Newspaper threatened with 'another Fort Hood' for criticizing Tea Party protest

Police in Michigan are investigating after an irate reader of the Port Huron Times-Herald reportedly called in a threat to the newspaper after it criticized a local House representative's participation in the anti-health reform Tea Party protest two weeks ago.

"A 60-year-old Port Huron woman threatened to take a gun to the newspaper and 'do what they did at Fort Hood,' according to police," the Times-Herald reported on Tuesday.

The threat referred to the shooting deaths of 13 people at the US Army base in Fort Hood, Texas, on November 5. Army psychiatrist Nidal Malik Hasan has been charged with murder in the shootings.

The newspaper says the woman's alleged threat came over an editorial that ran last week which described US House Rep. Candice Miller's participation in the anti-health reform protest as "shameful." Miller, a Republican who represents Michigan's 10th district, reportedly made herself very visible during the November 5 protest on Capitol Hill, organized by Republican firebrand Michele Bachmann.

Among other things, the protest featured a sign that compared Democrats' health care reform efforts to the slaughter of Jews in the Dachau concentration camp.

The Times-Herald's editorial stated:

Rally participants carried a variety of disturbing signs. One placard had a health care message superimposed over dead bodies from Holocaust concentration camps. One referred to President Barack Obama as "Sambo." One depicted the president as the evil "Joker" from Batman movies. One referred to "Obama and his Marxist buddies."

At one point, the crowd chanted "Nazi, Nazi."

Apparently, our congresswoman is OK with all of this.

The editorial concludes:

If Miller truly has signed up with the right-wing fringe -- the bigots, the hate-mongers and the Nazi-chanters -- all of us in the Blue Water Area might well need to take another look.

Perhaps Miller could start with an apology for her performance at last Thursday's GOP festival of hate.

According to the Editor & Publisher blog, the unnamed woman made her threat to the newspaper the morning the editorial ran. She had called a Gannett call center in Kentucky, where the conversation was recorded. Gannett owns the Times-Herald.

Police identified the source of the call and interviewed a woman at a local address in Port Huron. Police did not say if the woman admitted making the threat. The Times-Herald says police have not yet decided whether the woman will be charged.