Mike Vanderboegh, the Alabama-based blogger and former militia leader whose novel Absolved allegedly inspired four Georgia men arrested yesterday over an alleged plot to kill numerous government officials, is denying any responsibility and lashing out at Media Matters and other outlets who reported on that story.

Vanderboegh also reports that he suspects that one of the alleged plotters, Frederick Thomas, had posted comments on Vanderboegh's blog.

In one post, Vanderboegh wrote:

My as-yet-unpublished novel Absolved, for the uninitiated, begins with the premise that the ATF, for political agenda reasons of their own, has staged a deadly raid on the wrong Alabama good old boy from Winston County and what happens in the unintended consequences of that stupidity. There is nothing in there about ricin, or terrorist attacks on civilians (unless you count the forces of the federal government) or deliberate targeting of innocents. And did I mention that it is FICTION? [...]

Absolved is fiction. I hope it is a “useful dire warning.” However, I am as much to blame for the Georgia Geriatric Terrorist Gang as Tom Clancy is for Nine Eleven.

Vanderboegh has also stated that the reaction to the story has motivated him to get Absolved printed and thanked Media Matters for “writing my dust jacket ad copy” by referring to the book as “Blood-Soaked.”

In several conversations recorded by a confidential government source, Thomas allegedly said that he intended to model the actions of the group on Vanderboegh's novel. His self-proclaimed Toccoa, Georgia-based “covert group” was allegedly plotting to obtain explosives and silencers, to manufacture the biological agent ricin, and to target for assassination numerous government officials, including judges and employees of the Department of Justice and Internal Revenue Service.

Vanderboegh has been promoted by Fox News as an “authority” on the ATF's failed Operation Fast and Furious on several occasions. While the network has repeatedly reported on the alleged Georgia plot, they have yet to address their hosting of Vanderboegh, the alleged inspiration for it.