Terrorist Attacks And The US election

flogen

OK, all conspiracies aside (such as the October surprise theory), do you think terrorists will target the US before the elections in a hope to swing the vote?
It happened in Spain, so why not the US?

Also, most importantly, what do you think would happen as a result. God forbid we face another Sept 11th just a week or two before the elections, would it swing in favour of Kerry as voters see it as Bush's failure? Would it swing it for Bush as voters see it as a need for a more hardline president? Or would the election get post-poned to avoid any distorted results?

I'm not sure what would happen tbh. I wouldn't be surprised if an attack was discovered to be in planning, but I would be surprised if a big attack actually did occour. I think that if it did, Bush would lose because any big attack would leave people saying "Ok, you had all these wars, and spent all this money and taken away all these rights, and still we're just as vulnerable". While Bush could say he didn't have knowledge of Sept 11th, how could he say the same after 3 years of doing nothing but avoiding anything like it again?
Then again, America and its politics doesn't always work like that.

I'd be surprised if the vote was halted, even Republicans have shown negativity to that idea, its a fair point to make that voting continued during WW2 and even the Civil War (with votes being taken only minutes for big battles!), so what difference should this make?

flogen

mike65

I dont think it would make any difference to the likely result. i.e. a Bush win as things stand. It would be awkward for Kerry to make capital out of a terrorist act he could easily be seen to be exploiting the still warm dead.

Mike.

JohnK

I'd imagine that a terrorist attack would hand the election to Bush on a silver platter.

flogen

mike65 wrote:

I dont think it would make any difference to the likely result. i.e. a Bush win as things stand. It would be awkward for Kerry to make capital out of a terrorist act he could easily be seen to be exploiting the still warm dead.

Mike.

I don't think either politician is cold hearted (or stupid) enough to do something like that, but they wouldn't need to.

I think that an attack on the scale of sept 11th would boost one candidate or another to an un-doubted win, and that would be a decision made by the voters on their own rather than what Bush or Kerry were to say about it.

I wonder how many Americans would see an attack on the US as proof that Bush was right and they need to be kept safe (something Kerry may not be seen to be capable of), or who would see it as a huge failing and last straw for the Bush camp.

flogen

Zem

hey guys just thought i'd voice my opinion, i think it is hard to say which would benefit from voters reacting to a terrorist incident if it would happen but it would definately polarise the votes even further although it does seem that those that don't like bush already are voting for kerry which i think at the last figures i saw was like 86% but i don't think it was a 'scientific study' i think it was probably a fox news thing and they are pro-bush i think, so in all i think it wouldn't really have a major impact on society because america is already so split over it already.