Dreaming of a way
Another citizen of Trump’s America:
A Coast Guard lieutenant and self-described white nationalist who was arrested in Maryland last week was plotting to kill a long list of prominent journalists and Democratic politicians, as well as professors, judges and what he called “leftists in general,” federal prosecutors said in a court filing on Tuesday.
A a long list of prominent journalists and Democratic politicians plus also everyone on the planet.
Prosecutors quoted a letter that he drafted to friends in 2017 and that the authorities found on his computer. In it, Lieutenant Hasson, who works as an acquisitions officer at Coast Guard headquarters in Washington, wrote: “I am dreaming of a way to kill almost every last person on the earth. I think a plague would be most successful but how do I acquire the needed / Spanish flu, botulism, anthrax not sure yet but will find something.”
But maybe that was just a moment of grandiosity. Apparently he’s been more focused recently.
In the last month, prosecutors said, the lieutenant used his work computer to draw up a list of prominent figures he called “traitors” and wanted to kill, including many well-known anchors and hosts on the CNN and MSNBC news networks and a number of Democratic elected officials. The list included, among others, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Maxine Waters, Senator Richard Blumenthal, whom he referred to as “Sen blumen jew,” and many of the senators running for president in 2020.
He had recently performed internet searches seeking information about whether senators and Supreme Court justices receive Secret Service protection, the court filing said.
He was hoping to start a race war, to “get whitey off the couch.”
Federal investigators said in the court filing that Lieutenant Hasson had begun stockpiling weapons in 2017. When federal agents searched his cramped basement apartment in Silver Spring, Md., they said, they found a cache of 15 assault rifles, shotguns and handguns and more than 1,000 rounds of ammunition that the lieutenant had amassed.
The Program on Extremism at George Washington University called attention to the court filing in Twitter posts on Wednesday. In the filing, the authorities cited writings found on the lieutenant’s computer that point to extreme racist and apocalyptic views.
Shortly after the violence incited by a white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Va., in 2017, the authorities say, Lieutenant Hasson drafted a letter to a well-known neo-Nazi expressing support for the idea of building a “white homeland” in the Pacific Northwest.
Hey! No thank you! We’re just fine here, thank you very much, and we don’t need no stinkin white homeland.
The authorities said Lieutenant Hasson had studied the 1,500-page manifesto that the mass murderer Anders Behring Breivik, a far-right Norwegian extremist who killed 77 people in 2011, wrote in the hope of inspiring other killers.
Following Mr. Breivik’s advice about how to start a race war that would topple liberal governments, Lieutenant Hasson planned to assassinate prominent figures. He performed internet searches for the MSNBC host Joe Scarborough, among others, and for the phrase “civil war if Trump impeached,” the authorities said.
Lieutenant Hasson’s efforts appeared to intensify in January. The authorities say he searched for a section of Mr. Breivik’s manifesto that advises other mass murderers to begin a six-week cycle of steroids once all their preparations for violent acts are complete. Federal agents said they had found a locked box in his apartment containing more than 30 vials of human growth hormone.
So, possibly, he was close to putting his plan into action.
Things are really getting scary. I suspect things dropped to this point almost the moment Trump threw his hat in the ring. I don’t think we could have avoided the violence and hatred even (or maybe especially) if he lost. He has inflamed too many people already sitting around screaming at their TV because someone else is asking to be considered as human.
But not a terrorist though,
whiteright? Still a fine person.Probably not a story that’s going to be featured on Fox news. Unless Black, or Muslim. Then, terrorist, and not so fine, and Top Story (and direct to Trump’s brain/twitterfeed = WALL!!11!).
This guy used the Charles Manson idea of trying to start a race war!?!??!
His arsenal collection is not even that big, though. I could go to my local gun show this weekend and max out my credit card and come up with more than 15 assault weapons and 1000 rounds.
But he is male, so it is more likely that he would have someday actually used those weapons for offensive violence against innocents. Me being a female with less disposable income will have to be happy with the few weapons I have for self-defense.
Though I do wonder what will happen if USA police ever try to adopt the UK model of showing up to harass anybody who upsets a TRA online………..because thought police vs. armed citizens could get ugly fast.
Race wars (in the US) are the dumbest idea ever… We’re pretty damn racist but mostly in an indifferent, subconscious way. Few people care enough about race to have a “war”; they’ll just vote in monsters like Steve King and Trump instead.
BKiSA, agreed. I was reading a book last year about the white supremacists trying to start a race war throughout the 20th century, particularly following Civil Rights, and they did succeed in stirring up a handful of citizens, such as the Timothy McVays of the world, and in generating a handful of regional riots, but never anything to resemble a race war.
Besides, a lot of the people this jerk wants to target are actually white. Is he planning to blame something on the non-white population to start a race war? Or is he just…like…flawed in his logic?
It appears we’re dealing with full-on craziness here, so, even though it manifested in a political way, I don’t know that ultimately has much to do with politics.
Have to agree with you, Blood Knight in Sour Armor, about Americans mostly being disinterested in race wars and civil wars of any kind. Yes, we all have things we hate about each other but hardly anybody has the deep desire to get physical in any way about it. And then there is that mean old government who might decide to come in and arrest everybody on both sides if things get too bad for business. The Chambers of Commerce orgs that have so much power in each state know they are not selling much stuff in a burning store so there is a big incentive to keep people away from actually fighting.
Well sure, most white Americans aren’t on the verge of becoming Christian Identity ‘race warriors.’ And most Muslims aren’t ravening jihadis. But the deranged ideologies are well-rooted in the general culture, and it doesn’t take many Timothy McVeighs or Major Hasans to wreck a country.
Regarding the lieutenant’s attempt to start a race war with “just” fifteen assorted firearms and 1000 rounds, I recall Richard Burton’s character’s words in Jeff Wayne’s “War of the Worlds,” upon reuniting with the artilleryman:
It’s fortunate that, in most of these situations, that gulf is pretty broad. When it’s not, you get the likes of October 1, 2017 in Vegas…