BREAKING: Federal authorities have arrested a man in Florida in connection to the suspected explosive packages, according to multiple law enforcement sources.
— CNN’s Mark Morales, Evan Perez, Shimon Prokupecz, and Brynn Gingras report
— Jake Tapper (@jaketapper) October 26, 2018
Let’s see what happens this afternoon and I’ll defer to Adam on any interpretation/analysis.
MisterForkbeard
This will be interesting. We’re going to find out REAL SOON whether or not this is an establishment Democratic plot, or a lone wolf with health issues.
I’ve been told by my friends on the right that these are the only two possible choices.
Cheryl Rofer
Here’s his van. It’s hard to make out the stickers for sure, but I think they’re not for Andrew Gillum.
Cheryl Rofer
DOJ says news conference at 2:30 Eastern Time. I’m going to walk the kitties.
A Ghost To Most
My guess is there will end up being 14 bombs (14 words)
Cheryl Rofer
Another angle.
germy
@Cheryl Rofer: So if it turns out he’s not a liberal trying to make conservatives look bad, will all the fox news and talk radio and twitter RW’ers say “Gee, we were wrong…”
Cheryl Rofer
Moar
Cheryl Rofer
I would like to know more about the bombs themselves, but we probably won’t hear from the FBI until they’re confident of their analyses.
NOW the kitties, who are pestering me to death.
rikyrah
ONE Person?
phuck outta here.
this was a CELL
rikyrah
Meet Vickie Lee Jones.
She was shot & killed by a white supremacist YESTERDAY in the parking lot of a grocery store in Louisville.
She was a kind, warm, giving soul. She just retired from the VA Hospital.
Moved to her new neighborhood to be safe. Murdered by a bigot. pic.twitter.com/ZAS7cpQvzY
— Shaun King (@shaunking) October 25, 2018
Ajabu
Second large window There’s a presidential seal w/Dolt 45 pic. I am shocked!
Gravenstone
@Cheryl Rofer: Well I see at least one Republican party symbol in the upper right of the rear side window…
Keith P
@Cheryl Rofer: My money was on it being Debbie Wasserman Schultz, using the Trumpian strategy of being so blatant so as to throw people off.
The Moar You Know
Wasn’t going to take long. People fortunately have no idea how closely shit like this is being looked for.
schrodingers_cat
@rikyrah: Random lone wolf will be the official line. But I agree with you FWIW.
trollhattan
With no windows how do you parallel park?
There once was a man from Florida…
Gravenstone
@rikyrah: Possible this was the schmuck/patsy who did the parcel drops, as they likely have video or stills. Obviously we’ll learn more with time.
germy
@rikyrah:
I hope they can get him talking in custody. Hope he gives them the names of his friends/helpers.
trollhattan
False
flagvan!!!The Dangerman
Luckily, this asshole didn’t do something really terrible like accost someone in a Restaurant.
Gin & Tonic
@rikyrah: I dunno. White guy in his 50’s, I’ll bet he’s on SSDI and has lots of free time.
The Moar You Know
Laughing my ass off looking at the pics of that van. Might as well have spray-painted on the side “I MAKE BOMBS FOR TRUMP”.
Duane
Florida Man!
germy
r€nato
I may just have to tune into Fox News Channel to see how they spin/not cover this. Who wants to take the other side of the bet that they avoid showing close-ups of the pro-Trump shit on his van?
Horse_dave
I think you’re correct. Debbie Wasserman Schultz was/is using mind control to make the haters look bad. It’s the only possible explanation.
schrodingers_cat
Has Ron DeSantis said anything, yet?
trollhattan
@germy:
This is the perfect time to test Trump’s love of waterboarding. “Ticking bomb scenario!”
germy
@trollhattan: Ain’t gonna happen. No waterboarding.
I wonder how many rallies this guy attended, holding up a sign right behind PEETUS.
And I’m guessing Fox will pixelate or blur the van stickers.
Baud
Guy was probably on Obamacare.
MisterForkbeard
@Horse_dave: That’s “Debbie Wasserman Shulz”, man. Or didn’t you read the misspelled return label on the bomb?
MisterForkbeard
@rikyrah: My guess is that this guy was probably the only real terrorist, but he was egged on and directed towards bomb plans “as a joke” by various 4chan/The_Donald/Breitbart types who shocked, SHOCKED that he would actually do this.
Kay
I can’t believe he drove that van for the bomb drop offs.
r€nato
what’s the over-under on Trump tweeting that this guy is innocent until proven guilty?
good people on both sides!
cain
@Cheryl Rofer:
These must be some extraordinary kitties if they are pestering you to go for a walk. :-)
Bruuuuce
CNN reports that in California, a possible thirteenth package has been found, addressed to Kamala Harris. Needs confirmation, but it would be no surprise at all.
eric
@r€nato: i am going with “youthful indiscretion.” It worked for Henry Hyde (sort of)
schrodingers_cat
TV news at elebenty : Lone wolf with a history of mental illness and then some hand wringing by panel members about civility and both-sides.
sherparick
@germy: To turn a phrase, Rush and Fox will say they are wrong when the papier-mache dog catches the asbestos cat in Hades, or in one word “No.”
Finally, the NYT gives a face for the U.S. – Saudi Arabian Alliance. May we hang our heads in shame.
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/10/26/world/middleeast/saudi-arabia-war-yemen.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage
germy
https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/federal-authorities-arrest-bomb-suspect
r€nato
right now right-wing bloggers are frantically searching the web to find anything at all to tie this guy to the left. “He had a New Revised Standard Version of the Bible on his bookshelf, not King James Version! Obviously a liberal!”
dmsilev
@Kay:
I’m going to go out on a limb and predict that this guy was not exactly Professor Moriarty.
dmsilev
@r€nato: No no no. False Flag! Liberal Conspiracy to try to frame conservatives!
The Moar You Know
@A Ghost To Most: didn’t and probably wouldn’t have thought of this, but I’d lay down cash money on the chance of you being right.
Sloane Ranger
Slightly off topic but is it legal in the US to drive a vehicle with so much of the back and side windows covered?
Cheryl Rofer
Not a single Andrew Gillum sticker that I can see…
chris
Here’s yer false flag.//
JaySinWA
@sherparick: There is always the FBI patsy entrapped by undercover agent story to play.
Cheryl Rofer
CliosFanboy
@chris: LOL, was about to post same thing…
germy
If that’s what his van looks like, can you imagine what the inside of his house must look like?
Steve in the ATL
@Kay: trump supporter demonstrates poor judgment? Unheard of!
Captain C
@schrodingers_cat: Someone should point out that “look what YOU lib-ruls made ME do” is abuser talk.
Baud
@Sloane Ranger: I’ve seen vans with no side or back windows, so I assume it’s legal.
r€nato
There is a photo out there that is a close-up of the side of the van. It is 100% right-wing pro-Trump anti-left memes. One of Michael Moore with a target on his face. I wish I could post a pic here, don’t want to bother with uploading to my server and posting the link that way.
stan
Holy crap, there are rifle sight crosshairs on some of those photos.
Yeah, fox news will yell at everyone to ‘stop politicizing mental illness’
dmsilev
@germy: Probably contains a shrine to Trump fashioned out of mashed potatoes colored with cheetos.
germy
@dmsilev: And he calls it “Devil’s Tower”
Bex
@Bruuuuce: If the thirteenth package is for Kamala Harris, the fourteenth must be addressed to Nancy Pelosi. Hoping they stay safe.
Kay
@Steve in the ATL:
I’m always scolding criminals on poor practice. I see myself as a coach, really.
The Moar You Know
@Cheryl Rofer: Jesus. Well, they’re going to have to go with Plan #2: ignore this, because the “bomber is obviously a Dem” isn’t going to fly here.
NonyNony
I mean, Cesar Sayoc doesn’t sound like a ‘mercan name, so maybe they’ll play up the “dangerous foreigner” angle?
Naw – they’re going to go with “mentally ill individual” I’d bet. They’ll avoid discussing the politics around it at all – except maybe Shep Smith. He might get into it I suppose.
Baud
@The Moar You Know: You underestimate them.
But it’ll be interesting to see how they respond when the guy asks Trump for a pardon. And again when Trump gives it to him.
Bill Arnold
@MisterForkbeard:
This is my guess as well (~50%). If we want to stick with the term stochastic terrorism (I like it, but I like stochastic algorithms in CS, and biology) then it needs to be updated to explicitly cover orchestrated (mass) micro-targeting of easily-influence-able individuals.
lgerard
Love how trump refers to the current spate of Bombs, as if this is a recurring phenomenon and part of the usual political process..
Cheryl Rofer
A bunch of photos of the van are showing up on Twitter. Here’s one.
germy
I see from Sayoc’s resume that his last listed employment was Brett Kavanaugh’s life coach.
(sarcasm tag)
Kay
@The Moar You Know:
“CNN sucks”. The van is like a rolling confession.
Cermet
The fake news (aka fox) will spend ten seconds on it in their news program and every single other shit spewing talking head there will ignore it.
r€nato
This is definitely a time when we should follow Dickhead Cheney’s 1% Principle. If there is even a 1% chance that a Trump supporter could be a terrorist, we must act and act decisively to neutralize the threat.
Steve in the ATL
@Bill Arnold:
Oh man—are we going to have this debate again?!
Gin & Tonic
@Steve in the ATL: Maybe?
r€nato
well it’s already started… a FB page named “Indiana People for Arizona Immigration Law” is claiming the guy is a Democrat, therefore Democrats are behind this. Feel free to find that page and deluge them with insults and scorn.
Matt McIrvin
@Steve in the ATL: Call it “quantum” for even more fun!
germy
Gravenstone
@lgerard:
Or someone has given him reason to believe it will become one.
Baud
@Steve in the ATL: I always read that as “scholastic” and I think, when did nerds get so violent?
Steve in the ATL
@Baud: 1984.
https://m.imdb.com/title/tt0088000/
schrodingers_cat
@Matt McIrvin: Why not? Add chaotic to the mix. Chaotic quantum stochastic terrorism. How did I do?
Baud
@Steve in the ATL: Fucking Reagan.
debbie
@Cheryl Rofer:
None of these photos show the large photo of Hillary in the crosshairs of some weapon.
JaySinWA
@schrodingers_cat: It needs to match the meter of Kokomo for old times sake.
dmsilev
@Baud: As the saying goes, academic politics is so vicious because the stakes are so small.
Baud
@dmsilev: Also goes for blog comment sections.
dmsilev
@Baud: Quite true.
Kay
The bullseyes on the people he targeted are freaky, because they’re in specific places- Clinton is her face, some are on the heart, etc. He took so much care with the placement. Hillary Clinton clearly gets the brunt, BTW. They should up her security. It’s so odd how they still hate her so much because they won! She’s absolutely no threat to them. It’s like winning just made them angrier.
catclub
@Gin & Tonic:
somebody called this ‘older’. How could it be if I am older than that, … and I am still young?
trnc
@germy: “Hey, don’t most of these people work in the White House?”
catclub
@Baud: no, that’s the school shootings, over in aisle three.
r€nato
@Kay: As I keep saying… angry when their guy loses; even angrier when their guy wins.
I am starting to think they are just miserable people, period.
catclub
@schrodingers_cat: the mexican drug gangs are using quantum tunneling to get drugs across the border now.
r€nato
you know, when Obama won, then won again, I was happy about it. Not angry AF at those who didn’t like him.
There is truly something wrong with these people who are fanatical in their devotion to Dear Leader. Like their cult leader, they seem to have a bottomless pit inside of them that cannot be filled up, and knowing that at some conscious or unconscious level just feeds their anger and desire to lash out.
El Caganer
@Kay: I think it’s because they believe in magic, and their lives didn’t magically get better when their team won. Couldn’t possibly be the fault of their White Savior, though, could it?
C Stars
I just need a moment to take in the fact that in a week when a shooter gunned down two African-American senior citizens and then claimed “Whites don’t shoot whites,” and a guy driving this nutso Trump van seems to have sent 13 bombs through our postal service, one of the only discernible tenets of the modern GOP is decrying “identity politics”
I know the hypocrisy has always been thick with these folks but jfc…
r€nato
rage, like cocaine, is a helluva drug. They were filled with it on a daily basis for eight years and they just can’t kick the habit, even when they got everything they could have possibly wanted two years ago.
Kay
@r€nato:
They need constant infusions of fighting or they trail off and get depressed. They’re like drug addicts. It’ s why Trump gets more and more frantic- he has to keep them juiced up all the time and the hit has to be bigger each time.
T Jobe
Call him the “MAGAbomber” right?
schrodingers_cat
@Kay: He is going to be praising this bomber at one of his rallies before the election.
The Pale Scot
@r€nato:
If I had won that lottery thingy, that would have been a full page ad in every paper in the US for a next two years
Kay
@schrodingers_cat:
He has to keep ratcheting it up because really he’s a bore. He’s the loudmouth at a country club who everyone patiently endures. He uses those dumb words- “spectacular”, all those, because there’s no real energy or interest in what he’s saying.
I can’t bear his voice. It has so much self-regard in it. Such a broad braggy sound. Ugh. It’s like nails on a chalkboard. My husband watches CSPAN and I have to leave the room. I can’t do it.
schrodingers_cat
@Kay: I didn’t watch TV news for over a year, including the Snooze Hour. And even now I can take it in only in small doses.
Amir Khalid
@Cheryl Rofer:
Thank God, no Liverpool FC club badge.
efgoldman
@MisterForkbeard: More jackals. Huzzah. Stil jackals hall
Miss Bianca
@efgoldman: efg, huzzah you’re here! Been hoping to ‘see’ you again!
A Ghost To Most
There has to be a Dallas Cowboys sticker on that van somewhere.
Ruckus
@Kay:
They won but there is still no magic happening. There are still blacks actually walking free. There are women running for office, far more than ever before. They won but things aren’t the better they thought they’d be. They know the truth, but they can not admit it, they are pretty useless as humans. They know it, we know it and they know we know. They are ratcheting up because they can’t understand how the rest of the world doesn’t see things in plain black and white like they do. They know only two sides of anything. And their side isn’t getting anywhere. They won, why isn’t everything better? My answer is of course that they are full of shit. They are so full of shit it’s coming out their ears, nose and throats and it’s all they can see, smell and taste.
John Fremont
@stan: Doncha know , they were surveyors scopes!
Sarah Palin can explain it to you.
John Fremont
@schrodingers_cat: Yes, for his passion. Just like those supporters of his who mugged a homeless man.
Duane
@efgoldman: Really late but HI EFG. How old are you?