Very sadly, this might be a real possibility.
As an example, consider the Halloween Bombing, on the Madrid timetable, already a scenario enjoying wide speculation. It's certainly something on the FBI director's mind.
Were the President to go from, say, 4 points ahead in the polls, to an electoral defeat - say by 600 votes in Florida - in less than 72 hours, because of the sudden fear reaction and a 17 percent upsurge in MTV generation youthful fear, resulting in the anti-government vote experienced in Spain - Hanoi John would be heading toward the White House and more than a few folks would be oiling their guns.
Such a conflict would be unfocused and poorly organized and it would not even appear that we were undergoing a true Civil War for months and, perhaps, years.
Even a Confederate historian can look to the example of 1864 - and the importance of the Fall of Atlanta and the burning of the Shenandoah Valley to the reversal of Lincoln's re-election fortunes as hope that a similar, though certainly not identical, rash of good fortune will give President Bush his second term.
But, consider a September bombing, and the sudden collapse of the economy - an ATG missile bringing down the Airline industry - a grocery store truck bomb clamping down on the trucking industry and choking our consumer supply lines with a new security threat.
They haven't quite crossed the line, yet, but the True Believing D's are not above using fear as a unifying factor. They may have laid the groundwork by the Evil work of Clarke and CBS/Viacom - sowing doubt and fears of incompetence in the minds of the “undecided.”
If the President lost because of irrational fear helped by additional fear brought about by a temporary economic upheaval like the one in the weeks after 911 – then a victory by the D’s might eventually lead to a Waco incident every few weeks.
The Right would be seriously split over patience versus action for years into the future.
But --- Hillary doesn’t want Hanoi John to win, and we can seriously underestimate the capacity of President Bush to build an emotional connection with the voters and the American People’s traditional, but worn and assaulted, capacity for Rally.
You can be sure the Terror Networks are considering all these things, as should we all. The Fall of the Popular Party, 311, is a huge selling point for the Terror factions hoping to undermine our shaky confidence in our Electoral system.
Hanoi John, of all people, knows the advantage of “bringing the war back home.” Just ask the former North Vietnamese generals how valuable his and his compatriot’s work was in dividing American voter’s perceptions and undermining once victorious strategies in that conflict.
President Bush has known all along – we are in grave danger of losing our freedom if the battlefields of the War on Terror move from Baghdad and Kabul back to New York or the heartland.
Expect the D’s to make the mistake of calling the FBI director’s warnings “alarmist.” Expect also the opposite – silence, for fear of raising public awareness (and thus disarming a Madrid backlash) of the possibility that foreign governments and terrorist might attempt to defeat Bush in a well-timed attack.