OCTOBER SURPRISE, RIGHT ON SCHEDULE

President Bush's top political adviser, Karl Rove, said Wednesday that the Bush-Cheney campaign is planning some October "surprises" for challengers John Kerry and John Edwards.

"We've got a couple of surprises that we intend to spring," Rove told ABC radio host Sean Hannity while explaining that he intends to wage an aggressive campaign no matter what the polls show.

--NewsMax, 9/29/04

In the last week before the election, ABCNEWS is holding a videotaped message from a purported al Qaeda terrorist warning of a new attack on America, the DRUDGE REPORT has learned.

The terrorist claims on tape the next attack will dwarf 9/11. "The streets will run with blood," and "America will mourn in silence" because they will be unable to count the number of the dead. Further claims: America has brought this on itself for electing George Bush who has made war on Islam by destroying the Taliban and making war on Al Qaeda....

The terrorist's face is concealed by a headdress, and he speaks in an American accent, making it difficult to identify the individual.

US intelligence officials believe the man on tape may be Adam Gadhan - aka Adam Pearlman, a California native who was highlighted by the FBI in May as an individual most likely to be involved in or have knowledge of the next al Qaeda attacks....

--Drudge Report today

Too perfect, just too perfect.

Here's a May San Francisco Chronicle story about this kid (who is, of course, a suspect even though his face conveniently can't be seen on the tape). The article says he's a metalhead-turned-Muslim child of parents who raised him in a hippieish way in, yes, California. What a gift for Karl Rove -- the culture war and the war on terror in one neat package, and, unlike Lindh, he's at large. And his terror tape arrives the last week in October. What luck!

I know that somewhere this story takes a sinister right turn from reality into election-year propaganda mapped out months ago on Rove's laptop -- I just can't pinpoint where. Sorry -- I don't buy it for a second.

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...the sight or even the thought of Goldstein produced fear and anger automatically.

--George Orwell, 1984

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UPDATE: Josh Marshall quotes an NBC report that strongly suggests that this is no more alarming that the previous bits of hyped booga-booga the Bushies have sent out when W. is behind in the polls (headline: "CIA can’t authenticate taped threat to U.S.; NBC: Analysts cite 'low' concern").