If that sort of thing wasn’t frowned upon where I work, I would start a pool to see who can predict this election year’s October Surprise most accurately. Pay a buck, pick an event from a list of choices, and pick a day. At the end of the month, the pot is split between everyone who made a correct prediction.
Make no mistake, the October Surprise is coming. Our Republican masters are in serious danger of losing their monopoly – especially given the impact of recent scandals. The question on my mind is: what form will it take? Let’s look at a couple of possible scenarios:
Terror Alerts, Foiling of Plots, Non-Osama Kill/Capture
A boost in the terror alert level was a useful distraction from other news for a while, but it seems to have lost its potency and today would likely not produce even a blip on the ol’ approval-rating-ometer. We’ve killed or captured “Al Qaeda’s number 2 man” so many times that hardly anyone pays attention to that sort of news anymore.
The recent tactic of announcing a foiled terror plot has met with some success. A couple of guys sitting around in a bar in Florida saying, “Dude, wouldn’t it be cool if we could, like, blow somethin’ up?” becomes “Major Terrorist Ring Disrupted!” An alleged plan to mix multiple liquids into a bomb on board a plane becomes big news, never mind the fact that to turn said liquids into explosive material would require a fair amount of laboratory equipment to also be carried on and set up while the aircraft was in flight, or that British authorities more or less came out and said the US pressured them to make the arrests on a time frame that had to do with politics rather than with catching all the perpetrators and building a solid case against them. For the most part we’ve become jaded to even this method of propaganda, though, so even if they do uncover some new conspiracy, I doubt it will have much effect.
Saddam Sentencing
Saddam will be sentenced before Election Day, and the pundits will be out in force shouting cries of victory while ignoring the fact that by and large Iraqis were better off under the reign of a brutal dictator than they are under US occupation.
Might help the right-wing re-election effort, but in my opinion this in itself won’t be enough.
Osama bin Captured
The administration has a vested interest in keeping Osama alive and free. With him gone as a figurehead, a large portion of the electorate will likely lose interest in the War on Terror™ before there’s a chance to invade any more middle-eastern countries. Of course, if things look desperate enough, they may be forced to play the OBL card. If they can find him, assuming they don’t already know where he is.
And Iran, Iran So Far Awaaay
The same folks who knew where the WMD were in Iraq are convinced Iran is on the verge of blowing up half the planet. Never mind those nuclear experts who say the country is at best years away from building a viable bomb.
A bunch of surgical air strikes and some dramatic footage of exploding buildings will go a long way toward convincing many among the public that the Bushies are still actively Blowing Stuff Up For Freedom. Note that I’m not saying that dropping some ordnance on Irani nuclear sites is a bad idea in itself; I certainly don’t want that lunatic leader of theirs getting his hands on nukes. I suspect, though, that any action we might take at this stage will be motivated by politics rather than accurate intelligence, and will be ineffective and come back to bite us in the long run.
Guess what? As I write this, the Eisenhower Carrier Group is on its way to the Persian Gulf – within easy striking range of Iran.