This morning I saw an ABC News report that al Qaeda is planning terrorist attacks in the U.S. on Monday. Seriously, al Qaeda.

CBS News has learned about a potential terror threat for the day before the election.

Sources told CBS News senior investigative producer Pat Milton that U.S. intelligence has alerted joint terrorism task forces that al Qaeda could be planning attacks in three states for Monday. …

… U.S. authorities are taking the threat seriously, though the sources stress the intelligence is still being assessed and its credibility hasn’t been confirmed. Counterterrorism officials were alerted to the threat out of abundance of caution.

A senior FBI official told CBS News, “The counterterrorism and homeland security communities remain vigilant and well-postured to defend against attacks here in the United States.  The FBI, working with our federal, state and local counterparts, shares and assesses intelligence on a daily basis and will continue to work closely with law enforcement and intelligence community partners to identify and disrupt any potential threat to public safety.”

And it would be the FBI leaking this, wouldn’t it? It’s like the fake terror alert the Bush Administration put out just before the 2004 election, which is credited with tipping the election to Bush. Somebody wants to mess with our heads.

The Guardian reported today,

Deep antipathy to Hillary Clinton exists within the FBI, multiple bureau sources have told the Guardian, spurring a rapid series of leaks damaging to her campaign just days before the election.

Current and former FBI officials, none of whom were willing or cleared to speak on the record, have described a chaotic internal climate that resulted from outrage over director James Comey’s July decision not to recommend an indictment over Clinton’s maintenance of a private email server on which classified information transited.

“The FBI is Trumpland,” said one current agent.

…

The currently serving FBI agent said Clinton is “the antichrist personified to a large swath of FBI personnel,” and that “the reason why they’re leaking is they’re pro-Trump.”

And are these the same people telling us about an increased terrorist threat? By al Qaeda, of all groups? What happened to ISIS? Never mind; I suppose one boogeyman is as good as another.

But now everything in the news is suspect. Google is running a tribute to Walter Cronkite today. We need a Cronkite now; someone who can speak with authority to the nation about what’s really going on.

Kurt Eichenwald has a new article up at Newsweek about the many connections between Moscow and the Trump campaign. The evidence may be circumstantial, but there’s boatloads of it. Many scoundrels have been convicted on less. Yet I see people on the Right and Left dismissing the possibility of a Trump-Putin connection as just Clinton propaganda. When we read something that doesn’t jibe with our views, we assume we’re just being manipulated.

We can’t run a democracy this way.

Stuff to read: An American in a Strange Land and Pain, anger and fear: US voters deprived of a serious presidential election.