Asha Rangappa Bluesky thread on the shooter, recommending another thread (+ a related one)
Interesting thread/theory, and would fall in the “intra-faction conflict†part of my MAGA Map analysis open.substack.com/pub/asharang...
— Asha Rangappa (@asharangappa.bsky.social) 2025-09-12T17:52:54.097Z
The thread she's drawing attention to, from Tom Schaller - see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thomas_Schaller for info on him:
The killer may turn out to be a confused, young, white man from a gun-friendly Republican home with no coherent set of political views or inspirations.
— Tom Schaller (@schaller67.bsky.social) 2025-09-12T17:43:53.842Z
But that’s not the weirdest possible scenario here.
What follows is a 🧵 that considers a far more bizarre scenario…ready?
1/x
If, in fact, he is a Groyper inspired by Nick Fuentes and his “Nicker†followers, that means the shooter believed Kirk and TPUSA types are *insufficiently intolerant* of anyone not straight, white, Christian nationalist—i.e., that Kirk wasn’t far right and absolutist *enough.*
— Tom Schaller (@schaller67.bsky.social) 2025-09-12T17:43:53.843Z
Ponder that! 2/x
Yet, before shooter was arrested, many top Kirk allies and MAGAs, from Benny Johnson to Steve Bannon, rushed to issue fatwas declaring war on liberals, Dems, CNN/MSNBC as guilty of stochastic terrorism—a concept they suddenly love, never mind Jan6, MN legislators, etc.—that led to Kirk’s death. 3/x
— Tom Schaller (@schaller67.bsky.social) 2025-09-12T17:43:53.844Z
In effect, they were claiming that the threat environment resulted from attacks by left on Kirk for being too conservative (even calling him a moderate!), when the killer may actually believe Kirk insufficiently conservative and radicalized.
— Tom Schaller (@schaller67.bsky.social) 2025-09-12T17:43:53.845Z
BTW: Laura Loomer is among those who said so.
4/x
In short, they rushed not only to wrongly predict the killer’s *identity*—presuming he just had to be non-white, lib/Dem, trans, etc. (hence all the bomb scares and death threats yesterday at places like DNC and HBCUs)—but also got his *ideology* wrong, too.
— Tom Schaller (@schaller67.bsky.social) 2025-09-12T17:43:53.846Z
5/x
If in fact killer’s hate emanated from Kirk’s right, not left, and from *inside* not outside their movement, then what happens next?
— Tom Schaller (@schaller67.bsky.social) 2025-09-12T17:43:53.847Z
Few if any of those who immediately targeted the wrong people will apologize or retract, sadly. That’s the Roy Cohn/Trump way.
More interesting is whether… 6/x
…there will be internecine war (again) *within* the Right between Groypers and TPUSA types.
— Tom Schaller (@schaller67.bsky.social) 2025-09-12T17:43:53.848Z
There certainly will be arguments. But you can bet fury we saw directed yesterday at the Left will be significantly muted if Kirk’s death was fratricide—a domestic terrorist murder within the family.
7/7
As mentioned in the thread title, I'm including a related thread, one recommended in the replies to Schaller's thread. I don't have any info on J.C. Cantwell other than what's in his Bluesky profile, but Bluesky also provided the info that he's followed by a few people who also follow me on Bluesky and Twitter, one of whom is one of the few people on those platforms I correspond with via DMs, indicating Cantwell probably is someone who'd fit in on DU, so I'm posting his thread here even though I know next to nothing about him.
= new reply since forum marked as read
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