Anti-Trump Instagram pic of seashells now enough to indict ex-FBI directors

In my misspent youth, I once worked a summer job as a waiter at Shoney’s. It is an experience that I do not recommend. But it did teach me two valuable things: 1) How not to drown in a puddle of my own embarrassment when marching around the dining room with my fellow servers and singing a birthday song that began, “Happy, happy birthday, we’re so glad you came”; and 2) That when the surly line cooks ran out of chicken fried steak, they would shout “86 the chicken fried steak!” through the pass. To “86” something, in restaurant slang, is to say that it is out, finished, gone, through, not on the menu anymore. This is the only sense in which I have heard the term used in my entire life. But according to Wikipedia, which naturally has an entry about the term, two further meanings do exist. “86” can also be applied to people a restaurant refuses to serve, and some slang dictionaries say it can refer to murder. Which brings us to former FBI director James Comey, Instagram, and a picture of seashells. In 2025, Comey posted to Instagram an image of shells arranged in the shape of two numbers: “86 47.” Today, on completely new and unrelated charges, the Department of Justice has indicted Comey again, this time in North Carolina. The charge is nothing less than a threat to murder the president. And it’s all based on that single seashell image. The new indictment says that Comey “did knowingly and willfully make a threat to take the life of, and to inflict bodily harm upon, the President of the United States, in that he publicly posted a photograph on the internet social media site Instagram which depicted seashells arranged in a pattern making out ’86 47,’ which a reasonable recipient who is familiar with the circumstances would interpret as a serious expression of an intent to do harm to the President of the United States.” You might expect more details in a case this serious and against such a high-ranking former official; there are none.