CBS: PHILADELPHIA (CBS 3) — A threatening letter containing a suspicious powder forced evacuations at a Barack Obama campaign office in South Philadelphia Tuesday afternoon. According to police, a letter with a suspicious powder was sent to an Obama-Biden field office in the 1500 block of Christian Street. The letter was apparently opened by a volunteer at the office.”The letter was somewhat threatening in nature and it contained a substance that we believe to be a hazmat,” Captain Mike Gillespie said shortly after the incident. Police, fire and hazmat crews responded to the scene shortly after a 911 call was placed. As a precaution, 15 people inside the building were evacuated. Investigators said initial field tests on the powder came back negative and it was determined to be sugar. MORE
GOTHAM SCHOOLS: A Barack Obama campaign phone bank at the UFT’s Lower Manhattan building was the 
scene of an anthrax scare today, we learned on a visit to the building tonight. The phone bank received hate mail reading “Kill Barack” that was filled with a brownish-white powder today. Police spent more than six hours decontaminating the building along with four employees who came in contact with the substance, our source at the building said. CBS reports a similar event at an Obama campaign office in Philadelphia this afternoon. MORE
*
ANDERSON COOPER: There’s also the question of ruling after this and bringing the country together. It’s going to be all the more harder to do that whoever wins with all this anger out there.
DAVID GERGEN: Yes. There is this — I think one of the most striking things we’ve seen now in the last few days. We’ve seen it in the Palin rallies. We saw it at the McCain rally today. And we saw it to a considerable degree during the rescue package legislation. There is this free floating sort of whipping around anger that could really lead to some violence. I think we’re not far from that.
ANDERSON COOPER: Really?
DAVID GERGEN: I think it’s so — well, I really worry when we get people — when you get the kind of rhetoric that you’re getting at these rallies now. [via CNN]