Elections, and the possibility of a dead Osama bin Laden

Given that elections are now just over 50 days away, how much will things change if the US incursions into Pakistan yield Osama himself--dead or alive--or even al Qaeda's number two man-Zawahiri?

It is not outside the domains of possibility. But, imagine for a moment that happens--even as late as the Monday before elections. The global implications will be HUGE--far more than influencing the elections here on November 4th.

For starters, nabbing bin Laden or Zawahiri will just swing the elections to the Republican side. Not only the presidential elections, but even the Congressional seats. Every Democrat who opposed Bush's approach on the war on terror will pretty much be on an ejection seat. While as loyal citizens, Democrats will be thrilled with the capture of bin Laden or Zawahiri, I am guessing this will be ultimate nightmare scenario.
(I think early voting might make all the difference then. I suspect Democrats will urge their faithful to vote as early as possible--taking such a scenario also into consideration.)

Not only will Republicans end up winning it all, it might then take Democrats more than a decade to recover and gain any significant political strength. Conservatives would have completely taken over the Supreme Court by then.

If such a scenario unfolds, then we can expect Britain's Labour Party to be thrashed at the polls. Gordon Brown is a weak leader even now. We can also expect tough-on-terrorists parties to sweep elections in continental Europe. This will also strengthen Putin and Medvedev, who think that anybody who disagrees with them is a terrorist.

Israel will be tempted to become even more aggressive towards Syria, Hezbollah, and Iran. In turn, Iran will feel even more threatened and could start volleying missiles in the Strait of Hormuz, and shut down oil shipping for weeks.

Many Islamic countries will have to deal with a public face of being happy that the terrorists were caught, but will have to deal with the internal displeasure from a significant percentage of their citizenry that won't be happy if bin Laden is caught or found dead.

And, given that the world's economy is quite in doldrums now, I can only imagine that this (more so if Iran shuts down Hormuz even for a month) will trigger a global economic depression.

My own personal preferences aside, as an academic interested in politics and public policy, this is a scenario that completely fascinates me.