California Dreams. Not Pretty Ones.

Here's the problem. I don't think Wayne Madsen is a nut. I’ve met Wayne a few times over the years at privacy-oriented events. He’s sometimes rumpled, often a little intense, has a spook-like love for conspiracy theory (forgivable since he is a sometime spook himself). He’s definitely out there on the fringe where left meets right, and we’re not always on the same page politically, but I have found him to be very well informed.

So what to make of his latest effort, Terrorism and the Election: California is the Target!? Wayne, like the best intelligence analysts, has an eye for a threat model. But to take this one seriously, well, the cynicism being alleged is immense…

Here’s the scenario we must be all be prepared for:

If the pre-election internal tracking polls and public opinion polls show the Kerry-Edwards ticket leading in key battleground states, the Bush team will begin to implement their plan to announce an imminent terrorist alert for the West Coast for November 2 sometime during the mid afternoon Pacific Standard Time. At 2:00 PST, the polls in Kentucky and Indiana will be one hour from closing (5:00 PM EST – the polls close in Indiana and Kentucky at 6:00 PM EST). Exit polls in both states will be known to the Bush people by that time and if Kentucky (not likely Indiana) looks too close to call or leaning to Kerry-Edwards, the California plan will be implemented. A Bush problem in Kentucky at 6:00 PM EST would mean that problems could be expected in neighboring states and that plans to declare a state of emergency in California would begin in earnest at 3:00 PM PST.

The U.S. Northern Command, which has military jurisdiction over the United States, will, along with the Department of Homeland Security and Schwarzenegger’s police and homeland security officials in Sacramento, declare an “imminent” terrorist threat – a RED ALERT — affecting California’s major urban areas.

Although the polls in California will not be closed as a result of the declaration, the panic that sets in and the early rush hour will clog major traffic arteries and change the plans of many voters to cast their ballot after work.

That terrorist emergency declaration could be made around 5:00 PM PST and with only three hours left for voting throughout the state, a number of working class voters in urban centers will either be caught up in California’s infamous freeway traffic and be too late to get to their polling places or be more concerned about their families and avoid voting altogether.

In most cases I'd dismiss this as 200 proof tinfoil hat stuff and forget it. But I know this guy. Yes, he's over-alarmist sometimes. But sometimes he's right. And he's talking about the guys with the very suspiciously timed press conferences announcing vague terrorist threats.

Even so, can't helping thinking that at least here in Florida we have more to worry about old-fashioned, low-tech means of stuffing the ballot box now that Jeb Bush has forced through a law that allows unlimited unwitnessed absentee ballots.

(Note: If Marsden is too much for you, try fiore, which is sorta the same idea, but funny.)