Yes, occasional political violence across the ideological spectrum is as old as America itself. What’s different now is the frequency. In the five years after Trump was elected president in 2016, recorded threats against members of Congress rose more than tenfold, to 9,625 in 2021, according to a New York Times analysis of figures from the Capitol Police.

On Friday, a man pleaded guilty to threatening to kill Rep. Eric Swalwell (D-Dublin) and his staff. Earlier this summer, a man tried to stab New York gubernatorial candidate Lee Zeldin, a Republican congressman, during a July campaign event, and an armed man was arrested on suspicion of threatening to kill Democratic Rep. Pramila Jayapal outside her Seattle home.

A Simi Valley man was arrested near the Maryland home of Justice Brett M. Kavanaugh in June after he flew across the country with a black tactical vest, a Glock 17 pistol and, according to authorities, a plan to harm the Supreme Court justice. In August, two men were convicted of conspiring to kidnap Michigan Gov. Gretchen Whitmer in a plot that involved obtaining a bomb to blow up a bridge and thwart police.

And in May, two Northern California men pleaded guilty to plotting to blow up the state Democratic Party’s headquarters in Sacramento in a scheme prosecutors described as politically motivated by Trump’s 2020 loss.

Republicans who believe that the 2020 election was stolen from Trump and that Joe Biden is an illegitimate president are “substantially more likely” than other Americans to believe that violence is justified to advance political objectives, according to a new study by the UC Davis Violence Prevention Research Program.

Source: Editorial: The attack on Paul Pelosi is an attack on democracy – Los Angeles Times

The suspect’s exact motivation has yet to be established. But this week’s attack on Pelosi’s husband isn’t the first time an apparent QAnon follower has allegedly targeted the House Speaker with violence. On January 7, 2021, the FBI arrested Cleveland Grover Meredith at a DC hotel after he texted friends that he was, “Thinking about heading over to Pelosi’s… speech and putting a bullet in her noggin on live TV.” Meredith had been planning to be at the Capitol on January 6 but had car trouble and never made it. The FBI found hundreds of rounds of ammo, guns, and an assault rifle in his trailer. In 2018, Meredith put up a billboard emblazoned “#QANON” that advertised his car wash in Georgia. When the Atlanta Journal-Constitution asked him about it, he said he’d been drawn to QAnon by “common sense.” In court, his lawyer said that Meredith had “found a sense of purpose” in the QAnon world. He was sentenced to 28 months in prison.

QAnon emerged in 2017 as an online phenomenon, with followers taking cues from the anonymous “Q” who posted cryptic messages on 8chan. But it has been bleeding into real life in a violent fashion. In 2018, for instance, a man drove an armored truck to the Hoover Dam claiming to be on a mission from QAnon to force the Office of the Inspector General to release the “real” report on Hillary Clinton’s missing emails, referring to another strand of the far-right conspiracy theory. He engaged in a standoff with police before finally being arrested.

Source: Experts Are Seeing a Wave of QAnon-linked Crimes. The Attack on Pelosi’s Husband Might Be the Latest. – Mother Jones

Source: Do Democrats think climate change is a worthy cause to spend our children and their children’s money on? | Filosofa’s Word

Source: We need leaders to calm the tensions | NANMYKEL.COM

Source: Flu season hasn’t been this bad this early in more than a decade

Stories are meant to transport us to other times and other places.  The audience for some of my more wacky story ideas, like this one, might need us …

Parashat Noach 5783, A short short Still emerging from song, and transportation