Bob Woodward makes me want to hurl.

Or grab a bat. Or petition for his deportation.

His new book, State of Denial: Bush at War III, contains a collection of things that have been en train for 4 years, and many at least for 2. Yet he allowed his previous crap (books I, II) to permeate the zeitgiest un-challenged, preventing millions of otherwise sensible Bush-voters to keep beliving the fairy tale they were being fed. The Washington Post tells us Andy Card thought rummy should go. There are plenty of other non-surprises. Condi Rice is useless and doesn't pay attention. Violence on the ground has been much worse than advertsised. There is no plan. Generals are freaked. Politics trumps reality. Cheney is the real decision-maker. We are in much more danger, not less.

Duh. The only still-perplexing thing for me is how many seemingly sensible people this era will show as violently and willfully dangerous to self and nation. Who do I mean? Well, if you're still on the fence instead of on a ladder screaming your outrage, I guess I mean you.

I'm tired of trying to persuade the vainly unpersuadable. And I'm definitely getting a feeling for the atmospherics in the Raleigh Tavern. But what do I know? Let's check the handy predicto-list from Oct 2004 and see how we're doing:

The things we will learn in the next 6-18 months

• How much Iraqi looted explosives made it to Chechnya and Palestine and small Mediterranean ports.
• How many permanent Bases we have built in the western desert of Iraq and their unfavorable lease condtions.
• What Paul Bremer, Jay Garner and Colin Powell really thought of Operation Iraqi Freedom.
• What was left out of the Taguba Report on Abu Ghraib, and where there 2, 3 or 4 more "Abu Ghraibs"?
• What Donald Rumsfeld thinks of George Bush.
• How "cordial" where Cheney's 3 or 4 visits to Langley and what resulted.
• What did NSC staffers really think about Condoleeza Rice.
• Who leaked Valerie Plame's CIA NOC status to Robert Novak.
• Where all that missing walking-around/greasing-Iraqi-skids money for occupation forces went.
• What the EPA didn't tell us in the WTC environmental impact study.
• What the Mediare Prescription Drug Bill really costs.
• Who was at the Bush Administration's secret energy policy meetings conducted by Cheney and what did they talk about.
• How much the Pentagon was undercounting dead and wounded--ours and theirs.
• What really happened and what did we give away to have our Navy Recon plane and crew released by the Chinese in early 2001.
• How much well-vetted intel passed through NSC, State and DoD about North Korea's fast-tracking of plutonium conversion beginning mid- to late-2001.
• How deeply was Ahmed Chalabi aligned with Iran's Intelligence Services and how obvious, in hindsight, was it?
• How many times Tony Blair had to talk George Bush down off the ledge.
• How much DoD money was given to Pakistan, Afghanistan, Turkey, Jordan, Syria
• How deeply known, and how high, was the WMD McGuffin known as such and, how surprisingly early.

and last but not least:

• How many of Bush's notable business and political supporters were "truly and deeply" concerned about his volatile imbalances and decision-making, but were "afraid to say anything."

I missed some, like Foley or Waziri/Taliban treaties, and we're late-but-on-track for others. And there's some bad-bad mojo the clean-up crew's gonna have to fix in that list.

And guess who's gonna obstruct and obfuscate while that crew attempts to do so? Like I said, Raleigh Tavern.