In brief:

1.  Hillary Clinton has no chance at winning in the fall if she is nominated.

2.  She knows and believes she can’t win.  She is not a fool.

3.  Therefore, she must intend the consequences of her actions: to help McCain win the election.

Let's stop making excuses for her and face the ugly, but much simpler, truth.

An analysis follows ...

Why the hell is she still in this race, anyways?

If she steals the nomination with shenanigans at the Denver convention, she'll stir up feelings of disenfranchisement that have festered since 2000 and 2004.  There is no way in hell she'll have the enthusiasm and unity she'll need to win after that.  If she's nominated, she'll lose.  SHE CAN'T WIN.

All her sticking around in this race is doing is helping McCain.

If she doesn't have the ETHICS to quit when she can't win, I sure as hell don't trust her with the White House.

This is not much of a diary.  It's more of a brainstorm area on a hypothetical.

Let's say you're a corrupt as hell President.  And you are desiring to "bust out" the economy for your friends.  You've only got a few months left in office.  And a recession has begun.

... still with me?  ... then help me speculate on what might be possible ...

Hillary fears Obama knowing the dirt about the last 20+ years a lot more than a McCain admin.  Can you foresee McCain prosecuting anyone from the Bush or Clinton administrations?  Me neither.  This is about controlling the secrets of the Presidency, as much as it is the power of the presidency.  

I see some heavy attention being paid to Chris Matthews.  Certainly it makes sense to call someone to account for their words.  

But I think we're getting played here.

My theory below.  

Courtesy of Think Progress we learn that:

The 2008 elections are still a year away, but this morning outgoing Homeland Security Adviser Frances Fragos Townsend told CNN that al Qaeda may target the presidential elections. She said that while there is currently no “specific information,” “we know that Al Qaeda views these periods as being a particularly vulnerable period.”

Remember those six nuclear weapons that went missing for thirty-six hours around August 30th?  Remember how they were flown over the United States from North Dakota to Louisiana, where they sat unrecognized until a nameless hero noticed and raised the alarm?

Of course you remember!  Because it is scary as hell.   These six warheads held a lot of weapons-grade nuclear material:  around 60 Hiroshimas.  

Imagine you had the opportunity to interview Nancy Pelosi on camera.  Your readers had overwhelmingly made calls to ask about why impeachment was off the table.

So what do you ask her?   "Are You Too Well-Behaved to Get Us Out of Iraq?"

... went missing for 10+ hours last week.  

Once you believe it couldn't have been an accident, you have to ask questions like:  

How many people were necessary to allow this to happen?

Who benefits from this news?

Has this happened before?

This should be a very easy poll, but it's a fundamentally important issue right now.  For everyone talking about politics when they should be talking about the rule of law in this country, it's a simple choice.  What is more important to you, if you had to decide?  What if someone else's life depended on it?  What if someone else's KID's life depends on it?  Those are the stakes today.  Choose wisely.

I just want to capture my thoughts, knowing full well I could be very wrong, but my gut is telling me that the one thing this White House (Cheney and his puppet) wants most of all is precisely what they keep telling us they don't want:  an Iranian nuclear test.

Sorry if this offends your sensibilities.  I'm not trying to troll.  Please don't read the rest if all you have to add is "omg CT diary omg!"

The full cost of the Iraq debacle will be unquantifiable, in part due to the ripples of chaos spread throughout financial systems world-wide, but to a larger extent due to the pricelessness of tens (if not hundreds) of thousands of human lives and limbs.  Still, just in terms of the cost to the US, we can be confident the pricetag is greater than 650 billion dollars.

That money could have bought a $100 laptop computer for all 6.5 billion people on this planet.  Think of that.  What if George Bush had said, in 2003, that instead of attacking Iraq, we would give every human being on the planet a laptop computer.  Think of the good will, the togetherness, this planet would have felt, rather than the division, hate, and endless retribution the Iraq fiasco has brought on us.

But a $100 laptop, you say, that's impossible!  No, not at all.  More on the flip.

Every time you talk to that 33% who still approves of Bush, ask them about Bush's response to soaring energy costs.

Crude oil prices hit a record $75 a barrel today.  There is little doubt they will go higher, and surely reach catastrophic levels following any military action on Iran by either the U.S. or Isreal.  Even the most die hard Bush supporter will realize this.

To the 33% who support Bush:  "What is Bush doing TODAY to address this energy crisis?"

This fall's elections have to look terrifying to the GOP.  Losing control of either the House or Senate would risk Bush's plans for Iran.

Surely this administration wants to act quickly on Iran, believing that America will rally behind the president in a time of crisis.  That would potentially change the 2006 elections, and as a result, keep Bush from facing any real challenge to his lawlessness.

Recent public opinion polls, however, show that the public is deeply unhappy with the situation in Iraq.    If the president simply attacked Iran, the public would likely not side with him.  The problem with picking a fight, it seems, is making the other guy throw the first punch.

The problem for Karl Rove is:  how do I make it look like we were dragged into war?  If we can figure out his answers to this question, we will know his strategy for insuring that we are at war before November 2006, and that America looks like the victim.

I'll do some brainstorming below the fold, and I call on you to put on your Karl Rove devil-cap and pitch in.