This is a great post f rom Brad Delong...Check it...

"More Thuds and Screams from the Topkapi Palace

The plot is well-known. A small group of men sneak through the Sultan's Topkapi Palace in the middle of the night. A thud, and a splash. The following morning it is announced that the evil vizier of the Sultan has disappeared, and that the callow and bewildered Sultan is now receiving advice from a different group of high officials, and that henceforth everything will be fine.

Outside the palace, the merchants and craftsmen of Istanbul wonder what really happened.

Fantasy, of course. But meanwhile, back in today's world, Counterspin Central hears footsteps, thuds, and splashes from inside the darkened White House. He interprets these as signs that the grownup Republicans' in the national security wing are finally making their move to capture the Bush administration, and turn it from a public embarrassment and a policy disaster into something better:

Counterspin Central: The "Dump Cheney" movement within the Republican party is really picking up steam...

While Democratic rivals battle for the presidential nomination in a succession of grueling primary elections, Vice President Dick Cheney appears to be fighting to secure his spot on the Republican ticket behind President George W Bush. The vice president... is seen more and more by Republican Party politicos as a drag on the president's re-election chances... instead of the moderate voice of wisdom and caution that voters thought they were getting in the vice president, ongoing disclosures about his role in the drive to war in Iraq and other controversial administration plans depict him as an extremist... who exercises undue influence over Bush to further a radical agenda, a notion that was backed by the publication of a recent book about former treasury secretary Paul O'Neill, who described Cheney as creating a "kind of praetorian guard around the president" that blocked out contrary views.... Halliburton... billions of dollars in contracts for Iraq's postwar reconstruction... a major political liability....

Reports were already surfacing two months ago that a discreet "dump Cheney" movement had been launched by intimate associates of Bush's father... Brent Scowcroft and former secretary of state James Baker.... Scowcroft and Baker... have privately expressed great concern over Cheney's unparalleled influence over the younger Bush and the damage that has done to US relations with longtime allies...

The grownup Republicans' move is long, long overdue. But where are the grownup Republicans in the economic policy wing?

And if this strike by Scowcroft, Baker, and company is to do any good, they need to ponder the advice that Alessandro Farnese, Prince of Parma, gave to Henri, Duc de Guise: "As we say in Italy, he who draws his sword against his prince needs to throw away his scabbard." "

If this story is true, it may have been escalated by Jimmy Bakers appointment to go and round up some love from Iraq's creditors. Jimmy is popular in European capitals, and I'm sure he got an earful about the assholes in the White House, and how they can go blow themselves if they think they are getting any love from Old Europe, or Middle Eastern capitals for that matter. Then Jimmy comes back and tells Poppy that the evil Vizier has Junior in his icy grip and is blowing up Nato and compromising US economic interests in the cause of getting Rummy and Dick a foreign policy woodie.

I would love to see a GOP bloodbath. I really don't believe the removal of Cheney will come to pass, at least not yet. If the Plame thing catches fire, then this becomes a real issue, because Poppy will have to talk his son through the crisis...