Vandals smashed doors and windows at five Democratic offices around the country in the days surrounding the landmark House health care vote Sunday night, and a right-wing blogger in Alabama is taking credit for starting a so-called “window war.”
Here are the reports we’ve seen from around the country on the mini-epidemic of brick-throwing:
* Early on the morning of March 19, someone threw a brick through the window of Rep. Louise Slaughter’s office in Niagara Falls, New York, doing $350 of damage, the *Buffalo News* [reported](http://www.buffalonews.com/2010/03/19/993040/brick-thrown-through-window-in.html).
Slaughter (D-NY) briefly attracted the ire of conservatives over the “Slaughter Solution,” a procedural [maneuver](http://tpmdc.talkingpointsmemo.com/2010/03/slaughter-house-rules-the-truth-about-democrats-plan-to-pass-health-care.php) that was considered (but, ultimately, not used) to pass health reform.
* Also in Slaughter’s district, a brick was thrown through the glass doors of the Monroe County Democratic Committee office in Rochester, NY, over the weekend, the *Democrat and Chronicle* [reported](http://www.democratandchronicle.com/article/20100322/NEWS01/100322002). A note attached to the brick bore the Barry Goldwater quote, “Extremism in defense of liberty is no vice,” a spokesman for the committee [told](http://www.democratandchronicle.com/article/20100322/NEWS01/100322011) the newspaper.
* In the early hours of the morning on Monday just after the House health care vote, someone smashed the glass front door of the Tucson office of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ), the *Arizona Daily Star* [reported](http://www.azstarnet.com/news/local/crime/article_eb24e4fe-35dc-11df-ad88-001cc4c03286.html). “The perpetrator likely had to hop the gated fence to get access to the door, since it’s not viewable from the parking lot,” the paper reported.
* On Friday night or Saturday morning, a brick bearing unspecified “anti-Obama and anti-health care messages” was thrown through a floor-to-ceiling window at the Sedgwick County Democratic Party headquarters in Wichita, Kansas, [CNN](http://www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/03/22/pols.dems.vandalized/) and the *Kansas City Start* [reported](http://www.kansascity.com/2010/03/22/1830379/democratic-offices-vandalized.html).
* After the passage of the bill Sunday night, a “fist-sized” rock was thrown at a window at the Hamilton County Democratic Party in Cincinnati, in the district of Rep. Steve Driehaus (D-OH), the *Enquirer* [reports](http://cincinnati.com/blogs/politics/2010/03/22/rock-thrown-at-dem-hqs/).
Pinson, Alabama-based blogger Mike Vanderboegh has been tracking the breaking of windows at Dem offices after issuing a [call](http://sipseystreetirregulars.blogspot.com/2010/03/to-all-modern-sons-of-liberty-this-is.html) Friday: “To all modern Sons of Liberty: THIS is your time. Break their windows. Break them NOW.”
It’s far from clear whether Vanderboegh’s call to arms has anything to do with the incidents around the country.
The *Kansas City Star* [identifies](http://www.kansascity.com/2010/03/22/1830379/democratic-offices-vandalized.html) Vanderboegh as a former leader of the Alabama Constitutional Militia.
His blog, [Sipsey Street Irregulars](http://sipseystreetirregulars.blogspot.com/), identifies with the so-called “Three Percenter” doctrine: “During the American Revolution, the active forces in the field against the King’s tyranny never amounted to more than 3% of the colonists.”
The March 19 post says:
They will send the Internal Revenue Service and other federal police to do this in thousands of small Wacos, if that is what it takes to force us to submit.
This arrogant elite pretends that this oppression is for our own good, while everyone else understands that this is about their selfish, insatiable appetite for control over our liberty, our money, our property and our lives.
*
(This post has been updated to include the Cincinnati incident.)*
