Jere Brower, his wife Clara, and his 4-year-old daughter Ana, have a very good reason to believe Texas Congressman Ron Paul when he said people view his supporters as "dangerous."
The 38-year-old Atlanta man and his family have been targeted by militant Ron Paul supporters, one of whom threatened to "kneecap" him, then rape his wife and young daughter. Mr. Brower said he has also received death threats from supporters of Ron Paul.
The trouble started when Brower and some of his Facebook friends decided to have a laugh over Ron Paul's ties to racist and anti-semitic groups.
He wrote a post on Facebook intended to be a joke, but some Paul supporters took it seriously - too seriously.
"If you live in South Carolina and want to have some fun with these Paulbots here is what we do," he wrote.
"Go online and buy or make your very own KKK robe, complete with hood (hood is important). Then get some Ron Paul signs or make your own. Follow Paul around South Carolina and be sure to get photographed by the media. Again, hoods are important. All can be Klansmen for Paul. Black, white, Jewish, Asian - those Paulbots will s**t a brick."
The post has since been deleted, but was noticed by one of Ron Paul's supporters who posted it at La Cross Watchdog Blog, and claimed Brower was engaging in a smear campaign against Paul, a common complaint leveled at anyone who disagrees with anything Paul says.
That's when things started heating up.
One of the commenters at the pro-Paul blog suggested contacting Brower's employer - Google - in hopes they would fire him:
We need to report this guy to his employer, "Google" and force them to fire him...! Maybe he'll learn not to mess with the "Paulbots" cause we will mess with his ability to pay his bills and keep him occupied in that way...
Brower told the Spokane Conservative Examiner late Friday evening, however, that Google execs probably would not care that he doesn't support Paul.
Other messages, however, were far more onimous.
"It'll be funny when they get shot," wrote one Ron Paul supporter.
Another wrote:
It will be hilarious after they get beat up by on lookers. It seems like a South Park episode. Remember when the town people wanted to get rid of the rich black people? They called them richers and dressed in white robes and burned small little ts in their yards? Yea, these kids wil look really silly.
But other supporters went off the deep end.
Brower said that he received a number of threatening emails and messages from angry Ron Paul supporters before adjusting the settings on his phone so as not to receive any more messages.
One of the messages read:
You are a f*****g idiot a*****e. TO stoop as low as I see you are willing is enough to gag a maggot. Keep up the s**t and drive this country into a civil war you f*****g moron piece of human trash. How about I come on over. Maybe, I will start by kneecapping you with my HK 45. Then, while you wither in pain, I will give your wife the best f*****g she ever had. I will treat her nice. Then, maybe your daughter needs to become a real woman. How would you like that. It is not too hard to find out where you live you neocon f**kwad.
Brower then filed a complaint with the DeKalb County Police, and said he contacted the FBI.
No one was available for comment at the DeKalb County Police Department as of this writing.
Brower, a retired Army Captain who served four tours in Iraq, said there was a time he seriously considered supporting Ron Paul.
"I took a good hard look at Ron Paul," he said, but after hearing racist messages and witnessing disrespectful behavior at gatherings of Ron Paul supporters, he thought twice.
Brower's wife, Clara, is Asian, and the talk againt interracial marriage bothered him. He said he began looking into the controversial newsletters that have dogged Paul's career for years and went to other meetings to learn more.
But, he said, the more he was exposed to Paul's militant supporters, the more concerned he became.
"Good and bad - everything comes in different colors," he said.
The two-time Bronze Star winner says he is not too worried and can take care of himself.
But the threats against his family have him concerned.
Fortunately, Georgia has enacted laws against cyberstalking, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
The NCSL notes:
Cyberstalking is the use of the Internet, email or other electronic communications to stalk, and generally refers to a pattern of threatening or malicious behaviors. Cyberstalking may be considered the most dangerous of the three types of Internet harassment, based on a posing credible threat of harm. Sanctions range from misdemeanors to felonies.
Brower adds that he knows several Ron Paul supporters, and says "it's the radicals" that give Paul a bad name.
