Gonna stick my head in the lion's mouth and offer a few thoughts.

[WilliamPitt]

I've been surfing DU since yesterday, specifically in GD, noting the escalating tension and near-frenzy regarding Bush, his speech, Iraq, Iran and Syria. At the same time, I've been reading pretty much every major American newspaper's coverage of the speech, the fallout, the Iran stuff, the "surge," the Capitol Hill hearings, etc.

Here are some thoughts.

1. Any attack on Iran or Syria is farfetched, has been for months, and will remain so for the forseeable future. Why? Because we don't have the troops to repel the inevitable counterattack in Iraq, because an air war will be useless, and because the missile batteries staring down from the Iranian mountains along the Persian Gulf will erase our carrier fleet scant minutes after our first bomb is dropped. "But they're crazy!" is the inevitable response to this, which brings me to...

2. What we are seeing, for the first time, is the complete repudiation of Bush, his people and his whole program across virtually the entire political and media spectrum. There is no support for what they have already done, no support for what they want to do in Iraq, and no support for anything further, not even from the mouthpieces that helped us all into this mess. So what? Well, think about it. How many actions have these guys taken without cover? I think of very few. Iraq, the NSA wiretapping and the rest of it was done by way of a compliant media, a befuddled populace and a rubber-stamp Congress. None of these exist anymore, which means there is no cover. Which brings me to...

3. The speech itself, the tentative, hesitant, spasmodic tone, the furiouis reaction to it, and the broad-spectrum defections within political and media ranks away from Bush and the GOP. The Bush administration has finally and completely collapsed. Let me repeat that:

THE BUSH ADMINISTRATION HAS FINALLY AND COMPLETELY COLLAPSED.

Like any bully, they took one shove in the chest and folded like wet paper. They are completely isolated, in total disarray, under attack from all sides and faced - finally - with serious legal and political consequences via Congress not only for what they might do, but for what they have already done. We have Bush, Cheney and a handful of brain-damaged yes-men cowering at 1600 Pennsylvania. They are routed, outmatched and totally checkmated.

I know that many on DU believe these people are the Anti-Christ and capable of anything (and, P.S., abandon the "Hitler = Bush" line, it's bunk, the word you're looking for is "Stalin"). Perhaps this is so, but as I said, cast your mind back: these guys have done NOTHING to date without layers of comforting insulation: a frigtened populace, a lapdog media, and a compliant Congress. As I said, and as you can see, these are gone now.

I may be wrong, and Bush may wind up doing his best Martin-Sheen-in-The-Dead-Zone impression...but I doubt it.

Why?

Because he's a bully and a coward, and does nothing without that insulation.

Scary stuff? Sure. We're teetering on an edge not unlike the Cuban Missile Crisis. It could all go sideways. But I feel in my heart that what we are seeing is not the end of things, but a new beginning. The bearings on this bloody machine have been stripped. The engine has frozen. The bully has been exposed.

I believe we will look back on this week as the moment when, finally, the worm turned.

Flame away.