

A column of US Marines rolls north from Kuwait, attempting to keep supply lines open to besieged American forces in Nasiriyah, Najaf, Baghdad, and elsewhere. Meanwhile, American satellite surveillance picks up evidence of Iranian armor and infantry formations moving across the Iraqi border. By morning, they engage advance elements of US occupation forces already hard pressed by Shiite militias.

Massive anti-American demonstrations now range far beyond the Muslim world, encircling the entire planet.
</snippit>

Projections have failed before. After all, Iraq's projections were rather cozy too...

Nothing but paranoid fantasy cobbled together into one big Cassandra complex mental masturbation session.

that says a lot, no?

Don't be too rough on him. He can't help it. He already has a paranoid fantasy world to maintain. Asking him to take on another is just too unreasonable.

Go ahead, tell me what I had for breakfast today. Obviously you're omnipotent, and can discern my every thought and feeling from my posts, so I'll wait. While you're at it, tell me why I've been stepping on things so often lately. It's getting annoying.

What you and your ilk fail to grasp, and apparently always will, is that refusing to be a suicide dove doesn't make you a Republican. I like to actually focus on doing something positive, rather than obsessing, eating our own people over failure to comply with your personal political bible, and indulging in a general unwillingness to actually taint yourself by engaging in politics. I wager that I'm a much better Democrat than you are--I vote straight Democratic in every election, even if I don't completely agree with every single syllable the person ever spoke, because I firmly believe that Democrats are better than Republicans. And if I have to accept a moderate Democrat, I'll do it, rather than stay home in a huff and help elect a wingnut Republican.

What I do hate is the stupidity and shortsightedness that leads some people here to engage in liberaler-than-thou navel-gazing excercises. Half the threads on DU include somebody screeching hatred at some Democrat over some perceived offense, rather than constructive discussion. Sure, our politicians are far from perfect, but they're ten hells of a lot better than the alternative. I hate Joe Lieberman's guts, but if it came down to it, I'd much rather have him than any Republican in the Senate, because it's a bigger benefit to have a Democratic majority even if a few of them are unreliable on certain issues. If you can't see that, then you need to reexamine what's keeping you in politics.

Do I vote straight demo ticket in Chicago?
Hell no. Not when I have personal knowledge that several of them will be spending many years as guests of our local prison system. In those cases, I leave that office blank, or I vote with a write in. (If you think Ohio or Florida are weird, try to experience vote counting in Cook County. Magicians come out in fool robes, wave their wands, and shazaam, the machine candidates win in a landslide.

It is not some more liberal than thou navel gazing (although I love the term and will use it in my next book, if you don't mind) so much as recognizing a bigger truth. Much of the political system in Congress, especially in the house, is broken. Money has killed it off and now bills are written by the lobby of interest, voted on by bribed members, and signed by a wacko. While this is 99% a GOP problem, we should not - no, we cannot ignore that some of our own are also corrupt and corrupted, incompetent or like Joe, extremely mistaken on too many issues. If we do not take care to keep our house clean, what right have we to complain about how messy the current tenants have made it? Also, by pushing some of our less favored officials and reminding them how we feel, they may not know which side of their toast is buttered.

To be fair, if I lived in a state where my only two choices were Joe L and Rick "post-coital, anal discharge" Santorum, and if it were a close race, AND if a write in candidate was a fringe idiot in search of his village, AND i thought that my vote would actually be counted properly, then and only then would I vote for him. So, you see, we are not so far about. If I have this holier than thou attitude, I apologize, and I promise to work on it. As hard as I work on Dem campaigns. (I phone, I write, I send money, I donate time, I even ran for office)

I do not apologize for the inner-most idea that drives my actions and energy - the self-preservation of our nation. We are truly at risk of a national melt-down. What Bush has done to our constitution, wht Cheney has done to secrecy and intel with incredibly effective blackmail and back-stabbing, and what Ashcroft and Gonzales have done to the justice system is a crime. Where America was once a shining example of the best we have to offer, we are now hated and despised - solely because of George W. Bush & Co. Where democratic ideals, constitutional rights and privacy existed without destroying our defenses and protections, now stands a system resembling the Soviet Union of the 1970s. Except ours is likely to collapse much sooner than the USSR did. Unless we fix things now.

Anyone with even a basic grounding in politics, military strategy, or economics could tell you that this scenario is about as likely as a nuclear war between England and France. Sure, it's possible, but there are so many things about it which are ludicrously improbable that it degrades into simple kookdom, taking its proponents with it.

Always acerbic and attacking, sometimes with name calling, but mostly just broadly dismissive with no basis for opinion, no facts, and no intelligent counter-debate.

While you may disagree with the assessment put forth in that diary, if this is all you can contribute, then you are really wasting everyone's time, and adding nothing useful to the discussion.

Maybe there is a ball game on TV or a sale at Wal-Mart that would keep you occupied, or perhaps some shopping at the local mall that would be more productive for you.

Because it seems intelligent discussion is not your cup of tea.

This is one of them. Reading that, it sounds like the pre-war "intel" about Saddam's UAVs filled with chemical weapons hitting New York in 45 minutes. Anybody grounded in reality knows that it's impossible. The simple mechanics of the situation prevents it. You might as well have Japan sinking into the sea for all the realism it provides. But disproving it is rather like being asked to disprove the fact that the sun is actually a giant flaming lemon.

If you must know, here's a few of the more obvious bits of embellishment. There are no terrorists in the United States. If there were, don't you think they would have done something, anything, within the past five years? Don't you think invading Iraq or Afghanistan would have prompted them to move if they existed? Do you think that many Iranian spies could be in the US, with that much weaponry, and nobody know anything about it? Anything assuming terrorism is therefore fabricated out of whole cloth. You might as well say that the terrorists are all exterminators, and they intend to go house to house gassing every American family.

If oil at $75 a barrel hasn't caused the world economy to collapse, I doubt that strikes on Iran would push it over the edge.

Why, on Earth, would the Israelis want to invade anybody else? They're already on rocky enough ground with their neighbors without strapping themselves to our current foreign policy. Again, Iraq and Afghanistan haven't caused anything to jump off with Isreal.

I'm frankly shocked that no one is accusing the OP of being a freeper. 14 posts, and this is exactly the sort of "Left Behind" sky-falling apocalypse drool fest they enjoy.

Last but not least, we were treated to this same sort of dire prediction right before the war in Iraq. While that was bad, it wasn't nearly what was predicted. Again, I'm shocked people aren't saying that this is a plant or something to lower expectations for an attack on Iran. An attack, by the way, that was predicted last year at this same time, and failed to materialize.

And given that a war with Iran is now absolutely certain* unless Bush is removed from office, downright terrifying.

* - Yes, it's certain, in fact, I wouldn't be surprised if covert ops have already begun. Bush has demonstrated time and again that he couldn't give a damn what Congress says, he doesn't have to worry about being re-elected because he'll either be out of office or have suspended elections during a national emergency or if both of those fail, there's always Diebold. He'd get a certain amount of "rally 'round the flag" support if he started a war and the chances of the UN or someone similar being able to stop him are nil. Bad as it would be for the rest of us, a war on Iran makes every kind of sense from the pov of Bush's self-interest and since we all know by now that Bush and his administration have no moral or ethical scruples about doing anything at all (and I do mean anything, Bush would not think twice about torturing his mother to death with a cheese grater if it got him another year in office), a war with Iran becomes inevitible. Unless Bush is removed from office. The only think that can stop him now is his removal or the removal of large portions of his key administration officials. I doubt Libby alone will do it, Rove might but he'd likely end up running things from a cell anyway. Cheney, Rice or Rumsfield are the ones that need to be removed to really cripple Georgie McCokespoon's support mechanism.

I'm asking in all seriousness. Granted, he'd be totally bonkers to go to war with Iran, so maybe his reasons are baloney. Still.... why do it? What $ is to be made from it?

1. Flag-waving support
2. The chance to declare a national emergency and thereby stave off election
3. Domination of the region (see, PNAC)
4. The chance to have another war (is it just me or is Bush worryignly addicted to playing John Wayne in political circles?)
5. More Religious Reich support
6. Being able to effectively silence the investigations by diverting attention away from them
7. Huge distraction (when the nation's at war, people don't look too closely at domestic issues)
8. More Haliburton rebuilding contracts
9. Removes a president making increasingly worrying remarks about Israel

I just can't see what Bush has to gain from the collapse of the dollar and general collapse of U.S. society. Of course, maybe he has deluded himself into thinking he could attack Iran and still have everything be okay in the U.S. financial markets???

Alternatively, he's still gulping down the Shock & Aweade and believes the war could be done quickly, etc, etc.

That's assuming he even understands the international financial ramifications which, given his business record, is arguable.

My guess is they've switched their holdings to other, more lucrative currencies.

Face it, these guys are the farthest thing from patriots that could exist.

for the collapse of american society. He has friends in high places th at can take care of him.

1. Flag-waving support
Not anymore. Not at his popularity rate; the people know enough about Iran's oil contribution (never mind the failure in Iraq) and are whining too much about prices already.

2. The chance to declare a national emergency and thereby stave off election
This one's been said before. Hasn't happened yet.

3. Domination of the region (see, PNAC)
Dunno

4. The chance to have another war (is it just me or is Bush worryignly addicted to playing John Wayne in political circles?)
Not likely. It's not war when he'd use nukes to save on costs.

5. More Religious Reich support
And they are a small gaggle of crackpots.

6. Being able to effectively silence the investigations by diverting attention away from them
Possibly

7. Huge distraction (when the nation's at war, people don't look too closely at domestic issues)
Not this time. Quite the contrary this time; unless gas goes back to $2/gl and that won't happen!

8. More Haliburton rebuilding contracts
They don't have enough? From a country who might have to declare bankruptcy, in which case Haliburton's stuck with useless dollars.

9. Removes a president making increasingly worrying remarks about Israel
Isreal is a tiny country next to another one. Molehills vs mountains.

Not at his popularity rate; the people know enough about Iran's oil contribution (never mind the failure in Iraq) and are whining too much about prices already

But he can sell it that gas will go down because Iran would be under US occupation. The 29%er's would support him if he started chowing down on babies and he only has to get another 22% to claim majority support.

This one's been said before. Hasn't happened yet.

Emphasis on the word yet, a major terrorist attack on the mainland was unheard of until 9/11. He's already conducting himself as a dictator and he's said several times how much easier that would make things.

"Not likely. It's not war when he'd use nukes to save on costs.

That's supposed to make me feel better?

And they are a small gaggle of crackpots

What planet are you living on? Because the one the rest of us are living on, roughly 25% of the US population falls into any sensible deifinition of "fundementalist" and have enough muscle to push abstinence-only sex-ed as national policy despite it's destructive effects.

Not this time. Quite the contrary this time; unless gas goes back to $2/gl and that won't happen!

We'll have to agree to differ on that one.

They don't have enough?

This is a corporation, no such thing as "enough"

From a country who might have to declare bankruptcy, in which case Haliburton's stuck with useless dollars.

Firstly, that presumes that Bush understands the money markets and the possibility of a country declaring bankruptcy which is open to question. Secondly, the WTO can be relied upon to bail the US out of a hole, especially with the potential cash to be made from a US-occupied Iran.

Isreal is a tiny country next to another one. Molehills vs mountains.

It's a tiny nuclear-equipped nation which the US has a long history of intervening on behalf of and which Bush's Religious Reich base view as integral to their (batsh*t insane) doomsday predictions.

Secondly, the WTO can be relied upon to bail the US out of a hole, especially with the potential cash to be made from a US-occupied Iran.

Why would the WTO bail us out? Unless I am mistaken, nearly-$9 trillion sets a precedent and also renders every DUer's post about what our children and grandchildren will have to suffer through to pay it back meaningless.

As one subsequent post pointed out, I used teh wrong acronym, I was thinking of the IMF.

Now, why would teh IMF bail the US out? Easy. Firstly, a collapsing US economy (I mean, collapsing more than it has already) would have a direct knock-on effect on surrounding economies, especially in South America where many currencies are tied to teh dollar. Secondly, it wouldn't establish a precedent because the IMF isn't a court of law, it doesn't recognise precedent or have to follow it. Thirdly, never underestimate teh force of American exceptionalism ("We're special, the normal rules don't apply to us"). Finally, for various reasons, the US wields an awful lot of clout in the IMF (and WTO for that matter).

It wouldn't render the debt meaningless because, IIRC, the IMF deals primarily in loans so while a loan would stave off collapse, there would still need to be at least a pretence at paying it back.

The WTO is simply a forum for negotiating international trade agreements, and enforcing and arbitrating disputes over those agreements. It has no power or resources to bail out any country and has never done so.

You may be thinking of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). But in the case of the US having a liquidity crisis as a result of trade imbalances, the IMF would not have the resources to bail out the US, inasmuch as the main contributor to the capital of the IMF is the US itself.

If the US has such a liquidity crisis or a crisis of confidence in the dollar, the only way forward would be in effect a devaluation of the dollar against other currencies, which would be experienced as severe inflation in the US.

You're right, I was thinking of the IMF (I even know the difference most days, I'll plead lack of coffee).

Devaluation is one way forward but I seem to remember there are others. Granted, my memory is vague here but didn't Reagan do something similar which ended up indirectly crashing teh Mexican economy?

is not what you and other rational people believe , but, what Bush, his henchmen and lunatic followers believe. Most unfortunately, THEY ARE RUNNING THE SHOW.

1. Flag-waving support
We're already in a war, so this flag-waving support is maxed out.

2. The chance to declare a national emergency and thereby stave off election
When's the last time a U.S. election was cancelled due to the country being at war? Anyway, isn't it DU orthodoxy that election results are determined exclusively by Diebold voting machines?

3. Domination of the region (see, PNAC)
This assumes a successful military operation which is highly unlikely given how thin our resources are spread in the region already.

4. The chance to have another war (is it just me or is Bush worryignly addicted to playing John Wayne in political circles?)

This assumes that having another war is desirable for Bush, which is the point you're trying to prove.

5. More Religious Reich support

As per item 1, this is already maxed out.

6. Being able to effectively silence the investigations by diverting attention away from them
There are much more cost-effective ways of doing this. (e.g. having his caucus on Capital Hill blathering on about immigration is working pretty well)

7. Huge distraction (when the nation's at war, people don't look too closely at domestic issues)
And a large pimple on my nose would be a distraction from my fat gut. Given the fact that most people think Bush's foreign policy is a trainwreck, starting another idiotic war won't do anything to boost his support.

8. More Haliburton rebuilding contracts
Those crooked bastards don't need another war to justify those.

9. Removes a president making increasingly worrying remarks about Israel
Perhaps. But an invasion of Iran clearly creates more problems than it solves.

We're already in a war, so this flag-waving support is maxed out.

Arguable. Besides, it doesn't have to work for him to think it would.

When's the last time a U.S. election was cancelled due to the country being at war?

Never as far as I know. So what? The Nazis would never invade Poland, until they did. First time for everything and we know he's investigated teh possibility of "postponing" elections before.

Anyway, isn't it DU orthodoxy that election results are determined exclusively by Diebold voting machines?

Ah, you disagree then. I don't know about orthodoxy but certainly, it's what many (including myself) believe. With the Diebold option, there's always teh chance something could go wrong and, if there was an election, Bush would have to admit his term was over. If he "postpones" the election, his term never ends and he gets to stay in office indefinately.

This assumes that having another war is desirable for Bush, which is the point you're trying to prove.

True. I think Bush is dangerously addicted to swanning around playing at being someone in a Tomy Clancy novel.

As per item 1, this is already maxed out.

Open to debate. Roughly a quarter of the country falls into any sensible deifinition of "fundementalist" but a fair few of them are falling away from supporting Bush because to their perception, he hasn't done enough to further their cause, presumably because he hasn't enacted teh death penalty for homosexuality and banned abortion entirely (I work for the web's biggest spirituality site, I talk to these people every day). If he declares war against a country populated largely by Muslims (who the RR hate almost more than gay people), that lot come back.

There are much more cost-effective ways of doing this. (e.g. having his caucus on Capital Hill blathering on about immigration is working pretty well)

Point, I'll concede that one.

Given the fact that most people think Bush's foreign policy is a trainwreck, starting another idiotic war won't do anything to boost his support.

Forget whether it would work or not, the point is, Bush would think it would increase his support.

Those crooked bastards don't need another war to justify those.

No, they don't but remember the corporate mantra "profit is everything". A devastated Iran would need rebuilding and no corporation can ever have enough juicy contracts.

Perhaps. But an invasion of Iran clearly creates more problems than it solves.

We could and did say the same before the invasion of Iraq. Some of us said much the same before the invasion of Afghanistan. Bush couldn't give a sh*t how many problems it causes, so long as it serves his short-term goals (or at least, he believes it will).

They think they're playing poker with more chips than anyone else.

global.

They don't give a shit about the "US" per se. They are thinking global economics already. They are trafficking arms, and war, with a far different purpose than the average US citizen. These people don't give a shit about US, really. They are solidifying their long term (nefarious) plans.

Actually, an economically crippled US is much easier to manipulate - that is their goal.

"Actually, an economically crippled US is much easier to manipulate - that is their goal."

I couldn't agree more - it is their goal.

I have lived during the best years of the United States.

$8 a gallon gasoline. If you buy Greg Palast's argument that the Iraq war is being waged to keep oil supply tight and thus priced high, then $8 a gallon gasoline is the oil industry's wet dream. Every Bush program is about the transfer of wealth from the middle and lower classes to the filthy rich. Then add in the billions private companies such as Halliburton and Blackwater would make off the war. Ultimately, this nothing more than thievery.

(on edit) Guy sounds like he's writing disaster novel, and I'll take it as that, a story.
Needs more dialogue, though.

Paranoid fantasy.

I have no doubt that Bush WANTS to attack Iran.. The only question will Rove talk him out of it.

thought he could get away with a legacy of the apocalypse maker.

I'd imagine he's expecting the Rapture within his lifetime and therefore, couldn't care less about his legacy.

The original poster says a lot more than that, however.

nt

BushCo invaded . . . she was a West Point cadet at the time (having enrolled prior to 9/11 and all that has followed) . . .

"No way," said I. "Attacking Iraq makes no sense at all -- and it will NOT happen." . . .

my neice is currently deployed somewhere in Iraq and (for the first time in a long time) I'm praying every day . . .

just because something makes no sense whatsoever does NOT mean that Bush won't do it . . . as I'm sure we've all noticed . . .

Seems that some folks have really short term memories or the troll population on DU is HUGE.

I sincerely hope Your neice is safe and sound and will come home soon.

You might want to back up this assertion with some facts rather than resorting to accusations.

You've been here a long time. You know better than that.

I was HERE on August 22, 2002:



This is different. Bush no longer has the political capital, nor the forces, to pull this off.

Period.

Nuclear winter. Neighbor killing neighbor for food. No potable water. Better Red or better dead?

And here we all are !

This post would be nice on there, being fiction and all.

Till now, there has been no reason for this kind of attack in the USA. Hell, the Bush Repubvlicans might stage a fake version of this. It's not like they haven't done it before.

...in that the events have not happened.

Any person would be a FOOL though, to smile smugly and say that "Nothing like that COULD EVER happen!"

To quote a "preparedness" website: "chance only favors the prepared and equipped."

It's better to have and not need, then need and not HAVE...get it?

and VP Cheney assumes command as per the 25th Amendment, whereupon his first action as acting president is to beseech Congress to declare martial law across all the 50 states. Congress approves under duress. Acting President Cheney broadens the powers of the executive office by suspending habeas corpus and the Bill of Rights, cancelling elections, and disbanding Congress "until martial law is lifted."

Day eight: You kiss your ass goodbye.

And coming to know that they firmly believe there is both a huge war coming and that this war is the Armageddon that their holy book predicts as the end of the world, I can see that the poster is simply stating one of an infinite series of scenarios that human interdiction can, and with malice aforethought, possibly accomplish.

No pun intended; be afraid, be very afraid.

:hi:

They need Iran as an issue for November. Any military action before November makes no sense. Everyone that they listen to in the world, from Putin to Poppy to the Poodle, is hosing down the idea that attacking Iran will do them a lick of good. They're going to ride this Iran thing for at least another year.

I've been hearing reports about imminent attacks on Iran every few months since January '05. It's not gonna happen.

This is the introductory part of the diary:

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2006/5/12/231715/792

This Is the Way It Ends: Attack on Iran May Be Imminent
by areophany

Fri May 12, 2006 at 08:17:14 PM PDT

Rawstory has reported that two US aircraft carriers are steaming toward the Persian Gulf to join the one already there. Unspecified military scuttlebutt, says the site, tells of a coming attack on Iran, as early as June of this year. Within seven weeks from today.

Maybe the reports will turn out to be incorrect. Or premature. Maybe we have a little longer before the world we know is gone.

I'm trying to be as detached as I can in my thinking, trying not to get caught up in despair and anxiety and fear. But I am afraid, afraid of where our country and the world are going, more so than I've ever been in my life. More than I was when everyone worried about the Red Menace launching a nuclear bolt from the blue. I go about my daily business and I just want to scream at people. Don't you realize that all of this is over?

Prelude

I'm a 38-year old man. I work in a dumb, pointless job in a nowhere town and I have no influence or special insight about what goes on in the world. Once upon a time, when I was younger and more ambitious, I was a graduate student specializing in US foreign policy at a big name university. In my spare time I worked for a few big name think tanks and government agencies, researching and consulting. I gave up that life after a while, because I couldn't handle the stress of life among the power elite. But somehow I never gave up the habit of following politics in America and events in the world America was trying so hard to shape. The greatest drama of our lives unfolding every day. The future turning into history, right before our eyes. How could you not want to watch it happen?

In all those years, the story has been a long descent into madness, gathering force and momentum like a storm. You could see things coming unraveled in the world at large, in our society and our system of government. There used to be a certain kind of stability to the old establishment and the world it made. There was the Cold War and the bland, cautious domestic politics that went along with it - except for that business in the Sixties. That time when it looked like the United States might finally become a progressive society at last, committed to living out the true meaning of its creed. But that all ended in blood and things went back to the muddling through that we all thought of as drama, as the playing out of great events. Hostages in Iran, the Reagan Revolution, Iran-Contra, the Berlin Wall coming down, the boy from Hope moving into the White House, the long boom of the Nineties, the Contract with America and the stain on the dress. We thought of it all as meaningful and momentous, a nation trying to find its way. We couldn't help but think so, really.

<snip>


Portents

I can't help but think that the reckoning for our country is finally almost here. Soon it won't be a dimly imagined nightmare. It will be real and we will all have to live in it. We will have to make our way in a world like the one most of humanity lives in every day. Where things have fallen apart and having even the basic necessities of life for the briefest of time is a miracle beyond price.

<snip>

Ever since the election of 2000, the life we've known in the land of the free has been unraveling, slowly devolving into the wretched, ramshackle misery that once happened to other countries but never to us. Things that would have seemed unimaginable just keep happening. My God, how can we keep track of it all? A war of aggression in Iraq and a bloody occupation amidst secret and not-so-secret wars without end fought with stupidity unrivaled. KGB-style domestic spying operations. Torture and indefinite detention without charges. Graft and corruption on a gargantuan scale in government and business: looted pensions, hookers in the Watergate, elections manipulated, no-bid contracts and massive overcharging, it all runs together like muck. Laws written to funnel billions to drug companies, energy companies, credit card companies, how many more. The deliberate wrecking of national finances and the unbridled accumulation of public and private debt. A whole city drowned, its population condemned to exile so that the state will remain rock solid Republican. Partisan zealots installed throughout the court system and on the highest court of all. Orwellian legal doctrines allowing Presidential rule by limitless decree. A political party converted to a missionary organization for an apocalyptic blood cult of Rapture and ruin. Scientific research systematically squashed and distorted by End Times fanatics. The growing evidence ignored and mocked of a burning, flooding planet and a collapsing biosphere and the promise that our grandchildren will live in hell. And always the lies. An endless, vile, stinking cesspool of lies. And a media that dutifully transmits them, and a national opposition party run by cowards and hacks, that lets the lies go on and on and on and on and will do anything to stop it except fight.

<emphasis added>

And now, very possibly within the next seven weeks, the extremists who run the government of the United States are planning, in defiance of all informed advice and political logic and rational judgment and moral sense and basic sanity, to launch a massive military offensive against the Islamic Republic of Iran. The onslaught might even, as Seymour Hersh reports, use nuclear weapons. Out there in the electronic noosphere you can find any number of sober, well argued essays on the disasters that will likely ensue after any such attack, nuclear or otherwise. The sober policy wonk writings foretell Iran unleashing its Shiite militias and its ground forces to slaughter American soldiers in Iraq. They tell of Iranian missiles and guerrillas striking Saudi oil fields and Persian Gulf shipping and Israeli cities. They tell of oil prices soaring to levels that will rip the global economy to pieces and bring sixty years of post-1945 American affluence to a crushing, agonizing halt. They tell of Iranian terrorists murdering people on American soil.

For more than five years, things that nobody imagined and never should have happened have kept on happening anyway. Can anyone doubt that the people responsible really are preparing to commit this one, supreme act of insanity? Can anyone doubt that the reckless, fearful little man in the Oval Office, driven by personal demons and the voice of a vengeful God to seek redemption in a cause larger than himself, fully intends to pursue the course he believes will secure his place in history and in the favor of heaven?

.. that's been bandied about for the attack on Iran?

It's close ya'll.

More precisely, 06-06-06, or June 6 2006. :scared:

http://www.konformist.com/2000/bushjr666.htm
http://www.bushisantichrist.com


From: http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m0MKY/is_9_27/ai_108881880
"Pope fears Bush is antichrist, journalist contends - Church - journalist Wayne Madsden - Brief Article
Catholic New Times, May 18, 2003

WASHINGTON DC -- According to freelance journalist Wayne Madsden, "George W Bush's blood lust, his repeated commitment to Christian beliefs and his constant references to 'evil doers,' in the eyes of many devout Catholic leaders, bear all the hallmarks of the one warned about in the Book of Revelations--the anti-Christ."

(I am afraid.... (gulp), we're all about to find out sometimes next week...)

Here's the previous thread discussing this possibility:

If Ben Burch is right - 36 days and counting.
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=364&topic_id=1083036

Welcome to DU

Mr Murphy sez it can happen...to deny is to fantasize

"reality" I can see is that someone has created their view of what could happen, and other people are disagreeing with it. I remain somewhat skeptical, myself, having seen too many apocalyptic predictions such as "the crash of '79" etc. I do enjoy those Mad Max-style movies.

We have spent enormous sums of monies to Invade Iraq and now look...its only the beginning...Thats Reality.

To reject is to fantasize

far different from that on the runup to Iraq, and they seemed as worst-case as the administration's rose petals were best-case.

I don't buy terrorist cells in this country but I know we cannot afford another war. I have no doubt that they might attack Iran. Every country is making alliances to secure energy as oil drys up. We are taking it by force.
I think we will be at war with China in the next twenty years over energy unless we can get someone in power with a plan for a painless as possible (though it will be very painful) transition from an oil based economy to a sustainable one.