By way of followup, two weeks ago, when news broke about mail packages containing “bombs” being sent to Democrats, I cautiously advised that the devices appeared to be fake. But in their latest report on the topic, even Fox News is referring to the “bombs” as “improvised explosive devices.” That’s right, IEDs. But were they explosive devices or inert hoaxes.

I also noted originally, “To be clear, whether or not these devices were intended to detonate or disrupt, this is, by definition, an act of terrorism [as was] the case with the envelopes laced with the deadly toxin ricin, sent to the Pentagon and White House three weeks ago.” As President Donald Trump declared, “Acts or threats of political violence of any kind have no place in the United States of America. The full weight of our government is being deployed to conduct this investigation and bring those responsible for these despicable acts to justice. This egregious conduct is abhorrent to everything we hold dear and sacred as Americans.”

I originally estimated that, given the amateurish construction, packaging, and delivery method, the significant forensic trail would lead to the swift arrest of the package maker.

Indeed, he was apprehended within days.

The perpetrator was a bankrupt, Democrat-hating, sociopath with a long criminal history living in a van plastered with pro-Trump and anti-Democrat stickers. He was obviously ignorant, but when dealing with real explosive components, such ignorance almost always results in what is known, in the parlance of bomb techs and investigators, as “self-solving.” In other words, the bomb maker detonates the device while attempting to construct it, terminating his or her career.

As I noted for the record, if a bomb was designed for detonation upon opening, it would have a very different triggering mechanism — like those sent by leftist Theodore John Kaczynski, a.k.a. the “Unabomber.” He devised triggers designed to detonate the device when the parcels were opened, and his bombs murdered three people and severely injured others. But the recent mail package devices appear to have had no triggering mechanism, and it is not clear if there was any explosive component.

Late last week, I reconfirmed that, within 24 hours of the discovery of the mail packages, federal investigators advised key members of Congress that those “bombs” were inert. Thus, it is curious that there has been no public confirmation that the mail packages were a hoax. One reason for not making this distinction public was concern that if real devices had been mailed, other recipients might assume a device they received was fake and be injured. But that could have been made clear when announcing the devices were a hoax. A second reason might be not to advertise that so much disruption could occur with a few dollars of materials from a hardware store and some padded mailers. But I would argue that the disruption could have been minimized had the public been advised whether these devices were real or a hoax.

Consider if the deranged Bernie Sanders supporter, an Obama “99%"er from Illinois, had used blanks when he attempted the mass murder of congressional Republicans in June 2017. Had he used blanks, that story would have been out of the headlines in 24 hours.

In this case, not clarifying that the devices were either real or a hoax empowered the Schumer/Pelosi/MSM conglomerate to continue spinning their ”Trump spews hate“ narrative with sensationalist 24/7 mail-bomber headlines just ahead of an important election. Again, maybe one or more of these devices were not inert, but I have yet to see any official FBI, ATF, or Secret Service news release confirming the devices were actually bombs.