The ‘both connected with Turo’ may or may not be alarming; are there a lot of peer-to-peer carsharing programs? If there are, then it would be harder to believe this was a coincidence.
As for having fireworks in a vehicle—it it had been on, say, August 1, it would definitely need an explanation. But on January 1…it wouldn’t necessarily be all that unusual.
By the way, the idea that the New Orleans suspect was NOT working alone has had some cold water thrown on it: apparently the sightings of people planting bombs in the area stemmed from some kind of misunderstanding. (I just heard this on the cable channels; I’m not seeing online citations, yet.)
I have no idea; I’d never even heard of Turo, or the idea that there was anything like an “AirBNB for cars” (which is apparently what Turo is) until two weeks ago, when a Turo rental (and damage to it) was the subject of this thread here on the SDMB:
Edit:
But, regardless, the fact that there were two trucks involved in deadly incidents within a few hours of each other, in different cities, at high-profile locations, one of which was clearly a terrorist attack, and the other possibly the same – and both of them were involving trucks which were rented from the actual owners though such an app – does at least feel a little bit like “not a coincidence.”
If that’s universally true, then the fact that it appears in two cases may be less striking or meaningful.
It would be like assuming that because a suspect in a crime in one city rented from Enterprise, and so did a suspect in a crime in another city, then the crimes must be connected.
I’m inclined to believe that either Trump, or those surrounding him, or both, would see a Reichstag Fire-type incident as a useful and appropriate means to achieve their ends. Given that their ends are manifestly oriented toward grabbing power and keeping power.
So I pondered the likelihood of some Trumpites setting up that LV Tesla fire.
But I’m not sure it’s enough to Trump’s advantage. If they want to build up sympathy for Trump, an explosion somewhere near where he actually is would surely be better. I mean, how many people are going to decide that Trump’s a great guy and it’s a terrible, terrible shame that a Tesla exploded outside one of his hotels…???
Some, maybe. And Trump would almost certainly love any theorizing that Evil Leftists did this to harm him.
But, again – if the Vegas incident was, in fact, a terror attack – then you have two attacks, within a few hours of each other, using the same modus operandi: renting a large electric pickup truck via a carsharing app, then attacking a visible, well-known target.
Whether or not the Turo app is common or not for carsharing isn’t really relevant, IMO.
One thing that comes to mind is, if they catch fire (as the Cybertruck did), they burn intensely, with fires that are difficult to put out, due to the nature of EV batteries. And, reports are that the truck in New Orleans had explosives in it, as well, suggesting that the attacker intended to blow up the truck:
It’s not about a direct threat to Trump but just the suggestion of terrorism. And even this was actually an accident, or some malcontent with no connection to the MAGA movement or Trump himself, an incident like this is enough to call for stronger federal law enforcement, a crackdown where Americans fail to resist encroachment on their civil rights, and ‘emergency measures’. The actual Reichstag Fire was never actually attributed to the Nazi Party (or indeed anyway) but was the casus belli that lead to suspension of democratic institutions in the Weimar Republic. I’m not saying that this is what will happen or that there is an actual conspiracy; just observing the parallels and their potential implications.
“When I said that the criminals coming in are far worse than the criminals we have in our country, that statement was constantly refuted by Democrats and the Fake News Media, but it turned out to be true,” Mr. Trump said on his website, Truth Social.