Cobb: If Shit Gets Thick

December 24, 2003

If Shit Gets Thick

Over at Calblog, some speculation is going on about what might happen if we suffer another terrorist attack on par with nine-eleven. I will speculate also.

After the earthquake the other day, L and I started talking about what would be the likely target. Not having heard the details of new intelligence which Jay rightly says shows progress in the assym war, we thought of the most ghastly target imaginable. The Rose Parade.

Anyone who lives anywhere near Pasadena around the first of the year knows how impossible it is to get in and out of that town when the Tournament of Roses is going on. A terrorist with a dirty bomb could probably find no better target than the Rose Bowl on New Years day.

I can only think of one or two targets that would be more appalling to Americans were it to be destroyed by an act of terror. The first would be the Statue of Liberty and the second would probably be the Lincoln Memorial. You can blow up the White House in Independence Day and not many people screw up their faces. But when Charlton Heston wept on the Planet of the Apes at the desecration of Lady Liberty, she embedded herself that much deeper in the hearts of all Americans. I could go on about Lincoln, but the human target of choice would be the Rose Bowl.

I'm having a hard time keeping tears out of my eyes just thinking about such a thing, and I can be fairly grim. But I can assure you that America would go ballistic in several dimensions were such a thing to occur.

First, we'd start slapping each other around. The chorus of "I told you so" would become deafening. When I say 'shit gets thick', believe me, people will be cursing on the air.

Predictions:

1. People to the militant right of GW Bush will begin coming out of the woodwork. Do not be surprised to hear from Ross Perot. Another Republican with a war record will challenge. McCain perhaps.

2. Wesley Clark will have a better chance to be a hawk. If he does so he will unite Democrats.

3. Arabs and Muslims will be beaten in American streets.

4. North Korea will slip further in our priorities.

5. The dispersion of troops in the Middle East will up the ante to tactical nuclear.

6. The French will do a 180 and back the US. Chirac will pull a right-wing rabbit out of his hat which will devour the weasel.

7. We will begin to undermine governments like we did in the bad old days. Congress will undo restrictions on gunboat diplomacy.

8. The Crusade is on. Collateral be damned.

9. National ID happens quicker.

10. PC dies, people will smoke, drink, curse and have sex.

All in all a nasty situation for enemies and percieved enemies of the US. Not much changing for the worse domestically. I think the courts will continue check and balance as they have begun to do.

Posted by mbowen at December 24, 2003 03:49 PM

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Comments

After visiting the Hoover Dam recently and seeing the security, I think that is a likely target. It may not have the psychological impact at first but the massive flooding of cities and the resulting longterm lack of power would be such that we wouldn't have time to think about I told you so's.

However, it would be difficult to inflict the severe level of damage on Hoover Dam to cause such an effect.

Posted by: Justene at December 24, 2003 05:06 PM

Mr. Bowen: Fantastic blog; please keep up the great work.

I find it hard to argue with your line of thinking about the next wave of terror and its likely results on the American body politic...

...of course, I also happen to think the appearance of BSE in Washington is no accident -- but, IMO, far more likely to have originated with some PETA-brained f**kwit than with al-Qaeda...

Posted by: Ted Seay at December 24, 2003 06:28 PM

I hope you're wrong. All except for #10.

Posted by: don at December 24, 2003 06:28 PM