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Timothy McVeigh

Tracing America's Political Poisoning Back To Timothy McVeigh

You’d like to think that in the wake of the farcical and failed January 6, 2021, uprising to reverse the results of the 2020 presidential election, even the Republican Party had sobered up and right-wing conspiracy theories were fading from prominence in the United States.

Ain’t happening.

But then you’d also like to think that the malign influence of Fox News would have receded since the network agreed to pay more than three-quarters of a billion dollars to Dominion Voting Systems after numerous talking heads and ranking executives admitted under oath that they knowingly broadcast thunderous lies about the “stolen” 2020 election.

Also not happening. Despite some slippage of media outlets even further out on the fringe and the purging of “white replacement” conspiracy maven Tucker Carlson, Fox News remains highly profitable and influential. A substantial proportion of Americans, it appears, simply want to be lied to if it flatters their incipient paranoia.

You’d imagine, as well, that a former president who publicized the private address of another former president, enabling and encouraging an armed crackpot to stalk his neighborhood with lethal intent, would find himself shunned and essentially disqualified from seeking public office by members of his own party, who preach law and order.

After all, what would happen to any other criminal defendant who broadcast naked threats against prosecutors and their families?

Yet, with the signal exception of former New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who hasn’t the proverbial snowball’s chance, Teflon Donald Trump’s GOP rivals remain discreetly mute.

Instead, Trump appears to have a substantial lead for the GOP nomination. “NOW THAT THE ‘SEAL’ IS BROKEN ...,” began one all-caps outburst on his Truth Social account recently — a pointed allusion to the Book of Revelation (although it’s unlikely Trump’s ever read it). He ended up vowing retribution against Democrats he accuses of maliciously destroying the country.

It’s more like a professional wrestling spectacle than an American election campaign. Even the Mini Mussolini currently running second in polls promises to purge the nation of heretics. He uses the word “die” a lot.

So, have a substantial proportion of Republicans simply gone around the bend and abandoned reason altogether? Alas, many have, yes. And whether they acknowledge it or not, their movement’s patron saint is Timothy McVeigh, the Oklahoma City bomber.

I come by this opinion after reading Jeffrey Toobin’s extraordinary new book, Homegrown: Timothy McVeigh and the Rise of Right-Wing Extremism. A terrific reporter with legal expertise and a knack for vivid storytelling, Toobin has written several excellent books about criminal trials — including a bestseller about the O.J. Simpson case.

Toobin originally covered McVeigh’s trial for murdering 168 people (including 19 children) with a truck bomb that destroyed the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building on April 19, 1995, for The New Yorker. He describes having a flashback in 2020 while reading about the militia loons who plotted to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer and try her for treason in a kangaroo court.

“I know these people,” he said to himself, recognizing that the self-styled patriots’ motives were essentially identical to McVeigh’s a quarter-century earlier. Indeed, much of McVeigh’s deadly plot was conceived on a remote Michigan farm belonging to co-conspirator Terry Nichols’ family.

In one sense, McVeigh was a classic American loner, a juco dropout who failed in an attempt to become a Green Beret and left the Army without a profession or a purpose. It was, Toobin writes, “a shattering defeat ... he had no plan B.”

Much of Homegrown reads like a Jack Kerouac novel about a demented loner driving aimlessly through the American outback in search of somebody to kill: from his native upstate New York to Arkansas to the Michigan north woods to Arizona and the Flint Hills of Kansas. Basically, from one gun show to another.

And as he drove, he listened to Rush Limbaugh touting the political nostrums of the fellow he called “Mr. Newt.” When Gingrich urged Republicans to describe Democrats as “sick,” “pathetic,” “traitors,” “radical” and “corrupt,” McVeigh heard him. When Limbaugh talked about a “second violent American revolution,” he thought that sounded like a great idea.

But what really caught McVeigh’s attention was a prophetic potboiler called The Turner Diaries, a novel describing an uprising against a tyrannical government of Blacks and Jews who were taking away patriots’ guns. McVeigh was all about guns. He built his bomb based on the novel’s detailed instructions.

McVeigh never expressed an ounce of regret; he died defiant, a hero to himself. And thanks to the Internet, as Toobin makes clear, the sick, racially obsessed gun nuts like him are no longer alone. And then, after Trump became president, Toobin writes, “the wolf pack had a new leader.”

Reprinted with permission from Suntimes.

Trump May Dream Of 'Civil War,' But It's Not Going To Happen

Trump May Dream Of 'Civil War,' But It's Not Going To Happen

When it comes to prognostication, my favorite philosopher has always been the eminent Lawrence Peter Berra. “It's tough to make predictions,” Yogi famously said, “especially about the future.”

For all his baseball genius, Yogi came by his skepticism honestly. He spent three years managing the New York Mets—enough to make anybody leery about expressing confidence for next year.

Nevertheless, here goes: Regarding American politics, most of this loose talk about an impending civil war is just that, talk. Organized, armed militias running around the countryside attacking political enemies? Not going to happen. Of course there will be violence. This is, after all, the United States of America, where there are cranks and loons of every kind and description armed with guns and explosives.

Terrorism, maybe. After all, it was no less an eminence than Thomas Jefferson who wrote that “[t]he tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants.” And Oklahoma City terrorist Timothy McVeigh, who had the phrase emblazoned on his T-shirt when he was arrested. McVeigh imagined that murdering 168 fellow citizens with a truck bomb would spark civil war. Instead, he was tried, convicted, and executed in 2001.

For the record, Jefferson penned the unfortunate phrase in France, a slave-owning aristocrat playing revolutionary at Paris dinner parties. He wrote regarding Shay’s Rebellion, a 1787 anti-tax uprising in Massachusetts which his fellow Virginian George Washington believed demonstrated the need for a strong national government. At the subsequent constitutional convention (which Jefferson did not attend), Washington’s views prevailed. As president, he sent soldiers to put down the Pennsylvania “Whiskey Rebellion” with prejudice.

Following his own presidency, Jefferson founded the University of Virginia and designed its staggeringly beautiful campus: a living monument to stability, order, and Thomas Jefferson himself. One of the most appalling things about the “Unite the Right” torchlight parade there in 2017 was its desecration of “Mr. Jefferson’s university” as Virginians call it. You couldn’t expect a barbarian like Donald Trump to understand that.

But I digress. The main reason there’s so much loose talk about civil war is the publication of recent polls showing that strong majorities of Republicans continue to believe that the 2020 presidential election was “stolen” from the aforementioned Boss Trump. Meanwhile, the latest Washington Post -- University of Maryland poll shows that the “percentage of Americans who say violent action against the governmentis justified at times stands at 34 percent.” (40 percent of Republicans vs. 23 percent of Democrats.)

That and similar surveys show that between 58 and 71 percent of Republicans tell pollsters that Trump was the actual winner of an election he lost thunderously, making Joe Biden an illegitimate president.

It bears mentioning that contrary to the usual 50-50 framing, Republicans represent nowhere close to half of the electorate. One quarter is more like it. Looking at it that way brings the actual proportion of the sorehead minority down to something like half the headline number saying somebody needs to kick ass to bring back the glorious reign of the old p***y grabber.

It doesn’t say how many are prepared to drop the remote, clamber out of the recliner, and take up arms whenever Tucker Carlson says it’s time. Given the advanced age of the Fox News demographic, I’m confident the great majority of would-be warriors—like Trump himself—mean to follow the action on TV.

“The thing that’s most concerning is that [this false belief] has endured in the face of all evidence,” says Rep. Adam Kinzinger, one of two honorable Republicans in Congress (the other being Liz Cheney). “And I’ve gotten to wonder if there is actually any evidence that would ever change certain people’s minds.”

The answer is almost certainly not. After all, this is pretty much the same demographic that has resisted science and medicine amid a worldwide disease pandemic. Indeed, many are now angry with Trump for boasting about the very vaccines that they’ve risked their children’s lives resisting. They’re about to have a rough few weeks. Swallowing his election lies has been is risk free and easy by comparison.

There are also signs of waning certitude. The same Washington Post poll shows that the percentage of Republicans denying Joe Biden’s legitimacy has dropped from 70 to 58 percent since the January 6 insurrection. What’s more, fully 72 percent of all Americans saw the January 6 riot as a threat to democracy: a number that can only rise as investigations proceed.

Once the dam springs a leak, it’s doomed.

Having spent much of my adult life as a Yankee in the American South, I have seen this movie before. As recently as the 1960s, many Southern whites thought the world would end if schools and universities integrated. So watch the upcoming Alabama-Georgia game, and tell me what you see.

Civil war over Trump?

In his dreams. Nowhere else.

Militia Misfits Are Ridiculous And Infantile -- Yet Still Terribly Dangerous

Militia Misfits Are Ridiculous And Infantile -- Yet Still Terribly Dangerous

Back in my own days playing guns, we had the coolest hideout ever: a hut we'd built on a wooded half acre out of lumber liberated from a subdivision under construction. The way we looked at it, they owed us; a fair exchange for converting the woods and ponds where we hiked, fished, and ice-skated into a suburban subdivision. Rolling Hills, they called it.

OK, so the fireplace didn't draw, the roof leaked, and the secret compartment under the floor where we'd stashed our prized collection of naughty magazines got nibbled into the world's naughtiest mouse nest. It was a perfect hideout. No girls allowed. (Not that any of us knew an actual female person who'd willingly crawl into that dank interior.)

It was our secret refuge. We were twelve years old. We called ourselves "The Royal Majestic Order of the Quince," after a nearby flowering bush. We weren't trying to scare people, but not just anybody could be a Quince. Our weapons of war were BB guns, slingshots and acorns. Sometimes we took our little brothers prisoner and locked them up until they cried. Then a little while longer. We fancied ourselves merciless and bold.

Anyway, I couldn't help but think of all that pre-adolescent play-acting when I read about the "Wolverine Watchmen" and their hidden basement hideout behind a trap door under a vacuum cleaner store in rural Michigan.

We soon grew out of it. The Wolverines, apparently not.

See, that's the thing about these self-styled militiamen and wannabe terrorists. Their view of the world is essentially juvenile. Which doesn't mean they can't be dangerous. Quite the opposite.

To underline the point, here's a classic militia rant: "I believe we are slowly turning into a socialist government. The government is continually growing bigger and more powerful, and the people need to prepare to defend themselves against government control."

Sound familiar? It's Timothy McVeigh, terrorist murderer of 168 people in the 1993 Oklahoma City truck bombing.

Show me somebody who becomes obsessed with government "tyranny," poses for photos carrying an AR-15 and staring grimly in camouflage fatigues, and who hangs out Confederate flags, and I'll show you a bearded child. In contemporary America, there are few things more dangerous.

Only a child could possibly imagine that kidnapping and murdering Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer could lead to anything but disaster. "Grab the fuckin' governor," Wolverine honcho Adam Fox allegedly told an FBI informant. "Just grab the bitch. Because at that point, we do that, dude—it's over."

Now their lives are essentially over, all 13 of them facing state and federal charges after months of accumulating weapons and night-vision scopes, building bombs, communicating in coded messages, and even conducting post-midnight surveillance of the governor's lakeside vacation home.

Playing guns. One guy was going to paint his fishing boat black to facilitate a late night kidnapping; others planned to bomb a nearby highway overpass to distract law enforcement. They first attracted police attention by trying to learn the home addresses of local cops. That will get you busted every time.

Everything came apart after a couple of Wolverines got cold feet and went to the law. The Feds had informants wired for sound during meetings in the basement hideout—two of them, who didn't know about each other.

Gov. Whitmer, see, had provoked the outrage of bearded children across Michigan with a series of stringent lockdown orders meant to slow the spread of the Covid-19 virus. "LIBERATE MICHIGAN," the honorary head Wolverine in the White House tweeted on April 17 amid his deadly campaign to "re-open" the economy before public health officials thought it wise.

Two weeks later, armed militiamen occupied the statehouse in Lansing. At least two of the Wolverines participated. I kept wondering what would happen if some fool pulled the trigger. No way and no how should such conduct be legal. The Constitution is not a suicide pact.

Trump urged surrender: "The Governor of Michigan should give a little, and put out the fire," he wrote. "These are very good people, but they are angry."

Down in the basement, meanwhile, Wolverine chieftain Adam Fox vented: "Everything's gonna have to be annihilated, man. We're gonna topple it all, dude. It's what great frickin' conquerors, man, we're just gonna conquer every fuckin' thing, man."

Evidently, Fox's girlfriend had left him. I can't imagine why.

Then after Gov. Whitmer chided Boss Trump for his refusal to condemn right-wing extremists and white supremacists, he complained that she hadn't thanked him for protecting her. Trump cited "My Justice Department and Federal Law Enforcement" quite as if he'd played some role in the bust, which he surely did not.

The thing is, all the guns, camouflage fatigues and subterranean hideouts in the world can't give these bearded children what they need—decent jobs and good women to help them keep their heads on straight.

20 Years After The Bombing, How Is OKC Different?

20 Years After The Bombing, How Is OKC Different?

By Clint Davis, Scripps National Desk (TNS)

In April 1995, gas was about $1.25 a gallon, Seinfeld was TV’s most popular show and the O.J. Simpson murder trial was dominating the national conversation. Also, the hair was bigger.

It’s that last part that reminded longtime Oklahoma City resident Jennifer McCollum just how long it has been since her hometown was rocked by what was then the deadliest terrorist attack in United States history.

“I drove by the memorial recently and saw a laminated picture of (23-year-old victim) Julie Welch. I realized that her hair had gone out of style and it really crystallized for me that she was never going to grow old,” McCollum said. “It took my breath away because it was the first time I realized how much time had passed.”

April 19 marks 20 years since the Oklahoma City bombing killed 169 people and injured more than 650 others. The attack targeted the Alfred P. Murrah Federal Building in downtown Oklahoma City.

Despite the passage of two decades, McCollum and other Oklahoma City residents remember with perfect clarity what they were doing when they heard about — or felt — the explosion, at 9:02 a.m.

“I was still in bed when the house shook in the morning,” Oklahoma City Mayor Mick Cornett told the Scripps National Desk. “I had anchored the evening news the night before. I didn’t know what (the noise) was. I wasn’t sure there was anything wrong.”

Cornett said he turned on the television and saw reports within five or six minutes of the blast — but still none of the news outlets knew what had happened. “The initial reports were that it was some kind of natural gas explosion. The idea that it was a bomb never occurred to me,” Cornett said.

McCollum, 47, was working in public relations at Tinker Air Force Base, located about 11 miles from the blast. She said she also thought it was a natural gas explosion at first.

When someone told her there had been a “very large explosion downtown,” McCollum recalled having a sobering realization. “I just remember instantly being aware that people were, in that moment, dying,” she said. “A co-worker and I went into an office, closed the door and prayed together.”

“I couldn’t believe something so tragic could happen here,” McCollum said, echoing a familiar refrain many Americans likely would have uttered in the years before the Oklahoma City bombing and 9/11.

The prevailing notion after those attacks was summed up by 34-year-old Mia Blake, editor-in-chief of Oklahoma City-based Slice magazine. “I feel like our city is much less innocent since the bombing,” Blake said. “I think in general, people are more cautious.”

The bomb, built and detonated by U.S. Army veterans Timothy McVeigh and Terry Nichols, was housed in the back of a rental truck that was parked in front of the Federal Building.

Cornett said he didn’t recall widespread security changes across the city afterward but did say it seemed to make people more alert. “After the bombing, I think people took anti-government groups more seriously and were more likely to report them.”

McCollum said the bombing and subsequent national tragedies like the Columbine High School and Sandy Hook Elementary shootings have made her hold her children a little tighter.

“I kiss my children goodbye every morning with the knowledge that it could be the last time I see them. I just never want to leave them with a bad goodbye,” McCollum said, fighting back tears. “I try not to live my life in fear, but these things have happened to other people who never expected them.”

Among the victims of the bombing were 19 young children who were at a day care center inside the federal building. That fact still gives Mia Blake pause when she thinks about her 4-month-old son.

“I think, ‘What if I had dropped him off at day care that day?’ It definitely adds another dimension to my thoughts on the bombing.”

“Everyone thinks of the bombing first.” That was Blake’s take when asked if she felt the attack still defines her city among the nationwide consciousness. “I think it’s absolutely the first thing people recognize about Oklahoma City.”

McCollum was inclined to agree, adding, “It brought a nationwide awareness to the city and in the era of Google search, that can be negative; to always see tragic images when someone does a Google image search of Oklahoma City.”

Cornett, who was elected to a fourth term as the city’s mayor in 2014, said changing Oklahoma City’s national image has been an important part of his tenure. “We became branded by tragedy. That’s why I went after an NBA team — we needed the national public to connect something positive to Oklahoma City.”

Although Cornett doesn’t want the bombing to be first in the minds of the general public outside of Oklahoma City, inside the city limits, he’s adamant that citizens don’t forget what happened on April 19, 1995.

“We want to commemorate it,” he said, referring not only to the people who were killed but also to what he called an “unmatched” sense of unity that emerged in the city after the bombing.

“Our whole community was affected by that life experience,” Cornett said. “In the months after the bombing, something almost magical happened in the city. We came together, helped each other up and dared the world to pull us apart again.”

2015 Scripps News, Distributed by Tribune Content Agency, LLC

Photo: Larry via Flickr