Political turmoil will only accelerate beyond the election...

Buchanan gets the sense of it, throwing his rocks from the sidelines:

How, after Bush has called the Democratic Party a cut-and-run crowd, and Democrats have accused the White House and Pentagon of being incompetents in fighting the war in Iraq, does one ask for and receive bipartisan support to stay the course? What do our troops in Iraq, who risk their lives every day, think when they read that their commanding general believes, "We've got to get the (expletive) out of here," and that a victory strategy is "not my job."

France's defeat at Dien Bien Phu in Indochina lead to a second war of national liberation in Algeria, the fall of the Fourth Republic and the call for Gen. de Gaulle to assume power. The general did, and he rang down the curtain on the French Empire. Are we facing an American Dien Bien Phu?

The real question, is that after the fireworks of the campaign season are over and each party is labeled unable to govern: what happens?

Comments

[Anton Vereshchagin]

Interesting comparison, is Colin Powell the US version of de Gaulle? Wesley Clark? Anthony Zinni?

[zenpundit]

"And as long as any survive who have had experience of oligarchical supremacy and domination, they regard their present constitution as a blessing, and hold equality and freedom as of the utmost value. But as soon as a new generation has arisen, and the democracy has descended to their children's children, long association weakens their value for equality and freedom, and some seek to become more powerful than the ordinary citizens; and the most liable to this temptation are the rich. So when they begin to be fond of office, and find themselves unable to obtain it by their own unassisted efforts and their own merits, they ruin their estates, while enticing and corrupting the common people in every possible way"
- Polybius

[bricetebbs]

Great quote. The rest of it is good too:

"By which means when, in their senseless mania for reputation, they have made the populace ready and greedy to receive bribes, the virtue of democracy is destroyed, and it is transformed into a government of violence and the strong hand. For the mob, habituated to feed at the expense of others, and to have its hopes of a livelihood in the property of its neighbors, as soon as it has got a leader sufficiently ambitious and daring, being excluded by poverty from the sweets of civil honors, produces a reign of mere violence. Then come tumultuous assemblies, massacres, banishments, redivisions of land; until, after losing all trace of civilization, it has once more found a master and a despot."

[zenpundit]

Hi Brice,

Yes, but fortunately we are not at that second stage yet.

[bricetebbs]

True, I would say we are only about 20 words into the second part, but its worth looking at what might be coming next.

[Outlandish Josh]

I'm all for bringing down the curtain on the US empire.

[John Robb]

Brice/Zen, the position depends on how you spin tax cuts/deficit spending and illegal immigration.

[zenpundit]

Sharp as always, John. I'm for maximizing liberty but with effectively enforced, minimal rule-sets that have nonzero outcomes.

Josh,

You must be a fan of the dark ages.

[Tangurena]

The "blame it on the democrats" mindset must have reached critical mass.

>"[Dobson] touched on the uproar over former U.S. Rep. Mark Foley, D-Florida, who resigned Friday in a scandal over electronic messages he sent to former teenage male congressional pages."
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/010172.php

Even Fox has been repeating that Foley is a Democrat over and over again, hoping that sheeple will forget that he has been the Republican rep for a long time.

[blvravin]

what will happen after the election? well, with the house going to the dems and the senate maybe also...the lessons going back to 2004 might be implemented...

in august of 2004 when the videos out of fallujah were at full top...22 soliders banned together with 7 soliders when the 7 soldiers refused to drive a tanker full of contaiminated fuel to taji...they were in the brig for about 8 hours before the pentagon was notified by the commanding officer who was demoted...and they were not part of any video for the election...

seems someone trys real hard to keep the relative saftey of the soldiers and the iraqis inline so that a measured pullout can begin...

the problem is those who spew hate and have no desire to see this war end...no matter what side they are on...

by the ABC Brian Ross blog about the virgina national guard supposedly leaving some truckers i would say that story was only the foundation to a new horror story they want to build out of iraq...along with someone putting on his website that a 41 second video was posted on october 5, 2006 about planting devices on buses in a very rudementery diagram...i didn't see the video just the pic that was posted...

so, i would say that between august 8th to august 10th another convoy is the target...cause that is what real intelligence is about...connecting the dots...