Fake Anthrax Attacks in Two States
Someone launched a Judy Miller-type (that is, fake) anthrax attack on a bunch of Republicans in AL–and two academics in CA. (h/t TPMM)
Envelopes containing white powder set off anthrax scares in five Alabama cities, shutting down two federal courthouses Monday and trapping a congressman in his office as authorities tested the substance.
No one was injured, and investigators said at least five of the letters — all sent to the offices of senators or congressmen — were believed to be from the same source.
Recipients include:
- US Rep Jo Bonner (2 offices)
- US Rep Mike Rogers (2 offices)
- Senator Richard Shelby
- Senator Jeff Sessions
- Federal Courthouse (Anniston)
- Federal Courthouse (Birmingham)
- UC Irvine professor Cynthia Feliciano
- UC Irvine professor Nancy Da Silva
TPMM notes the coincidence between this and the attempted terrorist attack on Christmas Day. Me, I’m more concerned by general anxiety in the US.
I realize that the statistics of stochastic events tells us that two unrelated random events can happen close to each other in time, but it really gets my radar up with two fake anthrax attacks so far apart in distance but at the same time–and so close in time to the underpants bomber, too.
It is strange, though, that so many Republicans would be targeted. They’re all already in pantswetting mode from failed bomb attack.
What’s even more disturbing is that there was a recent anthrax story that I will go find a link for. If I recall correctly it was a novel infection route, like gastrointestinal. The case was explained as arising from an animal skin on a drum that someone was playing in a drumming group.
Edit: Here’s the link:
http://www.boston.com/news/health/articles/2010/01/04/nh_anthrax_case_linked_to_animal_skinned_drums/
Yeah. I think it happened in New Hampshire
I don’t take much from the Republican thing. After all, it was a fake attack. Thus the analogy to Judy Miller.
I find the Irvine-AL thing weirder though.
And I misstated what TPMM was arguing. They’re arguing–like you, I think–that someone may be playing into the general anxiety following teh crotch bomber to try to scare people about anthrax.
The thing I’m most worried about is if this anticipates a real anthrax attack like the previous one.
Yeah, you are absolutely right about the fake part. I should have picked that up…
And since I believe that attack was orchestrated by Cheney’s hit squads, it doesn’t help when we consider how pissed off he is these days and how many “left behinds” he still has in place.
Sy Hersh says Cheney “left a stay-behind” in the Obama administration–for the usual dark purposes.
A possibility after spending 6-8 years not catching the Amerithrax perpetrator and, instead, trying to frame people that were not the perpetrator.
Oh, look. Now there’s one in the UK.
So the biohazard detectors installed in post offices ARE working.
Even Boehner’s mail was detected as safe. His mail would have gone through this hub. And I realize nothing happen in Ohio just giving the perps a heads up. Now Bonner’s office (AL) would have mail go through a hub with the same system.
Instead of rubbing hands in worry, we should be noting the success of the biohazard detection system. None of the envelopes had the real stuff.
So, what is the scare here?
The similar MO as 9-11 Anthrax timing?
As for the UC Irvine folks…
Are these “faux anthrax” statements about biofuels and immigration issues?
Go here for Feliciano.
da Silva’s going to take a little more googling, I guess.
Hmmm…theories:
1) A simple, cheap AQ operation. We’re revelent. Really. Are you scared yet?
2) The scum with the real anthrax is back. Is he out of anthrax? The only thing the fake attacks do is cause increased security, why botch a real attack?.
3) Somebody new is on the scene. If so, the presumed connections between the two groups (AL Gopers and UC professors) would lead to a very small group of suspects. Southern GOPers do not have much in common with higher education.
4) It’s a bunch of idiots playing pranks for amusement.
5) It’s Iran, threatening us with what they could do. Fox News, when you use this one I expect full crediting.
FWIW, I’m currently going with #3.
Boxturtle (I’m gonna guess this one gets solved relatively quickly)
option # 6 the repuglitards did it to themselves. kkkarl rove is up to his usual tricks. remember when the dude found the bug he planted in his own office ???
IIRC, the previous anthrax attacks were all targeted at Democrats and media figures
were the previous phony attacks directed at someone else, while the real ones were Dems and media ??? (is this a repeat of a previous pattern)
maybe we need a timeline for this
Marcy’s anthrax investigation timeline has the individual letters in it.
Remember Rove and the “Canarys “in the Siegelman coalmine?
Also,what about that Dem Griffiths from North Alabama that up and left the D’s for the R’s just a week or so ago-and took the Dem’s voter list with him?
Griffiths staff has left enmasse in protest,btw.
Speaking of Siegelman, klynn@44’s google search topmost hit has a photo of AL Gov. Bob Riley at the groundbreaking ceremony for a big new biodiesel plant in October 2006.
Carter talked about a general malaise, and now it seems there’s a general–what?–malice or meanness, perhaps. People showing up at public events–right- and fright-wing ones–with guns, 58% polled (note: Rasmussen) saying the underwear bomber should be tortured, now these weird anthrax-pretend strikes, the guy in Las Vegas who lost a benefits dispute with the SSA and went on a killing rampage. And of course poverty, un–and under-employment on the rise in contrast to unbelievable wealth in the highest places, wars with no end in sight, corruption everywhere . . . Very disturbing set-up we’ve got operating here.
Pardon my ramblings.
I do not think I would call your observations ramblings.
How about spot-on concerns?
You brought up ” Carter talked about a general malaise”.
Which brings to mind this interview of John Yoo by The New York Times
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/01/03/magazine/03fob-q4-t.html
In answer to the question” When, exactly, did you become a conservative?”
Yoo answered- ” I’ve been one since I was a kid. I was 9 when Jimmy Carter took office. I can remember him giving a speech in a funny sweater and asking people to turn down thermostats. And then there was the malaise speech. I thought they meant mayonnaise.”
There is thought behind what you called ramblings.
They are not ramblings.
Yoo: Is this real or is this satire?
and klynn @ 27. Thank you for your kindness.
Prior topic: Skdadl, they’re not talking about using just the roofs. Some plans call for the plants to begin their lifes in soil on the roof and when they reach a certain size, they’re hung on a chain line that routes them through the building. The Air carries the nutrients and water, no soil involved at all! At each stage of their lives, they’re in an area of the building that provides optimal conditions for that stage of life. They’re harvested when they reach the first floor and shipped. There’s already a test site in operation.
Boxturtle (Imagine, the tallest building in Michigan could be a sweet corn farm!)
Thx, BoxTurtle. I used to live near a building in Toronto that would be an ideal candidate for that system, since it originally worked in reverse. I forget which auto maker built it (although I can find out with a bit of research) almost a century ago, midtown, very handsome brick building. They assembled the cars by starting on the main floor and then moving them up a floor at a time on elevators until the finished cars got to the top, where there was a test-driving track.
It’s a human-scale building — maybe five-six storeys? Paris size — and very nicely restored for commercial renters, with huge windows. I used to walk past it and think that one of those open floors would be perfect for me and teh kittehs, but for some reason, that wasn’t considered legal. They could easily do your hanging gardens, though, very big space up top, and obviously well reinforced if cars used to drive around it.
It was Ford, 672 Dupont at Christie, where they built Model Ts. You can see a photo of the showroom here (it’s about a third of the way down the page if you don’t get jumped there).
That was once a common manufacturing layout, c. 1920. There are buildings like it in Cleveland, among other cities. One has been renovated and is now part of the Cleveland Institute of Art.
So, who are these professors andwhat are they specialists in, anyway?
See my 9 for the condensed version.
I dunno – the descriptions of their work is so vague as to be next-to-meaningless in determining why someone would send white powder to them out of all the college professors in this world.
Someone’s going to have to read their papers – I’d bet money on the people who sent this powder having done just that.
Feliciano
Da Silva
Initial look says the professors have as little in common with each other as they do with the Al GOPers. They’re at the same large institution is all.
Boxturtle (Curiouser and curiouser – Alice)
Yes, their specialties seem unrelated to each other, except that both are in fields with political importance – immigration and biofuels respectively, as someone mentioned above. Not saying this is a huge data point, but it wouldn’t be true of many professors, so I think it’s worth keeping in mind.
As you say, it might be more useful to look at their publications.
A first glance at Feliciano’s google roster suggests interracial dating was an academic interest of hers. That’s suggestive of a possible tie with an angry Alabamian. But obviously, it’s all speculation – could be anything; and the two situations could be unrelated.
I’d look to see if an Engineering student took Feliciano’s Sociology class as a GE Requirement. That would be step #1.
Giving this comment more point, UCI requires one course in “Multicultural Studies” from everybody.
fatster only beat me because the wheelhouse made me sign in again after my last comment! :-)
Boxturtle (Seriously, I posted, hit refresh, and my post was up and I was logged out!)
I’ll have to concede, since you were delayed just a tad by a technical difficulty over which you had no control.
I just got logged out too FWIW. There is a benign and rational explanation for why this occasionally occurs, but suffice it to say it is not you.
I realize this should be on the trash thread, but, seriously, EW: Woolverweenies hiring the Domino’s CEO to be their athletic director? Will there be a pizza team? Will the coaches be fired if they don’t deliver a victory in 30 minutes or less?
Pizza and Bo Merlot. What a powerhouse.
WIlliam C. Rhoden brings the trash effectively
One of those believe-it-only-if-you-see-it kind of things, but it is nice to contemplate.
The Talibama??
And Cal Qaeda?
Heh heh, Jim.
h/t to you on that one!
Here are some updates in the news.
And a third envelope was was found at UC Irvine this AM.
It’s not fake anthrax, it’s powdered ACORNS!
-G
This is getting srsly squirrely.
Nuts!
-G
ACORN the org is an obsession with the right/fright wing. Hmmmmm.
OT
Yemen Embassy reopened. That was quick.
Professor Da Silva:
Professor Feliciano, professor of sociology and Chicano/Latino Studies, Center for Research on Immigration, Population, and Public Policy
Do you see any reason these folks might be targets?
And exactly how are they the same as the Republican lawmakers.
Mike Rogers is on House Homeland Security Committee. Jo Bonner is on Appropriations and Ethics committees. Sessions is on Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on Terrorism and Homeland Security.
Since the 3 letters to Irvine all went to women, I would suggest that might be the connection rather than their academic disciplines.
That would tend to indicate independent incidents.
What makes you say that? The article that klynn linked to in her comment at 29 doesn’t identify who the third female recipient is, but I don’t see any reason why we shouldn’t consider the possibility that someone at UCI has a bone to pick with female faculty members. I find it odd, that none of the UCI letters went to a male, especially since men still tend to outnumber women faculty in technical departments like Computer Science and Engineering.
from the OC Register story klynn linked to at #29:
This was a curious comment in the OC Register article
“Officials at Cal State Fullerton and Chapman University in Orange say their campuses have not received such letters.”
Why would they even be indicating that they HAD NOT received such letters?
Jo Bonner proposed some odd bills in 2007 and 2008 while on the House Ways and Means Committee. They are worded like this:
– To extend temporarily the duty on Dimethyl Carbonate
– To extend temporarily the duty on Ethyl Pyruvate
– To extend temporarily the duty on 5-Chloro-1-indanone
– To extend temporarily the duty on Phenylmethyl hydrazinecarboxylate
I have no idea what these chemicals are, or why a Representative from Mobile, Alabama would know about them, or if they dovetail with the professors’ work in California.
Ding, ding, ding!
All tied to biodiesel production.
Alabama is a major oil processing area – stemming from the fields in the G of Mexico. I believe these have something to do with raising the octane of gasoline chemically, without (expensive) processing.
But equally interesting is the fact that Volkswagon has a plant under construction there and
enjoy this Google hit…
Multiple biodiesel plants under construction or now producing. Nice way to help his state out there.
I should report that nytimes.com has absolutely NOTHING on this story, so the hypothesis that it was meant to stir up MSM alarm can be killed.
For the car people. Ford sales up .
Oh, next week we’re going to be all car all the time (well, Monday or Tuesday) as I’m doing the Detroit Auto show.
Zoom, zoom.
A few days ago (Dec. 31) my wife and I visited the Henry Ford Museum for a few hours on the way to the airport in Detroit. It was an interesting look at the Century of the Automobile, but there was not much dealing with the momentous changes of the past 25 years. Not, at least, in the part of the museum that we visited. Nevertheless, highly recommended. There were some interesting displays about the hundreds of car manufacturers from 1900 -1930, and how competition, the depression, and unionization conspired to concentrate manufacturing into the 3 majors. The last big fling of the “independents” was after WWII (remember Studebaker? the Jeep?). So now we’re down to 2.5, or maybe 2.
Bob in AZ
Yeah, but do any of them fly??? ; )
if not too much trouble, can you find the highest ranking toyota exec attending and kick him in the shins on behalf of myself and the milions of other lucky duck owners of the models subject to the “sudden acceleration” problem? thx!
I’d be pleased to.
But given the Japanese obsession with “face,” wouldn’t it be a bit more fun it I hit them there?
Very inscrutable of you to offer to go all Cheney on them!
fielder’s choice!
and back ON topic, we’re up to Envelope #4, also sent to a female faculty member, all bearing a return address in Idaho:
(and i could’ve sworn i heard a radio report overnight – insomnia – that one or two others have been found, but so far nothing in the press)
@59
Re: Griffiths-he’s a radiation oncologist. Here’s some background info from Wiki.
(I read elsewhere that one of his Congressional committees dealt with bio fuels and alternative energy . Will try to locate that,specifically.)
Party switch
On December 22, 2009, Griffith announced he would become a Republican. He cited the health care bill as a major reason for his switch, and had also clashed with the Democrats over fiscal and foreign policy. During his announcement, he stated:
“I believe our nation is at a crossroads and I can no longer align myself with a party that continues to pursue legislation that is bad for our country, hurts our economy, and drives us further and further into debt.”[16]
The GOP had been courting Griffith since August, when he publicly criticized the Democratic House leadership in the wake of raucous town hall meetings in his district, stating that he wouldn’t vote for Nancy Pelosi as Speaker as she is “divisive and polarizing”.[2] He also opposes the White House’s decision to cancel a missile defense shield in Europe, which could have contributed to Huntsville’s defense industry.[17]
In January 2010, rebelling against his party switch, Griffith’s congressional staff resigned en masse, including his chief of staff, legislative director and press secretary.[19][20]
Committee assignments
As a result of the change in party affiliation, Griffith has been stripped of all of his committee assignments. He previously sat as a Democrat on the Committee on Science and Technology (Subcommittees on Water Resources and Environment, Research and Science Education, and Space and Aeronautics), Committee on Small Business (Subcommittees on Contracting and Technology, Regulations, Healthcare and Trade, and Investigations and Oversight), and Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure (Subcommittee on Economic Development, Public Buildings and Emergency Management and Water Resources and Environment).
Wiki
@51
Mobile is also the site of a new billions of $$$ Thyssen Krupp steel manufacturing facility.
To wit:
New Alabama stainless and carbon steel facilities
On May 11, 2007, ThyssenKrupp AG announced an investment of €3.1 billion (US$4.19 billion) for building new carbon steel and stainless steel processing facilities in southern Alabama.[5] The announcement came after several months of competition between a site on the Mississippi River in Convent, Louisiana, and a site on the Tombigbee River, near Mount Vernon, Alabama, in Mobile County, about 30 miles north of Mobile.
When completed in the spring of 2010, the facilities will process a combined total of 5.1 million metric tons of carbon and stainless steel annually for sale in the NAFTA market and will employ a combined total of 2,700 people.
Additionally, the Alabama State Port Authority is investing over $100 million to build a slab terminal on the southern tip of Pinto Island in Mobile Bay to service the raw material for the carbon steel facility.
The project, alsong with a multi-billion dollar steelmaking facility currently under construction in Brazil, is a cornerstone of ThyssenKrupp Steel’s new global expansion strategy into the North American and NAFTA high-value carbon steel markets.
Wiki
re: Biodiesel and tax credits
Biodiesel producers lose $1 a gallon tax credit
Bad start to 2010 after ‘rough year’ for entire biofuel industry
OKLAHOMA CITY – An alternative fuel for diesel engines is off to a shaky start this year even though it emits fewer pollutants and cuts down on petroleum use because it’s made from environmentally friendly waste and vegetable oil.
A federal tax credit that provided makers of biodiesel $1 for every gallon expired Friday. As a result, some U.S. producers say they will shut down without the government subsidy.
Biodiesel’s woes come on top of a year of problems for the fledgling biofuel industry — an irony given the push to cut down on greenhouse gases and ease the nation’s need for foreign oil. A key driver for the alternative fuel — the high cost of oil — disappeared as diesel prices dropped 18 percent since the beginning of the recession. Then in March the European Union placed import-killing tariffs on biodiesel and other biofuels.
MSNBC
Posted on Saturday, January 02 @ 17:40:14 PST