BLUE PLATE SPECIAL from Earth-tones ex-VEEP

The blue phantom appears again and again, getting bluer with each apparition.

Former Vice President Al Gore will deliver a major address Monday on the threat posed by policies of the Bush Administration to the Constitution and the checks and balances it created. The speech will specifically point to domestic wiretapping and torture as examples of the administration's efforts to extend executive power beyond Congressional direction and judicial review.

Yes, Al will address the two concerns Americans have about the Republicans, oops, maybe I mean Democrats?

National Security and Crime [actually both in the cases of wiretapping and torture].

Not even the Democratic lunatic fringe on the Left Coast is charging that the wiretaps by the NSA are trying to eavesdrop on American political organizations to play political tricks. They are tapping lines to learn of possible attacks on America.

Nor have the allegations of torture, outside of the Abu Gharaib fiasco which was never authorized by a general officer, ever held serious water. Renditions of foreign suspects to other countries or exposure to extreme mental duress at Guantanamo may have taken place, but the suspected perps have again been potential threats to national security, not Amcits charged with disturbing the domestic peace.

The portentous nature of the event is described thusly:

The Vice President will make the case that the country -- including the legislative and judicial branches and all Americans -- must act now to defend the systems put into place by the country's founders to curb executive power or risk permanent and irreversible damage to the Constitution.

Actually, the founders were halfway-minded to make George Washington a king. It was our First President who demurred and actually ramped down executive power, but even George I never foresaw Lilliputians in Congress and the courts trying to tie down George III [!?!] in matters of national and domestic security.

Al is giving additional evidence that his defeat in Florida was fortuitous for the Republic. Al’s Deep Indigo shade of blueness won’t gain traction in a country still unconvinced that the Democrats don’t have strong credentials on national defense [against terrorism, for instance] and crime [like treason, for instance].

Bill Clinton tended to look the other way when he had opportunities to catch potential miscreants as when Sudan offered Osama’s head on a plate in 1995-6. Too many legal hoops to jump through and smoke-rings in his mind for Bill and his phalanxes of lawyers to confront.

George I never became king, but George III never wants to become one. GW only wants to make sure another 9/11 doesn’t happen on his watch. If Al’s former boss Bill had paid more attention to sleuthing out the perps after the 1993 World Trade Tower attacks, the '98 Embassy bombings in Africa, the attack on the Cole, and the first 9/11 might never have happened.

Ultra-violet Al will catch the attention of the Boston-Beltway corridor and the Left Coast blue crabs, but his whimpering will not halt the red-shift in the flyover states toward valuing defense and domestic security.