With two pipe-bombs at the DNC and RNC headquarters, as well as a truck full of Syrofoam+Gasoline bombs, there were clearly people who were trying to do major damage at the event.

EDIT: Given the timing of the DNC + RNC pipe bombs, it has been proposed that the pipe-bombs were purposefully placed away from the Capitol to further confuse capitol police before the riot. Capitol Police were too busy checking out the pipe-bombs to notice the crowd encroaching upon the Capitol building itself.

But herein lies the problem: the mob itself is a perfect opportunity to cause real mayhem. Even if the mob is composed of "relatively peaceful" people who aren't trying to kill people, all it takes is one or two bombs to go off at the right time (or one or two actual right-wing terrorists to take advantage of it), to turn a bad situation into a worse one.

Yeah, Timothy McVeigh style attack would be terrible. You know what would be worse? Timothy McVeigh hiding inside of an angry crowd of supporters.

Or hell, TWO Timothy McVeighs. How many angry right-wing extreme nuts are coming to this thing next week?

I'm saying a hypothetical Timothy McVeigh would kill people (ie: target Mike Pence or Joe Biden), then hide in the mob to prevent police from chasing him.

EDIT: Or any number of "more intelligent" schemes that takes advantage of a rioting mob. I had a bunch of specific examples, but I feel its not moral for me to discuss specifics and help any would-be attackers plan their stuff.

But ultimately, its not very hard to think of ways to take advantage of a mob.

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The main good news is that the National Guard is deploying in major force: riot shields for protests, and even are equipping themselves with lethal weaponry if things get out of hand.