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Threatening Letters Sent To Congressional Offices, Fox News, The Daily Show, Basically Everyone

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» 30 comments

Here’s another charming reminder that, guess what, there are crazies out there. More often than you’d think, politicians and media figures receive threatening messages from the public. In just the past year, shows like The Late Late Show and Dancing with the Stars had anthrax scares. This past week, though, a fairly shocking amount of Congress members and TV shows received threatening letters seemingly from a location in Portland, Oregon.

Letters that were described as “anti Establishment/Wall Street in tone” and included a white powder that was later found to be harmless were mailed to many disparate locations. In addition to targets like The New York Times and The Daily Show, Reuters has the disturbingly long list:

“House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner, the top Republican in Congress, received a letter containing a powdery substance at one of his offices in his home state of Ohio, a Republican aide said, adding that the powder was harmless.

Letters containing powder were also received at the home-state office of two senators, according to Senate Sergeant at Arms Terrance Gainer, the chamber’s chief law enforcement officer.

Other media that received the letters were The Colbert Report, Washington Post, USA Today, the Chicago Tribune, the Los Angeles Times, the Seattle Post-Intelligencer, MacNeil/Lehrer Productions, This Week with Christiane Amanpour, Countdown with Keith Olbermann and Fox News.”

The letters were signed by “The MIB” and, since they were postmarked in Portland, I’d say there’s an equal chance that this is horribly misguided viral marketing for either Portlandia or Men in Black 3.

All joking aside, back when I was in college, I interned at The Colbert Report and, any time I manned the phones for even 30 minutes, I’d get at least a couple calls from people who were, at the best, confused and, at the worst, unsettling enough to pass along to security. Events like this remind us of the dark side of being in the public eye. Unfortunately, it’s just a fact of life that there are dangerous and disturbed people out there.

Below, watch a clip from Fox News in which Bret Baier announces the letters that Fox News received:

(h/t Media Bistro)

Editor’s note: This post has been edited since it’s original posting – Jon Nicosia

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  • Anonymous

    Sounds like radical right-wing nutjobs. A.k.a., the GOP base.

  • Anonymous

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  • Anonymous

    Quick lets blame a political group that we disagree with and say that they are all crazy due to the actions of some individual that we know nothing about!

  • Anonymous

    The authors of the letters were successful: they received the attention he/she craved.

  • Anonymous

    And what evidence do you have to reinforce this notion, exactly?

  • Anonymous

    Sounds like radical nutjobs..  There I fixed that for you.

  • http://pulse.yahoo.com/_WH3ZLMM7CUKUHUIMK4TKXW6SQE John

    Obviously Sarah Palin’s fault.

  • Anonymous

    Letters that were described as “anti Establishment/Wall Street in tone”

    Sounds like radical right-wing nutjobs. A.k.a., the GOP base.

    But then, many people have observed that what progressives think is radically wrong most of the time.

  • Anonymous

    Now we finally know what StoneparkIV has been up to all of this time. 

  • Anonymous

    Begone Troll.

  • Anonymous

    My only surprise is that there aren’t 16,000,000,000 letters to Congress.  These fools all need to go home and kint sweaters for the rest of their lives.

  • http://www.madcharles.com/ MadCharles

     Hahahahahahahahahah….

  • Anonymous

    Seems some people in Portland have too much time on their hands.

  • Pablo
  • Charles Ulysses Feney

    Dick Cheney ordered the White House Staff to begin taking Cipro on the evening of 9/11 to prevent Anthrax – 2 weeks before the Anthrax letters were sent!

    http://www.historycommons.org/timeline.jsp?anthraxattacks_other=anthraxattacks_cipro___bayer&timeline=anthraxattacks

  • Anonymous

    Wow. What amazing logical reasoning you have.

    I’m surprised that you’re surprised that the government had intel on things like that. But then again, you’re a Ron Paul supporter, so you’re prone to believe wild conspiracy theories.

  • Charles Ulysses Feney

    And you’re a TSA crotch juggler, prone to wild power “grabs”!

  • Anonymous

     Well, your mother was a hamster and your father smelt of elderberries!

  • Anonymous

    RINO!

  • Anonymous

    I’m eager for your explanation as to how you came to this conclusion based upon a singular post.

    I bet it’s interesting…

  • Just some Blow Hard…

     funny you should say that because all the letters were advertising this site.  Hey mediaite, good to know I can advertise my blog here for free.

  • http://www.facebook.com/EverydayFormula Richard Schulz

    Here, we’ll save you all some time. Just fill in the blanks:

    Typical ______ tactic. They’re all for freedom of speech when we’re talking about ______ or ______, but as soon as you bring up __________ they go and mail anthrax. When will _________ learn the error of their ways. _________2012 

  • Anonymous

    You hate Ron Paul; thus, you’re a big-spending neocon.

  • Anonymous

    Damn I’m good at predicting these kind of responses…

    But still, not a very good explanation. It’s very one-dimensional, thus very weak. In theory, I could hate Ron Paul for a variety of reasons, such as his foreign policy doctrine, his domestic policy doctrine, etc–let alone his fiscal doctrine. 

    In practicality and reality, I don’t hate Ron Paul. I hate his followers who are prone to offer one-dimensional attacks due to their inherent lack of capability to see the world in the complex manner deserved.

    But I wouldn’t expect a mainstream Paul-ite to comprehend that.

  • Anonymous

    I’m just joking with ya. I’m a fellow Obama voter, just like you.

  • Anonymous

    I feel as though that is a more threatening statement than “RINO LAWL”

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Neil-Murphy/100000566621491 Neil Murphy

    That was awesome.

  • http://www.facebook.com/people/Neil-Murphy/100000566621491 Neil Murphy

    Permission to steal that one for later use?

  • Anonymous

    Ohh, I love this game! Let’s see, “Typical _Fart_  tactic. They’re all for freedom of speech when we’re talking about _Boobies__ or _Butts___, but as soon as you bring up __Poop___ they go and mail anthrax. When will _Senor Stinky Pants___ learn the error of their ways. __Turd Monkey____2012           

  • Anonymous

    Never wanting to be dismissed, Glenn Beck often offers the number of death threats he has received.
    Maybe he wants to go out with a “BANG !”

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