Somehow it is all too convenient, this “October surprise”. None of the named targets were really in danger, although others could have been hurt touching, picking up, or opening a package. The same could not be said when a Bernie Sanders supporter showed up at a baseball field in Alexandria determined to kill Republicans.

Now the Democrats genuinely get to say “both sides”, with packages containing explosives sent to the Clintons, Eric Holder, George Soros and others conveniently two weeks before a possibly history-changing midterm election. The blame is already being put on those whom Hillary called “deplorables” and a package sent to CNN will be blamed on President Trump for those “CNN sucks” chants at Trump rallies.

Back then we weren’t supposed to link that individual with the rhetoric of Sanders and other Democrats who warned that if the Republican agenda was enacted, millions would die.

As the liberals rise up in righteous condemnation of Trump’s “toxic” rhetoric, we will be asked to forget Rep. Maxine Waters’ call for nonstop harassment of GOP players, of key Republicans being hounded out of restaurants, confronted in elevators and even in their offices and at their homes. We will be asked to forget the violent riots on college campuses to keep conservative speakers from speaking.

A package was delivered to Eric Holder, who recently spoke of the virtues of a well-placed foot in the marketplace of ideas:

"Michelle [Obama] always says ‘When they go low, we go high,'" Holder told the crowd. "No. No. When they go low, we kick them," Holder said at a campaign event for Georgia Democratic gubernatorial nominee Stacey Abrams in October.

Another package was delivered to the home of Hillary Clinton, whose non-toxic rhetoric included her famous “deplorable” remark, which arguably cost her the 2016 election along with the failure to obtain a Wisconsin highway map:

Addressing the issue of Trump’s popularity, Clinton said: “To just be grossly generalistic, you can put half of Trump supporters into what I call the ‘basket of deplorables.’ Right? Racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic, you name it… She continued: “Now some of those folks, they are irredeemable, but they are not America but the other basket… are people who feel that government has let them down, the economy has let them down, nobody cares about them, nobody worries about what happens to their lives and their futures.

Hillary recently provided a timeline for a return to civility, namely when Democrats are in power and control everything:

"I would love to see us return to civility," Hillary Clinton told CNN's Christiane Amanpour on Tuesday. Unfortunately, she added, that won't be possible until the Democrats return to power. "You cannot be civil with a political party that wants to destroy what you stand for, what you care about," she said. "That's why I believe, if we are fortunate enough to win back the House and/or the Senate, that's when civility can start again."

Of course, rhetoric does not justify a response with explosive violence, yet, as noted, for a so-called domestic terrorist attack, this scattering of suspicious packages seems too lame, too ineffective, too conveniently timed and doesn’t really pass the smell test, at least according to Rush Limbaugh:

Mrs. Clinton, it's your party, forgive me, that is encouraging this kind of thing. It is the Democrat Party that's home to all of these mobs. It's the Democrat Party -- Mrs. Clinton herself who said that being uncivil at this point in time is entirely proper and understandable. It's -- the time to go back to civility will be after the Democrats win. You've got bought and paid for operatives by Mrs. Clinton money showing up at Trump rallies trying to make them look like deranged Trump supporters. The Democrats are even paying people to draw swastikas on American flags and waving them around, made to look like deranged, lunatic Trump supporters. And so, in the midst of this atmosphere, we have this series of bombs that were supposedly sent today, exclusively to Democrats. And it just -- there's a smell test that this stuff has to pass, and, so far, a lot of people's noses are in the air, not quite certain of what to make of this. This is just -- it's not Republicans that show up, for example, at the offices of the Family -- what is it, some pro-life group's offices, some guy shows up with a gun and was going to shoot people, got caught before he was able to shoot anyone, Family Research Center (sic) I think, yeah. Republicans just don't do this kind of thing. Even though every event, like mass shootings, remember, every mass shooting there is, the Democrats in the media try to make everybody think right off the bat that some tea partier did it, or some talk radio fan did it, or some Fox News viewer did it. Turns out, it's never, ever the case. Not one of these bombs went off. And if a Democrat operative's purpose here is to make it look like, hey, you know, there are mobs everywhere, the mobs are not just Democrat mobs. I mean, look at this, you've got people here trying to harm CNN, and Obama, and Hillary and Bill Clinton, and Debbie blabbermouth Schultz. It just -- it might serve a purpose here.

Indeed it does. It’s called a “false flag” -- doing a terrible thing yourself in a way your opponent will be blamed for.

The Democrat’s genuinely toxic rhetoric had real consequences and if it were not for the fact that Scalise, as a member of the House leadership, was assigned a security detail, perhaps dozens of GOP congressmen would have been slaughtered by a deranged Democrat.

We cannot and should not forget that it was a Bernie Sanders supporter, inspired by what Illinois Republican Congressman Rodney Davis called “political rhetorical terrorism”, that inspired the leftist loon who set out to assassinate Republicans practicing for the charity game.

Bernie Sanders rightly and correctly disavowed the crimes of a volunteer whose actions he could not envision or control. Yet he and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi have spent the time since President Trump’s reelection yelling fire in the political theater we call democracy, warning endlessly that people will die because of the Trump agenda, painting apocalyptic visions of planetary doom. With them claiming the Republican agenda is dooming the sick, the elderly, and the planet itself, was it so surprising that another liberal infused with the left’s messianic complex, would try to save us all by killing Republicans trying to implement Trump’s America First agenda?

Pelosi especially should remember her own words as reported by the Washington Examiner:

With less than one week until Obamacare enrollment concludes, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi used congressional Democrats' inaugural weekly address to warn of the catastrophic effects repealing the law would have on the public. Tragically, repeal of the Affordable Care Act will lead to death, disability and suffering.

Imagine that. Quite a call to arms for the assassination of the Congressional leaders who would impose “death, disability, and suffering” on the American people. Similarly, Bernie Sanders can disavow the shooter, but he can’t disavow his own inflammatory rhetoric. As CNN Politics reports:

Sen. Bernie Sanders did not hold anything back Thursday when he condemned the House passage of the Republican-backed bill to replace Obamacare. "If the bill passed today in the House became law, thousands of Americans would die, because they would no longer have access to health care," Sanders told CNN's Anderson Cooper on "AC360."

The Arlington shooter no doubt saw this as a call to lock and load. And not to be outdone on the “people will die” list of GOP policies decried by Democrats is Trump’s withdrawal from the Paris Climate Accord. As California Gov. Jerry Brown proclaimed:

Thursday on CNN International, Gov. Jerry Brown (D-CA) reacted to President Donald Trump decision to withdraw from the Paris agreement on climate change by calling it a “crazy decision.” Brown said, “Well immediate reaction is this is a crazy decision. It is against the facts. It is against science. It is against reality itself. We know we have to decarbonize our future. If we don’t, it is a horror. People will die. Habitat will be destroyed. Seas will rise. Insects will spread in areas they never have before.

Somehow shouting “CNN sucks” at a rally while complaining about documented instances of fake news does not compare to constant claims that people will die if you elect Republicans.

The packages may be found to be a real threat from an obviously unbalanced individual or individuals, but it may very well also be a false flag designed to reaffirm the Democrats' continuous slander against the GOP.

Daniel John Sobieski is a free lance writer whose pieces have appeared in Investor’s Business Daily, Human Events, Reason Magazine and the Chicago Sun-Times among other publications.