Mail bomb speculation thread

[ñͤͣ̄ͦ̌̑͗͊͛͂͗ ̸̨̨̣̺̼̣̜͙͈͕̮̊̈́̈͂͛̽͊ͭ̓͆ͅé ̰̓̓́ͯ́́͞]

Suppose for a moment that Mueller got the goods on the McConnell-Trump-Russia-GOP clusterfuck and they have become aware that Mueller has said goods.

Would this mail bomb attack simultaneously fulfill a number of strategic goals, regardless of whether the Dems take Congress?

• It tests the "false flag" (ff) narrative for further escalation.
• If the ff doesn't play that well, there is time to deploy even more desperate measures, that could make the ff idea more viable.
• If the ff does have legs, now or eventually, it could rally the GOP vote—who are primarily motivated by fear.
• It hedges against the ff narrative failing by encouraging already high levels of white nationalist violence to escalate.
• Even without the ff narrative growing legs, escalating violence is a pretext to sending police/military presence to the polls to suppress votes (intimidating people that have been historically abused by police by their mere presence, enacting "emergency legislation" to make voting more costly, time-consuming, etc).
• If after all that they still lose control of Congress, then in full-on cornered animal mode the mail bombs provide encouragement for the civil war so many on the right think they want.
• It tests the viability of using assassination to avoid consequences for what they know Mueller will present to the world.

I'm probably wrong about all this, but what do you think?

[Cain]

I do think you're probably wrong (in the sense that I'm relatively sure in the absence of further evidence that this is a random lone nut) but it's worth considering the strategic implications from that direction, certainly.

One possible problem coming from the conservative narrative is that "these bombs didn't pose a threat anyway as all these people have extensive security and screening measures".  This is coming from the kind of people I would most worry about making prominent calls for instituting a crackdown in the event of a terrorist attack (Frank Gaffney, by way of example).  There's an element of truth to this that is hard to ignore, that while pipe bombs could have maimed or killed anyone unfortunate enough to handle them, they are fundamentally not as scary or provocative as, say, a suicide bombing, or multiple shooter event.

These bombs also mostly targeted former officials and fundraisers, and with the exception of Maxine Waters (who admittedly was targeted with two bombs), not currently sitting representatives.  This also makes it harder to tie this into a "threat to the vote" narrative.

The false flag narrative is definitely doing the rounds, as well as false equivalences from more mainstream conservative figures (thanks, Meghan McCain).  Epistemic closure means this theory will have serious legs, regardless of how many pieces of evidence against it exist, but it could certainly be used to "poll" how many mainstream Republican figures are willing to flirt with or seriously entertain such suggestions, in public and private.

I do think that with regard to Mueller, they'd be willing to trigger and possibly weather a constitutional crisis by simply dismissing him instead of turning to political violence and assassination.  Now the Russians on the other hand...but killing Mueller would be as good as a signed confession, and I'm not sure the GRU tradecraft is good enough to do it without being caught down the line.  America is also much harder to get in and out of than Europe, where Russia has a lot more infiltration options.

If we were to look at a government motive for this, my thinking would be more in line with the Italian "strategy of tension".  Anonymous bombings and attacks from the far-right and far-left helped prop up the status quo and permit broad crackdowns without descending into outright authoritarian rule, and acted as cover for a number of criminal operations by both the intelligence services and organised crime groups. 

[Q. G. Pennyworth]

The simplest explanation is that this is a single person or a very small group of like-minded people (I will eat my tentacles if it's more than 5) who ingested too much Alex Jones and Decided To Do Something About It. Every one of the targets is someone that the greater right wing propaganda machine has shit on aggressively in the last two years, if you were to ask a random asshole at a Trump rally who the worst enemies of America are right now they'd spout off a nearly identical list. The Git Er Done sticker is very in-joke, it doesn't come across as a wide audience call to action.

I think a more reasonable fear for down the line is that the rhetoric doesn't cool off and more right wing "lone wolves" get the message that this kind of behavior is tolerated or encouraged by their heroes at the top. So what then? I suspect the people at most risk would continue to be the folks who get accused of being Lizard People, not the people who are reasonable contenders for major office. They believe in their people too much to "get in the way" by blowing up a challenger. It's the people "manipulating the system" that "need to be dealt with."

The only benefit the GOP gets from this is the potential that Dem candidates get scared or distracted and make dumb mistakes. I don't think that's worth it unless they're already in the Civil War II Electric Boogaloo camp.

[hooplala]

Dudes, it's ROSEANNE.

[Cramulus]

Chuck Schumer Relieved He's Never Taken Stance Meaningful Enough To Have Someone Mail Him Explosives

[rong]

China was behind it.  Says right on the clocks "made in China"

[Doktor Howl]

I am stating that this is the Proudboys, and I am willing to bet a FIVE PAGE hate letter on this.

[LMNO]

In all the talk about how the right will react to this, I totally forgot about the most plausible for some reason: It didn't actually happen.

'Fake News Fake Bombs' Sign Seen Outside Florida Debate Site

[Doktor Howl]

I am stating that this is the Proudboys, and I am willing to bet a FIVE PAGE hate letter on this.

To clarify:  At least half of the plotters will have Proudboy tattoos or some other recognizable method of affiliation.

[altered]

As much as I want to say you're right, LMNO, the right simply don't gain from that particular twist in the story as much as the false flag tall tale. As they've amply demonstrated, they very specifically speak to what they think is most good for their political side. So when faced with "Weakens Dems but doesn't make them look outright hideously evil" and "Paints the left as cartoon mustache twirling villains gone bad, somehow," they'll pick that second one every time.

The fact only a few of their creatures haven't gotten the memo and have been spouting other lines makes it obvious this is the case, in my opinion.

WRT speculation on where this goes: I can't help but think that yes, this /is/ a lone crazy radical, not an organized group action. The problem is that abortion clinic bombings and murders (LOL at this "hurrr Republicans don't do this" bullshit tubefeed they're trying to ram into the public sphere) similarly began with lone crazies created by extreme public discourse. And it escalated from there. I foresee the same thing here, unfortunately, especially since the right is essentially portraying the left as not caring about anyone's lives, not even their own side's. It's similar to the extreme rhetoric of the anti-abortion activists in the 80s, and the results are likely to be similar or worse, I would guess.

[hooplala]

I am stating that this is the Proudboys, and I am willing to bet a FIVE PAGE hate letter on this.

To clarify:  At least half of the plotters will have Proudboy tattoos or some other recognizable method of affiliation.

I'm with the Dok on this one. Though it still could be Roseanne!

[hooplala]

As much as I want to say you're right, LMNO, the right simply don't gain from that particular twist in the story as much as the false flag tall tale. As they've amply demonstrated, they very specifically speak to what they think is most good for their political side. So when faced with "Weakens Dems but doesn't make them look outright hideously evil" and "Paints the left as cartoon mustache twirling villains gone bad, somehow," they'll pick that second one every time.

The fact only a few of their creatures haven't gotten the memo and have been spouting other lines makes it obvious this is the case, in my opinion.

WRT speculation on where this goes: I can't help but think that yes, this /is/ a lone crazy radical, not an organized group action. The problem is that abortion clinic bombings and murders (LOL at this "hurrr Republicans don't do this" bullshit tubefeed they're trying to ram into the public sphere) similarly began with lone crazies created by extreme public discourse. And it escalated from there. I foresee the same thing here, unfortunately, especially since the right is essentially portraying the left as not caring about anyone's lives, not even their own side's. It's similar to the extreme rhetoric of the anti-abortion activists in the 80s, and the results are likely to be similar or worse, I would guess.

I think False Flag and It Didn't Happen essentially amount to the same thing for the right. Either the Dems set the whole thing up, or they made it up. Alex Jones' accusations in the past were essentially mixtures of both concepts.

[altered]

Hedging on the subject like he does is more about "the big win" and a fallback plan in case that fails. Making it up lets people say "at least there weren't any people actually at risk!", it's a weaker narrative, to be used only if "false flag" fails to stick because it just makes the left liars, not pure goddamn evil. If they could get away with blaming child sacrifices to satan on the left as a whole, they would. I'm not entirely remembering but I think that may have even been one narrative thread of the whole stupid fucking Pizzagate thing.

I don't see these things as the same because the end effects are different.

[Doktor Howl]

Trump just tweeted that this is somehow the understandable anger of someone who has had it with the fake news.

Not even kidding.

[altered]

Genuinely not surprised. I fully expected him to say something that would legitimize political violence after his advisors stopped choking him until he said good things. It's the pattern he follows consistently.