OU update
Tapscott is still following the case closely. One of his links leads indirectly to this page, written a couple years ago. The author is pushing a highly dubious theory, but along the way he mentions something distinctly interesting: that David Boren, long-time Okla senator who became pres of OU in 1994, was originally George Tenet's mentor, and has lots of connections in the intelligence community. That would help to explain why the old 'nothing to see here' line came in so quickly and firmly in this case.

Another of those links cites a lot of yanked-out information. Some of it is normal: initial reports of death and injury counts are always wrong, and news organizations properly remove them. But one thing is definitely abnormal: the Wayback Machine (archive.org) has blocked the minutes of the Triangle Engineering Fraternity that gave some insight into Hinrichs's thinking in the last year. Of course, blocking anything on the web is sort of pointless, but this indicates some hard pressure from the Feds.

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I'm especially intrigued by Hinrichs's father (Joel II). Something about his vocabulary, his sort of offhand and familiar way of describing violent acts and suicides .... Purely guessing, I'd say he's some species of leftist. He described his son as 'conservative', then changed that to 'apolitical'. Now there are plenty of genuinely apolitical people: ordinary folks who are deeply engaged in work, friends, and family, who barely know the name of the current President. But those folks don't use the word 'apolitical'. In my experience, whenever somebody says that he's 'just not very political', you can bet he's extremely political, and on the left end of the spectrum. It's a good shibboleth.

Think of Nick Berg, Adam Pearlman/Gadahn, and John Walker Lindh. All come from solidly anti-American families, and all got involved with the Jihad in various ways. Berg's role is less clear than the other two, but he was playing both sides at the very least. My guess: if the facts are ever known (that is, if we ever have any non-Commie historians) these family groups will be seen to fit into the same mold. Does Hinrichs fit that mold? Not nearly enough facts yet, but something smells familiar.

Why are family ties important in this context? The federal intelligence agencies may not be very good at analysis, and they're certainly not good at giving out information to authorities who need it. But they've always been VERY good at gathering information. A family that has been active in non-mainstream politics for a while has been in someone's files for a while. When the son of such a family does something dramatic, it's not going to be a huge surprise to the folks who read the files. And when a violent act is unsurprising, questions about prevention will inevitably arise.
  ¶ 11:53 AM