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You are here: Home / Organizing & Resistance / Enhanced Protest Techniques / Open Thread: Homegrown Terrorism

Open Thread: Homegrown Terrorism

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Via TPM, the Seattle Times reports there’s been an arrest in connection with the attempted bombing at Spokane’s MLK Day Parade:

A magistrate clerk at the U.S. District Court in Spokane said that Kevin William Harpham is scheduled to make an initial appearance Wednesday afternoon in Spokane. Harpham was arrested Wednesday near Addy, Stevens County.
__
Harpham, 36, has been charged with one count of attempting to use a weapon of mass destruction and one count of knowingly possessing an improvised explosive device, according to a complaint that was unsealed Wednesday.
__
An FBI source in Washington, D.C., said one man was arrested Wednesday outside a home near Addy. Agents, including a bomb expert from Quantico, Va., were preparing to search a house where others associated with the suspect may be living, the source said.
__
The suspect is believed to be affiliated with white supremacists, the source said…

Reader Interactions

129Comments

  5. 5.

    COB

    A small correction perhaps?

    Muslim-turbaned, Koran-spouting, white supremacists

    Isn’t that how it was meant to read?

  6. 6.

    The Moar You Know

    white supremacists = Nazis = Hitler = socia1ism = liberal operation.

    You heard it here first. About an hour before you’ll hear it on Fox.

  7. 7.

    Calouste

    Can we just call this the attempted mass murder, not the attempted bombing? The bombing was the means, but the mass murder was the goal.

  10. 10.

    Mike E

    I’m surprised he didn’t go all Eric Rudolph and blend into the ferns. Nice catch.

  12. 12.

    Studly Pantload

    Terrorists my ass. These are just some spirited boys who are at heart God-fearing Christians. HEY, LOOK, IT’S A BROWN PERSON NOT TRYING TO THWART AN AL QAEDA PLOT–BETTER HAUL HIS BARBARIC ASS BEFORE A HOUSE SUBCOMMITTEE!

  13. 13.

    Villago Delenda Est

    Surprise, surprise surprise!

    It’s a racist asshole wingtard. A teabagger ally.

    Gosh, never saw that coming…and neither did the fuckwits of The Village!

  14. 14.

    bkny

    jeez … don’t harsh on peter king’s day; obviously, this was timed by the feds to embarrass him. ;-)

  15. 15.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @The Moar You Know:

    The wingtards are too fucking stupid to know that “National Socia1ism” is a marketing slogan.

    So, naturally, Nazis are actually liberals…the ORIGINAL DFH’s, in fact.

    Well, they do have fashion sense. That means they MUST be gay!

  16. 16.

    patrick II

    I am always amazed that someone could with premeditation create such a weapon but would also leave two t-shirts in the bomb bag which were from local events near his town.

  19. 19.

    danimal

    Do you think he’ll get better treatment awaiting trial than Pvt. Manning? Discuss.

  20. 20.

    Politically Lost

    I’m reading this post in line at Foster’s Freeze standing next to some moo-ron of a young adult with an Arian Nation hat on.

    I’m in NorCal wine country liberal Satan territory. There are ignorant fuckwads like this everywhere.

  21. 21.

    Cat

    Pro-Tip:
    When buying 2nd hand tshirts for your home made bomb, don’t buy ones given out by the local charity events.

  22. 22.

    Cat Lady

    He’s just a white lone nut like all of the other white lone nuts but every Muslim is a terrorist. QED

  23. 23.

    meh

    There is a big Aryan Nation compound out in Idaho not that far away from where he was arrested…

  27. 27.

    gene108

    Just posting this again from another thread, because I found it interesting.

    There was a Republican freshman Rep. from Texas on C-SPAN this morning. A caller asked, what Republicans have done to create jobs. The Rep. said they repealed Obamacare. Someone Tweeted a similar comment. His response, again, was the House repealed Obamacare.

    You have House members claiming they’ve repealed it, without the Senate passing the bill and the President signing the repeal into law.

    Fucking morons.

  28. 28.

    Studly Pantload

    @Cat:

    Good murderin’ and maimin’ help is so hard to find nowadays, what with all the Evil Geniuses having moved exclusively into white-collar crimes, which of course is where the big money is.

  33. 33.

    Southern Beale

    @gene108:

    And no one has yet explained to me how repealing Obamacare creates jobs. Just cause they called it the “job killing death panel Soc1al1zed medicine bill” or whatever DOES NOT MAKE IT SO.

    Why is it these cannards seep into the narrative and no one asks them about this? Obamacare kills jobs, because the GOP said so! Easy peasy! Well I said I saw monkeys fly out of my ass this morning. Any takers?

  35. 35.

    Villago Delenda Est

    @gene108:

    The guy’s sticking to his talking points. Obviously incapable of thinking on his own, or on the spot. The kind of guy who would have had a very short tour of duty as a junior officer in ‘Nam.

  36. 36.

    Gustopher

    Ah, another three-namer like Lee Harvey Oswald, John Wayne Gacey, John Quincey Adams, Neil Patrick Harris and Barack Hussein Obama. You just can’t trust the three-namers.

  38. 38.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Southern Beale:

    Well I said I saw monkeys fly out of my ass this morning. Any takers?

    Thank you for your kind offer, but I must decline. Flying ass-monkeys really do better someplace where they have a yard to play in.

  40. 40.

    El Cid

    The FBI actually referred to the bomb plot as “domestic terrorism”; I haven’t seen any FBI release on the arrest yet.

    On the subjects of Nazi’s and fascism & ‘leftists’ or ‘soshullists’, the Nazis and other fascists were pretty clear about that.

    If you’re against the theory of class exploitation in an industrialized society of owners versus workers, and you’re against the theory of class conflict within such a society between capitalists and wage workers…

    In other words, if it’s not capitalists versus labor…

    …then you aren’t a “soshullist”.

  41. 41.

    Gustopher

    Why is my comment awaiting moderation? Was it the reference to John Quincey Adams?

  42. 42.

    Mike G

    The suspect is believed to be affiliated with white supremacists

    You could knock me over with a feather, I’m so shocked.
    File it under Isolated Incident of Right-Wing Violence, #545,408,780,903.

  43. 43.

    Gustopher

    Hopefully they have enough to drag in some of his little white supremacist friends too.

    There are plenty of them, we can spare a few.

  44. 44.

    Cat

    @Studly Pantload:
    Yet another industry suffering from brain drain due to the out sized compensation the FIRE industries pay.

    When will our Gov’t act to curb the FIRE industries behavior so other Evil Geniuses can once again find competent henchmen at an affordable wage?

  47. 47.

    Cermet

    If this is the guy (lets not jump the gun), charging him with attemping to use a weapon of mass destruction (if so) is about the most damning and heavy charge that anyone can be hit with without the actual mass murder part included. This guy is history until the trial and even more so if convicted. The FBI isn’t playing games here on this one.

  48. 48.

    Tonybrown74

    @Southern Beale:

    I didn’t know “Kevin William Harpham” was a Muslim name. Man they are getting craftier and craftier!

    Apparently, he was a Terror Baby …

  49. 49.

    El Cid

    The CDC and other government elitists once again snub their nose at the South, the most patriotickest area of the country.

    Much of the South and Appalachia fall into the newly defined “diabetes belt” identified by CDC researchers, a section of country that nearly parallels the so-called stroke belt.
    __
    The 644 counties in the diabetes belt have a significantly higher prevalence of the disease than the rest of the country: 11.7% versus 8.5%, according to Lawrence Barker, PhD, of the CDC, and colleagues, who reported their findings in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.
    __
    The diabetes belt includes portions of Alabama, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, and West Virginia.
    __
    That’s very similar to the stroke belt, the researchers say, but there are a few differences. For instance, much of West Virginia falls in the diabetes belt but not in the stroke belt. Conversely, Indiana is part of the stroke belt but not the diabetes belt.
    __
    The diabetes belt also corresponds, to some extent, with patterns of physical inactivity that CDC researchers reported earlier this month.

    Map of diabetes diagnoses nationwide, at county level.

  51. 51.

    KG

    @Cat Lady:

    He’s just a white lone nut like all of the other white lone nuts but every Muslim is a terrorist. QED

    No, no, no, this guy is a lone wolf wacko, but every Muslim is part of a grand unified jihad conspiracy.

  52. 52.

    scav

    Well, no doubt P King will bring up the fine distinction that he’s only worried about violence against the right sort of ‘mercans. I mean, tut tut, we can’t go about throwing terms like “terrorism” around with too broad a brush now, can we?

  54. 54.

    Studly Pantload

    @Cat:

    What’s all the more sad is that the media in general (let alone the Beltway Press) aren’t going to let their hair catch fire over this story because the target of this planned mass murder wasn’t Christian White Privilege.

    By their reckoning, Timothy McVeigh’s crime wasn’t taking out a bunch of people to try to start a race war, it was that his victims included soccor moms mid-level managers from the suburbs.

    Or am I being too cynical, here? Someone feel free to talk me down if you think I am.

  55. 55.

    Alex S.

    Open thread? Ok!

    ‘Game change’ the tell-all-you-didn’t-need-to-know-about-the-2008-election book by Mark Halperin and John Heilemann is being made into a movie. In the role of Sarah Palin: Julianne Moore.

  56. 56.

    RalfW

    Listening to the ultra-leftist NPR this afternoon, they were interviewing Imam Rauf and asked him about the Muslim extremist “home grown terrorists.” I sorely wished he had talked about McVeigh, or that this news had broken before the interview was taped.

  57. 57.

    Mike Kay (True Grit)

    I just found out that Broder kicked the bucket.

    Is it wrong of me to be happy?

  61. 61.

    Sister Machine Gun of Quiet Harmony

    @El Cid:

    Well, El Cid, you can see those elitists at the CDC are out to get our more ‘Merican Southern brethren with their socia!ist gay agenda exercise and diet recommendations. They are in collusion with the EVELEST first lady evah to destroy the ‘Merican way of life!

  63. 63.

    AnotherBruce

    It’s fascinating that liberals can be Dirty Fucking Hippies and fascists at the same time.

  65. 65.

    Cermet

    It was noted that one of the “T-shirts” was for (and written on as) “Rally for Life”. So will we hear about the Antiabortion forces are allied with terrorist who use weapons of mass destruction … come on media, I’m waiting.

  67. 67.

    Anne Laurie

    @Cermet:

    It was noted that one of the “T-shirts” was for (and written on as) “Rally for Life”. So will we hear about the Antiabortion forces are allied with terrorist who use weapons of mass destruction … come on media, I’m waiting.

    I made that assumption when the bomb was discovered, too, but apparently it’s an anti-cancer race.

    Still gotta score a few extra points on the Irony Scale, though.

  70. 70.

    meh

    you watch – the freepers/redstate/stormfront d’baggers are gonna start whispering that the White House timed this arrest to deflect America’s attention from the rightful witch hunt of Caliphate loving Brownies to the un-American persecution of light skinned European Americans…

  72. 72.

    Cermet

    Damn, so much for my attempt to attack the Pro-life- just proves stupid is as stupid posts … been there before and I’m sure in the future-thanks for the fast correction!

  73. 73.

    Mike Kay (Ding-Dong-Broder's Dead)

    Wow.

    What a 24 hours.

    Yesterday was Fat Tuesday, and today wingnut welfare queen Broder fell off the face of the earth!

  74. 74.

    Digital Amish

    @Studly Pantload: I’m afraid that today a measurable portion of the Republican party would chalk McVeigh’s action up to budget cutting — over-privileged government workers, yaknow.

  75. 75.

    JPL

    Tonight network news will probably cover Peter King’s hearings on scary Muslims and home grown terrorism but not cover the white supremacist arrested today.

  76. 76.

    Mike Kay (Ding-Dong-Broder's Dead)

    The great satan David Broder is gone.

    Time to open some Merlot!

  80. 80.

    Litlebritdifrnt

    @Alex S.:

    You have to be kidding me? I will only accept this if Tina Fey turned the role down, if she didn’t then the casting director needs to be fired.

  81. 81.

    Omnes Omnibus

    @Mike Kay (Ding-Dong-Broder’s Dead): Aside from any objections on the grounds of manners and good taste people might have to celebrating a person’s death, I have to ask why merlot? It is not famous as a celebratory beverage. It is, shall I say, rather ordinary.

  82. 82.

    Mike Kay (Ding-Dong-Broder's Dead)

    @Omnes Omnibus: Ya know, when Hitler committed suicide, they partied in Times Square.

    Manners and good taste, like religion, is a con invented by the elite to control the population.

    A more in tune society would be outside the Washington Post with pitchforks.

    As for the merlot, I’m sorry that not all of us have the time to become oenophiles.

  83. 83.

    Mike Kay (Ding-Dong-Broder's Dead)

    Kind of fitting that the Great Satan died of Diabetes considering everything he did to impede government research, including stem cell research.

    Live by the wingnut, die by the wingnut.

  87. 87.

    Mike Kay (Ding-Dong-Broder's Dead)

    I’m so drunk with happiness that the Great Satan is gone, that I might make a contribution to FDL.

    TOGA! TOGA! TOGA! TOGA! TOGA! TOGA!

    TOGA! TOGA! TOGA! TOGA! TOGA! TOGA!

  89. 89.

    Seebach

    Gone from us to a better place, a happy middle-ground between Heaven and Hell where reasonable people can find common ground.

    So much win. Bless you, sir

  91. 91.

    Svensker

    I’m waiting to hear from my brother and my cousin, who both assure me that “not all Muslims are terrorists but all terrorists are Muslims.”

    Wonder how long I’ll have to wait. If you hear hell freezing over you’ll know it’s happened.

  92. 92.

    Mike Kay (Ding-Dong-Broder's Dead)

    The only problem I have is the Great Satan didn’t face a war crimes tribunal, like Julius Streicher and Shūmei Ōkawa.

  93. 93.

    Herbal Infusion Bagger

    Gone from us to a better place, a happy middle-ground between Heaven and Hell where reasonable people can find common ground.

    Let’s go to the Poet:

    I then, with horror yet encompast, cried:
    “O master! what is this I hear? what race
    Are these, who seem so overcome with woe?”

    He thus to me: “This miserable fate
    Suffer the wretched souls of those, who lived
    Without or praise or blame, with that ill band
    Of angels mix’d, who nor rebellious proved,
    Nor yet were true to God, but for themselves
    Were only. From his bounds Heaven drove them forth
    Not to impair his lustre; nor the depth
    Of Hell receives them, lest the accursed tribe
    Should glory thence with exultation vain.”

    I then: “Master! what doth aggrieve them thus,
    That they lament so loud?” He straight replied:
    “That will I tell thee briefly. These of death
    No hope may entertain: and their blind life
    So meanly passes, that all other lots
    They envy. Fame of them the world hath none,
    Nor suffers; Mercy and Justice scorn them both.
    Speak not of them, but look, and pass them by.”

  94. 94.

    gex

    @Svensker: I don’t know why people refuse to admit the Klan was a terrorist group. I’m pretty sure there was a white guy or two in that group.

  96. 96.

    JPL

    NBC led the news with Peter King’s connections to IRA and hearings for four minutes, then spoke about Libya and now onto NPR. No news yet about the Spokane terrorist.

  97. 97.

    trollhattan

    @beltane:

    I was inappropriately pleased when Novak hitched a ride on the hellbound express. With Broder I’m more along the lines of, “why didn’t you retire twenty years ago and take up golf?”

  99. 99.

    Dennis SGMM

    Does this mean that members of the Aryan Nation will now be placed on the No Fly list? Thought not.

  101. 101.

    Mike Kay (Ding-Dong-Broder's Dead)

    There’s a silver lining in the Muslim witch hunt – it has turned once reliable republican voters into diehard Democrats in key swing states (VA, FL, MI, IN). In 2000, 80% of 6 million US Muslims voted for Bush. Today, they vote for the Democratic party.

    This is an under reported reason why Obama was able to flip Indiana by 21 pts and Virgina by 14 pts.

  102. 102.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    @Herbal Infusion Bagger:

    Let’s go to the Poet:

    Let’s!

    There once was a journo called The Dean
    Who spent life existing at the mean
    When facing Judgment’s knell
    To enter Heaven or Hell..
    He asked, “Are you sure there’s no in-between?”

  106. 106.

    Orygunian

    Didn’t someone on the front page here just give some sort of, sort of, sort of, absolution to the Broder? Who knew he was in his 80’s?

  108. 108.

    Mike Kay (Ding-Dong-Broder's Dead)

    There’s a silver lining in the Muslim witch hunt – it has turned once reliable republican voters into diehard Democrats in key swing states (VA, FL, MI, IN). In 2000, 80% of 6 million US Muslims voted for Bush. Today, they vote for the Democratic party.

    This is an under reported reason why Obama was able to flip Indiana by 20 pts and Virgina by 14 pts.

  109. 109.

    JPL

    I really thought the news would cover the arrest of a homegrown terrorist but I guess he’s the wrong color.

  110. 110.

    Alex S.

    @Elia:

    They could have done that all the time already, but until now, they wanted to make it appear as if it was about the budget, not about power.

  111. 111.

    Calouste

    @gex:

    There are white guys in there so by definition it can’t be a terrorist group. They’re freedom fighters, silly. Pete King’s favorite buddies the IRA are somewhere in between. At one point in time Irish weren’t white, so they were definitely terrorists, but as Irish-Americans were accepted as members of the white American race, they turned into freedom fighters.

  112. 112.

    Mike Kay (Ding-Dong-Broder's Dead)

    With the passing of the Great Satan, Sally Quinn has lowered her nose to half-mast.

  114. 114.

    Just Some Fuckhead

    @Alex S.:

    They could have done that all the time already, but until now, they wanted to make it appear as if it was about the budget, not about power.

    Which means, of course, we’re winning.

  115. 115.

    Elia

    The whole “teahadist” thing is even more apropos right now. This is just flabbergastingly self-destructive on the part of the 8 Republican Senators. I hope for their sake that Mr. Koch’s got some nice consultancy salaries lined-up for ’em.

  117. 117.

    Gravenstone

    Since this is an open thread, I wanted to share the bit of cognitive dissonance one of my Facebook friends indulged in today. She was attacking the WI teacher’s unions (and Wi education in general), even though the only reason she’s in WI is because her special needs children were getting a crap education in her home state of FL and are thriving here. Gee, I wonder if those evil teachers unions might have had something to do with that?

    /facepalm

  118. 118.

    Kryptik

    @Gravenstone:

    Well, of course, HER teachers are just spectacular, but it’s all the union asshole teachers with their seniority screwing it up for everyone else, don’tcha know.

  119. 119.

    Spaghetti Lee

    Fuck every last one of those fucking Republican assholes, with a rusty pitchfork. They are scum, filth, rotten to the core Kochsucking monsters. I hope they’re all recalled and end up begging in the streets.

  121. 121.

    Mike Kay (Ding-Dong-Broder's Dead)

    @Elia: I’m sure they’re being paid off as we speak. What corporations usually do is hire the spouse or some of the Pol’s grown children. That’s how Wellpoint bought off Evan Bayh. They didn’t directly give him the bribe, no, they hired his wife, giving her some superficial job for $700,000 per year.

  122. 122.

    Mike in NC

    @gex:

    Newt Gingrich says his passion for his country contributed to his marital infidelity.

    Yes, a new low even for that miserable little prick.

  124. 124.

    Kryptik

    @Alex S.:

    This is unfortunately true. Even if it’s massively unpopular, it would still be their legislative victory and law of the state until there are enough WI Dems in their legislature to get past a little Scotty veto.

  126. 126.

    mantis

    I’m really disappointed that the white community has not done more to help authorities unmask these terrorists among them. Maybe Pete King can hold some hearings about it.

  127. 127.

    Anne Laurie

    @JPL:

    I really thought the news would cover the arrest of a homegrown terrorist but I guess he’s the wrong color.

    Katie Couric covered it, briefly. No mugshot, but the words “associated with white supremicist organizations” were used.

  128. 128.

    policomic

    @RalfW:
    I was listening to even-the-liberal-NPR just now (8:00 p.m. CDT). They did not deem today’s arrest worthy of mention in their top of the hour newsbreak. Had time to cover the Dow and NASDAQ, though.

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