Suspect arrested in letter bomb case

Cesar Sayoc mugshot. Wall Street Journal.

A suspect in the letter bomb case has been arrested for sending bombs to several high profile Trump critics. Wall Street Journal. Cesar Sayoc, a 56 year old from south Florida was arrested for the crimes. Sayoc was a Trump supporter and a male stripper who had several run ins with the laws. This was not the first time he made threats as he had served a one year probation sentence for a 2002 incident where he threatened to bomb a utility office he was having a dispute with. Sayoc is half white and half Native American. 

My Comment:

Though I think the threat this man represented has been massively overblown in the media, I am happy that he is in custody. Sending fake bombs to people isn't something that is ever ok, even if it is against people I don't like. I don't believe in political violence in any way, even if it's just a threat like this. I sincerely hope that Mr. Sayoc spends a very long time in prison. 

I really don't know what Sayoc was trying to accomplish here. If he was actually trying to murder people, which I don't think he was, he failed miserably. I do believe that I heard that Sayoc said he didn't want to hurt anyone but I haven't been able to find a source for that to confirm it. If he was trying to shut up the people he sent the fake bombs to, it didn't work. I doubt any of them were really intimidated and they now have the opportunity to gain sympathy from the attacks. 

Indeed, Sayoc's plot probably did damage to the man he claims to support. The last thing President Trump needed was this idiot making threats against his enemies. The media is having a field day with this and will probably cover it until and after the 2018 midterms. If he was trying to help he was a complete failure. 

It seems like Sayoc wasn't all there mentally. Someone in the Walls Street Journal was quoted as Sayoc being a racist, which makes little sense as he isn't fully white himself. Plus the pictures of the van he owned showed he was WAY too into politics. And I say that as someone who is too into politics. With his entire van covered in Trump pictures I wonder if he wasn't trying to draw someone into a fight. He also had a criminal history of making bomb threats, so it isn't too surprising that he did this. 

I do wonder if Sayoc had some help. I kind of think that Sayoc might have been a "known wolf" and been known to the FBI or other law enforcement. The FBI has a long history of encouraging terror plots to the point of giving them weapons and/or explosive and then arresting them at the last minute. Though I have no proof, I wonder if that is what happened here. If it did, I doubt we will hear about it anytime soon. 

I don't think this case effects the election all that much. The people that hate President Trump will still hate him while the ones that love him will continue to do so. I doubt that even one vote has been changed because of this attack. The general public seems very willing to move on to other things.

The general response I have seen from Trump supporters has been that Sayoc wasn't one of us and that none of us support this kind of political violence. Indeed, the main reason I supported President Trump in the primaries was due to the violence against him and his supporters. Compared to some of the major attacks against Republicans, including the Alexandria baseball shooting, the attack on Rand Paul and the various powder/Ricin attacks, not to mention the constant attacks against normal Trump supporters, this incident was basically a joke. Nobody was ever in any real danger. Some are still thinking there is a wider conspiracy, and I do agree that there are questions about that this case that should be asked, but for the most part we have already moved on. 

The Democrats and media are trying to act like innocent victims  but I am not buying it. I don't think it's a coincidence that almost everyone targeted in this incident were people that have either threatened Trump and his supporters with violence or didn't speak out against it. I think in Sayoc's mind he thought he was helping to protect the president. Given how violent the left was, I can at least understand that line of thinking even if Sayoc's response was completely unjustified to say the least. 

I don't plan on covering this story again, as I feel it really isn't that important in the grand scheme of things. Indeed, I am somewhat annoyed that the amount of coverage for this case greatly exceeded even the coverage of the Alexandria shooting. A fake bombing campaign is a serious thing, but not the world changing event that the media is making it out to be.