It's Already Time for a 'Dumbest Theories About Times Square Bomber' Post

New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg put his ignorance of the situation and the suspect to great use last night jumping to conclusions that might earn him a long-jump spot in the London Olympics if he decides not to put his dough toward a presidential run that year:

Bloomberg later told CBS Evening News Anchor Katie Couric that the suspect behind the bombing attempt could be a domestic terrorist angry at the government who acted alone.

"If I had to guess 25 cents, this would be exactly that. Homegrown, or maybe a mentally deranged person, or somebody with a political agenda that doesn't like the health care bill or something. It could be anything," he said.

It's always important not to jump to conclusions in a suspected terrorism case, unless the conclusion you're jumping to is that it was a "one-off," isolated, lone wolf kind of thing. Then, you're free to speculate all day long. Bloomberg was only guessing about what the attack was but he sounded pretty sure about what it wasn't:

"There is no evidence here of a conspiracy, there is no evidence that it's tied into anything else. It looks like an amateurish job done by at least one person," he told Couric.

I understand the need for the mayor to be careful before assigning blame for a terrorism attempt, but the problem is he's only careful not to smear one party. If he doesn't have information, why is only one conclusion off-limits— the one new information happens to support?

"Times Square bombing suspect Faisal Shahzad told interrogators that he received training in bomb making during a recent five-month trip to Pakistan, according to a senior U.S. official familiar with the matter.

Moving on, we have CNN's morning anchors suggesting this attempted bombing is probably just fall-out from the housing market crisis. Video at the link from our friend Michael Moynihan:

Now that a deranged Pakistani-American with a political agenda (one presumes) has been detained, CNN did some honest to goodness journalism and discovered that—wait for it—suspected bomber Faisal Shahzad is a deadbeat that failed to make payments on his mortgage. This, says the blow-dried bozo in Atlanta, likely "brought alot of pressure and alot of heartache" and could have motivated him to take his revenge on the Bubba Gump Shrimp Company.

And, finally, we have Contessa Brewer of MSNBC taking the silly crown so early in the game and with an enthusiasm which will be hard to top:

"I get frustrated...There was part of me that was hoping this was not going to be anybody with ties to any kind of Islamic country." [Audio available here.]

Brewer continued, "...There are a lot of people who want to use terrorist intent to justify writing off people who believe in a certain way or come from certain countries or whose skin color is a certain way. I mean they use it as justification for really outdated bigotry."

Indeed, a Tea Party terrorist might have been more useful for someone who is intent to justify writing off people who believe in a certain way and use it as a justification for bigotry. To be fair, he could end up being a Pakistani-American who trained in a Pakistani terrorist camp who is also incensed about federal intrusion into his life via Obamacare and inflamed by his inability to qualify for a loan modification, but we should probably hold our horses.

In other news, a white powdery substance was sent to the Arizona governor's office today, requiring a lockdown of the building. There was a hazmat team on site. It's unknown what the substance is or from whom it came. Unlike Brewer, I hope this turns out to be a false alarm of some sort. But if it weren't liberals who are mad at the Arizona governor, you can bet this incident would make it into all the networks' "Republic is crumbling" montages and lamentations about the loss of civility, false alarm or no.