And, So It Begins...

This, from the New York Times certainly provides a whisper of what's on the horizon.

Also disturbing, the Times reports that:

"While President Bush is spending the weekend here for the Asian-Pacific Economic Cooperation forum, President Hu Jintao of China is here in the midst of a two-week visit to Argentina, Brazil, Chile and Cuba. In the course of it, he has announced more than $30 billion in new investments and signed long-term contracts that will guarantee China supplies of the vital materials it needs for its factories.

"The United States, preoccupied with the worsening situation in Iraq, seems to have attached little importance to China's rising profile in the region. If anything, increased trade between Latin America and China has been welcomed as a means to reduce pressure on the United States to underwrite economic reforms, with geopolitical considerations pushed to the background.
'On the diplomatic side, the Chinese are quietly but persistently and effectively operating just under the U.S. radar screen,' said Richard Feinberg, who was the chief Latin America adviser at the National Security Council during the Clinton administration. 'South America is obviously drifting, and diplomatic flirtations with China would tend to underscore the potential for divergences with Washington.'

"Chinese investment and purchases are seen as vital for economies short on capital and struggling to emerge from a long slump. In Argentina earlier this week, for example, Mr. Hu announced nearly $20 billion in new investment in railways, oil and gas exploration, construction and communications satellites, a huge boost for a country whose economic vitality has been sapped since a financial collapse in December 2001.'"

And, Dubya's focus remains his hellish war in Iraq. And, oh yes, lately, he's actually begun showing signs that the nuclear potential of Iran and that nut in North Korea might, just might, be something worth taking a closer look at; besides, yes, BESIDES, of course, gay marriage and a woman's right to choose.

Why don't I have confidence in Condi Rice to understand the immensity of the geopolitical shifts that have seemed to creep up on us -- The Fog comes on little cat feet... (Carl Sandburg, The Fog). From the shadows, from the fog of Dubya's unflaggingly single-minded crusade against the evildoers, a quiet, but nonetheless realignment of the rest of the world's peoples is shifting toward something that will, most likely, leave America behind wallowing about in it's newly-sticky morass of moral value initiatives that, quite frankly, the rest of the world couldn't care a whit about.

The complexities of the emerging geopolitical realignment is as interesting as it is frightening. The inability of Dubya to understand that is downright scary.