Clint Van Zandt (sp?) says Anthrax Killer felt ALTRUISTIC!!! WTF!?

[Sparkly]

He claims the killer was trying to make people aware, and could claim that while he/she may have killed people, he/she saved more.

:wtf:

Please tell me if I misunderstood what he said.

[Punkingal]

1. I heard it as....

That could possibly be what the killer was thinking, not that he was. Remember, he is supposed to be able to get into the minds of nutcases like that.

[Sparkly]

6. Yes -- still makes no sense to me even as a theory.

Why just Democrats? Why the weird messages?

I would think any acts of terrorism could be explained with that motivation ('trying to make us aware of danger'), so what boggles my mind is that it's a guess at the motivation of a domestic terrorist act, for no reason I can see.

Of course, I'm no expert and maybe he came to this conclusion based on some factors he didn't have time to explain -? Seems like a far stretch to me!

[Bitwit1234]

2. Anthrax

Another question..why kill democrats. The letters were sent to dems and those posting the truth about bush. What was that supposed to prove.

[Supersedeas]

14. The Corp Cable media pretends there is no connection bt victims

[tibbiit]

3. Perfect Human Demons run our World

He claims the killer was trying to make people aware, and could claim that while he/she may have killed people, he/she saved more.
....

Another example of having to kill people to save people.
tib

[peekaloo]

4. didn't hear it BUT I noticed on last night's CBS story on the anthrax

killer Botox-Katie only mentioned the letters that went to Brokaw and the NY Post.

:mad:

[tanyev]

5. With altruists like that, who needs sociopaths?

:shrug:

[jobycom]

9. Robespierre and Stalin come to mind. Even Usama bin Laden.

People who believe they are sacrificing themselves to create a better world, whether the world wants it or not. Some altruists become sociopathic when they reach the conclusion that there are dangerous, inhuman enemies standing between the present chaos and the future Utopia they envision. It's a small step to say "Those standing in my way are evil, and should be destroyed."

To me, true evil for the sake of evil rarely, if ever, exists. The most powerful evil we face in the real world are people who believe they are doing good. Bush. Hitler. Reagan. Usama. Even us, if we aren't careful. Frankly, that's one reason I hate these dehumanizing nicknames people invent around here, like Chimpanator or Sheeple or Repukes. It's just another step towards declaring the enemy non-human, and thus clearing the way for their extermination. Hopefully not literal extermination, but that has happened.

Geeze, I ramble too much. Sorry to bother everyone. I'll stop now. :)

[jobycom]

7. I agree with him

I don't know who CVZ is, but I agree that the Anthrax killer thought he was being patriotic and helping the nation to fight its internal enemies. The attacks were clearly a coup attempt, to kill enough Dems in the Senate to give control of the Senate back to the Republicans.

Timothy McVeigh and Ted Kazinsky also believed they were doing the right thing, fighting the real enemy in order to create a better America. Ann Coulter probably believes that about her own filth. Messiah complexes often lead to bloody outcomes.

The thing is, I'm not sure whether the Anthrax mailer was a mentally disturbed individual or a government operative, with or without sanction from someone higher up in the government. If he were just mentally disturbed, I find it hard to believe he hasn't struck again. Even if he has lost access to Anthrax, an ego like his would drive him to find another way to attack--like Kazinsky. If he were a government official doing what he believed, rightly or wrongly, was his job, that would explain him not striking again. Though that's all guessing, there's no telling what a person will really do.

[Sparkly]

8. Aha -- That does make sense to me.

But that's different from what Clint VZ said... His suggestion was that the killer was trying to warn us about the dangers of anthrax, not addressing the selective victims...

To me, it sounds like the kind of leap they made to create "motivation" for Anita Hill. Rather than accept the obvious (she's telling the truth), they came up with, "She believes she's telling the truth, but she's delusional." Here, rather than accept that the killer may be a rightwing nut, it's "He believes he's warning the country against the dangers of anthrax."... Just seems like a very odd leap!

Your hypothetical makes more sense and yes, from that point of view it's possible the killer felt he was altruistically saving the nation (from Democrats).

[jobycom]

10. Ah.

Then I don't agree with Clint. I can see what he's thinking--there were people raising concerns about how easy a chemical attack could be, and some who were saying that the US mail could be used for an attack. So I can understand Clint's view, that someone may have been trying to prove it to us and thus felt that they were, in effect, vaccinating us against a worse attack.

That argument would hold water if the targets had been more random, or had been connected in some other way. But the targets were too clear--the National Enquirer editor who printed embarrassing photos of Jenna, several journalists the right-wing media had been harping on as enemies of Bush, and two Democratic Senators who had attacked Bush, one of whom would have been replaced by a Republican, thus shifting power. There were no neutral targets, no conservative reporters or politicians, no Representatives or state officials, no one in the State Department or federal law enforcement--no one you would expect as targets if the purpose had been to wake America up to the Anthrax dangers.

The killer was targeting opponents of Bush, and trying to bring about a coup in the Senate, and no doubt as part of his message he was trying to frighten the nation into greater paranoia, but only for Republican/Bush-esque purposes. He may have thought he was a good little Republican, but he wasn't just trying to warn American about the dangers of Anthrax. He was hitting the wrong targets for that.

[Warpy]

11. Consider how difficult weaponized anthrax is to handle safely

and without contaminating the environment. Envelopes containing spores had those spores volatize immediately when the envelopes were opened, traveling through ventilation systems and contaminating entire government buildings.

The only way to put that stuff into envelopes is in a high level containment facility. REmember, the outsides of the evelopes have to be decontaminated, too. If they'd tried it anywhere else, there would have been large numbers of innocent bystanders infected with that stuff.

This is an inside job. The only question is whether it was ordered by the Bush family or it was a CIA zealot acting alone. The fact that the first target and the first fatality was an obscure photogropher who published an embarrassing photo of the Bush twins falling down drunk lends credence to the former.

They shut the House down. Only Jeffords's defection that gave the Dems a temporary one man majority stood in the way of shutting the Senate down, as well. It could have been a dictatorship 5 years ago.

Most people in this country have forgotten the anthrax mailings completely, and that may be the biggest tragedy of all.

[Schema Thing]

12. Sounds reasonable to me

as well, this person had a plan of action that was set to trigger in the event of a terrorist attack.

<P>

I think it's an extreme rightwinger, a true believer, a nut, but obviously a brilliant nut. I suspect his identity is known both by his senatorial victims, and the white house. There are what, maybe 10 people on the planet who could have done this?





On edit, just read your clarification above. My thoughts mirror jobycoms; I don't believe this is a person making a point about terrorism in general.

[dazzlerazzle]

13. anthrax killer(s)

if this was a terrorist plot, the illegal wire-tapping should have discovered the plan... at the time, judicial appointments were a big thing and the democratic contol of the senate was something some people possibly would go to extreme means to stop. we may know someday, but it could be decades away.