Broken Masterpieces

December 17, 2003

An October Surprise

So another Democrat has bought into the crazy conspiracies out there. Madeleine Albright says that Bush may announce the capture of Bin Laden in October right before the election. Here's the Newsmax story. This is just amazing. Any serious Democrats out there? Can anyone believe that someone like this was once Secretary of State?

UPDATE - Here's the transcript from Fox News:

MORT KONDRACKE: "I was here at Fox News, Madeleine Albright, former secretary of state was in the Green Room getting made up for a different show. And she said do you suppose that the Bush administration has Usama bin Laden hidden away somewhere and will bring him out before the election?"

MARA LIASSON: "The October Surprise."

KONDRACKE: "The October -- she was -- she was not smiling, you know."

BRIT HUME: "What did you say?"

KONDRACKE: "I said you can't seriously believe that. And she said, well, she thought it was a possibility. I mean, you know, that is just unthinkable. That's irrational. It's -- but they will believe anything about George Bush, the Democratic Party. And this is not some kid in sandals, you know, working in the Dean campaign. This is the former secretary of state."

Posted by Tim at December 17, 2003 06:30 AM
Comments

Have you noticed the propensity for Americans to buy in to "conspiracy theory" answers over the last 40 years?

Can we correlate this phenomenon with the influence that TV and Hollywood have had? Think about it. If you were to ask the average person what they knew about John Kennedy or the Vietnam War, they'd probably use Oliver Stone's movies as references. Chris Carter, the creator of the X-Files, actually believes there is a conspiracy with regards to aliens and the U.S. government.

Our culture is losing the distinction between imagination and reality.

Posted by: Rusty Lopez at December 17, 2003 07:49 AM

Never forget that Madeline Albright is, and always has been, a Democratic hack. Yes, she does possess some core beliefs that would appear to place her outside the current party mainstream (humanitarian intervention, for example), but she will do (and say) whatever is needed for her party to prevail.

Having said that, I believe that her comments honestly reflect a growing uneasiness on the part of the Dem elite that the war, as a campaign issue, may rapidly slip away from them. Not only does the symbolic value of Saddam's capture hurt their cause, but in their few lucid moments they understand and truly fear that the intelligence extracted from his interrogation will severely undermine the insurgency, verify the Iraq-Al Qaeda link, and prove, beyond a reasonable doubt, the existence of WMD.

Posted by: randy bell at December 17, 2003 09:00 AM