Yesterday, A. Joseph Stack III got into a small plane, took off, and crashed into a building housing the IRS in Austin, TX. The software engineer left an angry manifesto blaming the US government for a myriad of problems. He spoke of "Big Brother" and fumed that nothing would change with the IRS unless "there was a body count." Much of Stack's rants are similar to the every day posts over at The Smallest Minority. Kevin Baker, the site's host, declared last October
I say we take off and nuke the site from Orbit. It's the only way to be sure.
in reference to the US Education system in this country.
I have stated previously that it was only a matter of time before people who think like Stack start committing acts of violence. If President Obama and the Democratic controlled Congress pass health care legislation with reconciliation, it will be a virtual certainty. As has been said many times at TSM, "the time for reasoned discourse has passed." As a Holocaust survivor once said, "When someone says they want to kill you, believe them."
What strikes me as more interesting than these sad facts is the finest example of hypocrisy I have ever seen on display. I want you to imagine for a moment that Joseph Stack is Abdullah Mohammed and he just crashed his plane into the same building. Do you suppose we would have the deafening silence that we have now in terms of the base's response to this? Kevin Baker has a "Moment of Zen" post up today that I absolutely guarantee you would be a chest thumping, nationalistic screed against extremism had Stack been a Muslim.
IT'S NOT_______WHEN WE DO IT!!!
No shit.
Actually, tons of shit...as in they are full of it. So how many disgruntled, anti government engineers flying airplanes into buildings will it take before people wake up and see how similar they are to Al Qaeda?
38 comments:
Hmm...I wonder if Stack was a poster over at the site.
Typical bias. Just Marxy just tapping into his inner rage and passing off his biases as truth despite the facts.
This guy was mad at everyone.
GM executives (“commit unthinkable atrocities”)
The American medical system (“murdering tens of thousands of people a year”)
Politicians (“thieves, liars, and self-serving scumbags”)
The Catholic Church (“vulgar, corrupt”)
Organized religion (“monsters”)
The American public (“incredible stupidity”)
Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan (“sleazy”)
The airlines (“rich, incompetent cronies”)
Austin, TX (“a highly inflated sense of self-importance”)
The Justice Department (“on the take”)
The FAA (“a tombstone agency”)
George W. Bush (“presidential puppet”)
The IRS (“Big Brother”)
Communism (“From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.”)
Capitalism (“From each according to his gullibility, to each according to his greed.”)
Are you ever going to adjust your beliefs to fit the facts?
And just 'cause I know how you hate actually following links through to original sources because they expose your biases, here is a link to his actual screed.
Have you admitted that the Kentucky Census worker actually committed suicide instead of being murdered by conservatives as you claimed?
Or will you also try to claim that ultra-Obama-lover Amy Bishop is also a conservative because the 3 people she murdered were black?
I really like when people are expressing their opinion and thought. So I like the way you are writing
It's interesting to me that you would lump this guy into "the base". I'm reading an apparently unhealthy mix of "loony left" and "base" in what this guy wrote.
"I decided that I didn’t trust big business to take care of me"
There's a bold life decision. Way to go buddy. By his own admission this guy was trying to take advantage of the IRS code. When he gets popped for it he blames everybody but himself.
"Bye to California, I’ll try Austin for a while"
Again, his inability to succeed is everybody else's fault but his own.
"...and he came back with results very similar to what I was expecting. Except that he had neglected to include the contents of Sheryl’s unreported income; $12,700 worth of it"
Uh, the obviously incorrect results were very similar to what you were expecting, and yet the quite predictable outcome was the CPA's fault and not yours?
Anti big business. Anti union. Anti big church. Anti government.
On behalf of those you would characterize as the base I politely decline inclusion of this guy in our membership.
If a member of the Sierra Club had crashed his plane into a Bureau of Land Management building to protest the coal mining technique of blasting off mountaintops during the Bush administration you can be guaranteed that the right wing would have labeled it a terrorist act. Heck, they called it terrorism when some nutjobs set some Hummers on fire in 2003.
One important reason they're not calling it terrorism is that if they do, the illegitimate laws and practices that Bush and the right wing insisted were necessary to combat terrorism will come into play. The FBI would be essentially be required to run roughshod people's rights. That would mean that this guy's friends, his relatives, anyone he talked to, anyone he emailed, any website he posted on, and anyone he did business with would be considered a potential terrorist threat. Those people would be subject to wiretaps, intrusive tax investigations, etc.
So, now that the shoe is on the other foot, the right wing isn't so prompt to call it terrorism. But it was terrorism when Tim McVeigh blew up the Murrah Federal Building, and it was terrorism when Eric Rudolph blew up bombs at the Olympics, abortion clinics and a lesbian bar. It was terrorism when anthrax was used on Americans by an American (though we're still not quite sure who).
How is this different? The apparent intent of this solitary act was to intimidate and exact revenge on those Stack felt were harassing him. Generally, terrorism is defined as a systematic use of violence as a form of coercion. This usually implies some sort of organization or conspiracy.
In that light, people are classifying this as a type of good-old-fashioned lone-wolf American suicidal murder rampage, like Columbine with a plane.
But the Fort Hood shooting was identical in execution to Columbine. Instead of just carping about how he was being picked on in school, Hasan was complaining about Muslims being picked on in the Middle East.
Apparently if you're a suicidal, self-centered lunatic shooting up a building you're just a nut job, but if you're a suicidal, self-centered lunatic with a cause you're a terrorist.
Mohammed Atta crashed a plane into the WTC in order to protest America's defiling of the Holy Land. Stack crashed a plane into an IRS building to protest tax laws. Both committed the identical heinous act for a cause they perceived to be greater than themselves.
But, okay, I can cede that this guy wasn't really a terrorist. He was just another suicidal putz who got himself into trouble by wasting time and money on a private plane and getting irate when the IRS wouldn't let him deduct it from his taxes.
In other words, he sounds like every other whiner in the Tea Party, blowing up their dislike of Obama, Wall Street, and the government into overblown rants about tyranny, socialism, communism and Nazism.
But if he was talking to others, and they encouraged him to take some kind of action, what do you think we should call those people? And what should we do to them?
Actually, I was waiting for the predictable response to it on here.
Stack said that "insurance companies, are murdering tens of thousands of people a year and stealing from the corpses and victims they cripple". That is stikingly similar to what KennedyDem said on here just a few months ago.
When talking about healthcare, Stack said "It’s clear they (politicians) see no crisis as long as the dead people don’t get in the way of their corporate profits rolling in.". That is par for the course rhetoric on this blog from several folks (you know who you are).
GWB and organized religion don't have very many friends on this blog either.
Thanks for providing the links Ed. Look Dick, there is a link to a website on the internet - where all knowledge exists.
Predictable? Hell, the sun rose in the east didn't it? As in...
blk: If a member...
Yes blk, by all means, let's just speculate. After all, that is way more fun than dealing with reality. So where are the quotes from Beck or Rush calling this guy a hero, a patriot, etc.?
M wants to say this is a tea-partier? Hell, he was as anti-corporate as much as he was anti-govt. Left? Right? Isn't crazy enough?
Ed, nice list from Michelle Malkin.
My main point in this post is your hypocrisy. If Stack were Muslim, screaming and yelling would ensue regarding the evil we face and how we must defend against it. Just think about it, Ed. A Muslim flies a plane into a building with this same list of people he's pissed about...would you under react in the same way?
As for your other question
http://markadelphia.blogspot.com/2009/12/anger-hateand-fear-part-one.html
"On behalf of those you would characterize as the base I politely decline inclusion of this guy in our membership."
I think you are in a class by yourself, pl...finest kind:)
"what do you think we should call those people? And what should we do to them?"
Well, if you are talking to someone from the base, they have a different answer if he supports some of their causes.
"Actually, I was waiting for the predictable response to it on here."
I'm waiting for a response similar to the one with the FT Hood shooter. And yet we don't have one yet..hmmm...
"Isn't crazy enough?"
I have no problem admitting that he was not a tea partier. That's fine. He does have many similarities to TSM commenters--my first point. And his action caused a VERY predictable under reaction from the base-my second point.
Essentially, it's yet another in a series of examples demonstrating how they are completely full of shit and why their ideology is completely pathetic.
"nice list from Michelle Malkin"
That list didn't come from Michelle Malkin. If you had bothered to check my first link, you would have seen that it come from there. MM's post on this incident has no such list.
Secondly, that list is verified by Stockton's actual screed.
What is WRONG with you?
Genetic Fallacy
Genetic Fallacy
Genetic Fallacy
Genetic Fallacy
Genetic Fallacy
Genetic Fallacy
Genetic Fallacy
Genetic Fallacy
Genetic Fallacy
Genetic Fallacy
Genetic Fallacy
Genetic Fallacy
Genetic Fallacy
Genetic Fallacy
Genetic Fallacy
Why the F*** can't you understand what a flippin' Genetic FALLACY is? Hell, even just the simple word "FALLACY"? It isn't like I haven't pointed you to definitions often enough!!!! The first time should have been plenty. But nooooo, you just go on pretending that "fallacy" means "good logic", just like you pretend "socialism" is "good capitalism."
"If Stack were Muslim" and we had E V I D E N C E that Muslim ideology is what had motivated him, then we would have reason to blame the ideology that motivated him.
Based on his own writings, what motivated this guy was that he painted himself into a corner, then blamed everyone else for the results, NOT that he was driven by conservative (and definitely NOT Christian) principles.
"A Muslim flies a plane into a building with this same list of people he's pissed about...would you under react in the same way?"
If he was Muslim, but the only available evidence of his motivations was the exact same screed, then yes, the reaction would be the same.
Heck, there was a Muslim who just threw his 3 month old daughter into the river. Even though he's definitely a Muslim, it looks more like he did it because he's a screwed up individual, NOT because he's a Muslim.
M, you should use this as an opportunity to be a key player in the truth movement. Repeat after me...
"Austin was an inside job"
"Austin was an inside job"
"Austin was an inside job"
Clearly this incident was one orchestrated by the Obama administration to rally support around initiatives to wipeout the dangerous tea party movement.
The evidence is right in front of your faces, people. If you choose not to believe it's only because you are drinking the leftist koolaid.
You aren't going to respond to Eds post are you? You're just going to invalidate a source that Ed didn't even use.
Stack didn't like insurance industry profits and neither do you or blk. Why did you only give half the story in your original entry?
It isn't a coincidence that my post, pl's post, and Ed's post quote the guys manifesto verbatim and providing links for you to check the facts.
blk's post is full of (cut and pasted) "If a member...", "you can be guaranteed the right wing would have labeled it...", "If they do...", "The FBI would be essentially...", "That would mean...", "would be considered a potential...", "Those people would be subject to...", "The apparent intent...", "This usually implies...", "he sounds like...", "if he was talking to others...".
Then Marks post contains "If Stack were Muslim...", "would you under react...", "if you are talking to someone from the base...", "I'm waiting for a response...", "He does have many similarities...".
Not really dealing in fact as much as "what if's" regarding how someone else might react to the event. Hell maybe I could make the case the Obama didn't connect the dots in this case and that Obama isn't protecting the country. I just don't feel safe anymore. Pl, you live 4 miles from me...do you feel safe?
Here's where I got the list
http://michellemalkin.com/2010/02/19/it%E2%80%99s-all-the-tea-party%E2%80%99s-fault/
Granted, it was a linked to another site but this was where I was first pointed to via email.
"You aren't going to respond to Eds post are you?"
I did respond. He's full of hypocritical shit. Last, I'm not disputing that he had other grievances which don't fit with your typical right winger. He does, however, have enough similarities with the base that if he were a Muslim and had the same list of similarities with that ideology, the reaction would be much different. And that's why I call FUCKING BULLSHIT!
I mean, he flew an airplane into a government building for crying out loud--complaining of the IRS. Suppose it were a Muslim who said he did it because of Israel, US occupation in the Middle East and he was paying homage to bin Laden. But suppose he also said that global warming was a hoax and Obama was born in Kenya.
Now think about me saying, "Well, he wasn't a terrorist because of the last two things he said. Sounds like a lone nut to me."
Can you see how ludicrous that sounds?
Uh, Mark? You are engaged in a debate with people that want to nuke our nation's education system. Do you really think they are going to understand anything you say?
Again, with the "If he were a...", "the reaction would be...", "Suppose it were a...", "Suppose he also said...", "Now think about me saying...".
You keep asking us to debate a hypothetical situation. We're talking about the totality of his manifesto and what the manifesto itself said.
So because Michelle Malkin pointed to the site, the list is wrong, even though it accurately summarizes the screed?
Not only are you now skipping links to the original sources (or as close as can be gotten), you're now looking for links to the source so you can apply the genetic fallacy to keep from dealing with what you don't like?
Why does it seem impossible for you understand that using any fallacy (in this case, the Genetic Fallacy) is as effective at moving your argument forward as pushing it with a rope?
Remember that post you had a couple of days ago where you quoted Lincoln? Mark Twain and Lincoln are both often credited with saying something similar:
"It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to open one's mouth and remove all doubt."
Even though the attributions are questionable, the quote you used and this version are both based on a much older quote.
"Even a fool is considered wise when he keeps silent, discerning, when he seals his lips."
(Proverbs 17:28 HCSB)
Have you considered the wisdom of this adage?
But by all means, feel free to keep opening your mouth. You're giving such an effective demonstration.
"I did respond. He's full of hypocritical shit. Last, I'm not disputing that he had other grievances which don't fit with your typical right winger."
That's because they fit with the "typical left winger". But you don't see any of us claiming that he's a "typical liberal", do you?
Who's the hypocritical one here? I guess "hypocrisy" is yet another word to add to the Marxaphasia Dictionary of Muddled Meanings.
Once again, people on my side of the aisle make us decent conservatives look insane. I don't dispute that they run the party now but please understand, mark, that there are some of us who aren't insane enough to believe that our nation's education has been overrun by commies.
elizabeth,
"You are engaged in a debate with people that want to nuke our nation's education system. Do you really think they are going to understand anything you say?"
Marxy doesn't understand the use of that phrase. It's hyperbole. More specifically, it's a quote from a movie ("Aliens", I think) which describes a situation that has gotten so bad that the only reasonable option is to tear the whole thing down and start over.
Doing such is nothing new. The American Revolution was one extreme instance of such. On a more prosaic scale, how many buildings have you seen in your lifetime where it was simply cheaper and easier to tear the whole thing down and start over rather than to try to fix something that cannot be reasonably fixed? Or people who have lost body parts because repairs simply were not possible, and removing it was the only way to save the person's life?
BTW, Marxy also got woodenly literal with his reference to that phrase, directly equating it with actual violence rather than its actual use as a metaphor to describe dismantling the entire thing and starting over. It should be obvious to anyone that it is not possible to actually nuke "The Education System".
Yes, it sounds like a radical suggestion. But have you even examined the E V I D E N C E and debates that lead to such a suggestion?
If you want to have an informed opinion (instead of Marxy's "Conservatives are just evil, m'kay?" approach), then check out the actual evidence and reasoning which lead to such an extreme sounding suggestion. And don't forget to also check out the comments where even more evidence has been presented and debates have taken place.
Marxy claims that all sides of a position should be examined. So go ahead, do an in-depth examination. You might be surprised at what you find.
IK if you are talking about TSM, they aren't Republicans over there. That is mostly libertarian turf. I know that makes your head hurt, but trust me, they want no more to be associated with you and whatever brand of Republicanism you love, then you do with them.
M Here's where I got the list
Pardon me, but who the FUCK cares that you found it trolling a right-wing pundit's website. If MM posts that the sun rises in the east are you going to howl about the injustice in that and that anyone who agrees that the sun rises in the east OBVIOUSLY has conservative confirmation bias? Jesus fucking christ - get a grip.
Stack had every bit as much in common with this blog and it's readers as he does with TSM. Deal with it.
人間好話，要如海綿遇水牢牢吸住..................................................
http://www.examiner.com/x-35976-Conservative-Examiner~y2010m2d19-Media-fail-to-mention-Joe-Stack-hated-capitalism
Take that!
Once again, Markaphasia, you illustrate just how right I am when I say that you are a perfect an example of the Left in this country. Thanks.
You say that you "have stated previously that it was only a matter of time before people who think like Stack start committing acts of violence."
I believe I've been saying it longer than you have, since 2003 at least. I've also said that such acts are the acts of people pushed beyond their thresholds of outrage, and they're not helpful to my side of the argument.
Now, one thing I'd like to point out is your lack of reading comprehension. You state, in quotation marks" (that's "verbatim" just so you know): "As has been said many times at TSM, 'the time for reasoned discourse has passed.'"
Really? Please point, by means of a hyperlink, to that phrase in any post I've written. You just accused me of wanting to kill you - "As a Holocaust survivor once said, 'When someone says they want to kill you, believe them.'" - using those words as your evidence.
The closest you will come, I believe, are these words from my recent and oh-so-accurately titled Überpost What We Got Here is . . . Failure to Communicate:
Their vision is an activist vision, while the constrained vision is a largely passive one, intent largely on limiting the power of government to judge or interfere with individuals exercising their individual rights.
It is, indeed, a conflict of visions, and the time for passivity is over.
Which you, apparently, have read as a call to arms for "the base" to rise up and kill . . . you?
And you call us hyperparanoid?
Indeed, the time for reasoned discourse is over. It does not, however, follow logically that the alternate to "reasoned discourse" is violence (except if you're a Leftist.)
As Thomas Sowell has pointed out, repeatedly, the Left, the Unconstrained Vision, believes that talking and reason is all that's necessary to prevent violence, but when that fails all they have left (no pun intended) IS violence. On the Constrained Vision side, we believe in deterrence.
Or as Clint Eastwood once so famously said: "Go ahead. Make my day." ;-)
"We're talking about the totality of his manifesto and what the manifesto itself said."
So am I. Compare what he wrote to what we see at TSM. Now compare what the FT Hood shooter has said to what hirabis say. Al Qaeda flew airplanes into buildings and Stack flew his airplane into a building.
But Stack is a "lone nut" who doesn't represent the base whereas Hassan's attack was a terrorist attack. Why? Because he has brown skin?
"you found it trolling a right-wing pundit's website."
It was emailed to me from a reader before I even put up this post. In his email, he said "I know you are going to try to make this out to be the work of a right wing domestic terrorist but here is his WHOLE manifesto" followed by the link to MM's site.
"had every bit as much in common with this blog and it's readers as he does with TSM."
Have I ever stated that we should blow up government buildings on this site? Have I ever said we are "past the point of reasoned discourse?" I don't have a problem when Kevin et al screed about punching someone in the face or dropping a grenade down someone's shorts...everyone jokes and blows off steam like that.
But some of the dialogue over there is very similar to Stack's. So, it's NOT terrorism when it's an angry white man screaming about the IRS but it is terrorism when an angry brown man is screaming about the US government.
"to what hirabis say"
You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
Hirabi has pretty much the same meaning as "apostate", which is someone doing other than what their religion teaches.
However, when you compare what modern jihadi's are doing to what Mohammad did — otherwise known as WWMD? — the answer is that they are doing EXACTLY what Mohammad did.
"Have I ever said we are "past the point of reasoned discourse?""
You PROVE reasoned discourse is not possible with YOU almost every time you post, especially when you misuse words like "hirabi", "dive", "verbatim", "free market", "social cohesion", etc.
So now you feel ok to talk about the fort hood shooting markadelphia. You 100% ignored it up to now simply because someone you know knew someone down there. So did I, big whoop.
As Kevin said, post links to his words or stfu.
WAITAMINUTE!!!
Kevin, your defense of not using the phrase "the time for reasoned discourse is passed" is to use it again?
elizabeth,
Here is part of a reply to Marxy that I posted over at TSM.
"More importantly, you're complaining that Kevin supposedly said we're past the point of reasonable discourse. Here's a hint: Discourse is ONLY possible if everyone is speaking the same language, as in the same words with the same meanings! You REFUSE to use the same meanings, therefore, the impediment to reasonable discourse IS YOU!!!"
elizabeth, please explain to me how reasoned discourse is supposed to be possible with someone who refuses to understand what we write and refuses to use the same word definitions as everyone else. (You know, as in nuking the eduction system, which isn't physically possible…)
Furthermore, elizabeth, have you researched the underlying reasoning behind Kevin's statement? Have you read Kevin's essay, What We Got Here is . . . Failure to Communicate?
Have you even tried "reaching across the isle"? If not, you're contributing to the inability to conduct reasonable discourse.
"Seek first to understand and then to be understood."
—Stephen R. Covey
Have I ever stated that we should blow up government buildings on this site?
You have preached the EXACT same rage against capitalism as Stack did. Not one fucking iota different. By YOUR logic as applied to TSM, Stack is just as relevant here. You cannot disown the connection here and insist on it there - unless you are just a classless one-sided hack.
Where have I preached "rage against capitalism?" In fact, I have stated several times on here that I love capitalism and am quite sad that we can never go back to "good capitalism" again.
Juris, I don't continually say "We need to take off and nuke the site from orbit."
Where have I preached "rage against capitalism?"
Corporate Abuse ring a bell? How about screeds about health insurers, and the CEOs with their 3 vacation homes? Do I really need to spend an hour in your archives? Why does it shock you that you and Stack have that in common? I really think it's that you just want to use Stack as a stick to beat the other side.
"We need to take off and nuke the site from orbit."
Have you never seen that movie? Would the progressive/liberal solution to that situation be to have a sit down with the aliens and talk through our differences? Or would the primary concern be to salvage the investment and save the colony? How about capturing an alien and bringing it back for research?
That line is used as a metaphor for what was the right course of action. The only sensible action.
I've heard it used it many contexts, and I've used it myself. Never, other than here, have I seen it interpreted as a fear of something literal.
Elizabeth:
WAITAMINUTE!!!
Kevin, your defense of not using the phrase "the time for reasoned discourse is passed" is to use it again?
I want him to show, by means of a link to my own words, where I've said that exact phrase - verbatim - in the context he states. He states that my meaning is a lethal threat - to him and those like him, supposedly.
My point, by using that phrase, is to point out to him A) that I had not said what he puts in my mouth, and B) that even had I said it, his (mis)interpretation is ludicrous, paranoid, and personally insulting.
Actually, he didn't say that you said it. He said
As has been said many times at TSM, "the time for reasoned discourse has passed."
That doesn't name you. He did specifically name you as saying the nuke quote.
Good Lord but you're a silly git, Mark. Obtuse barely begins to describe it. Dennis the Peasant's take is one of the best I've read:
http://dennisthepeasant.typepad.com/dennis_the_peasant/2010/02/ive-met-andrew-stack.html
His description of the Stacks that he has dealt with as a CPA sounds remarkably familiar. Pretty much like you, in fact:
* Andrew Stacks are arrogant: Convinced of their intellectual superiority, they will neither seek nor accept counsel.
* Andrew Stacks are insecure: Because it threatens their sense of self, they refuse to acknowledge their errors.
* Andrew Stacks are unteachable: Because they refuse to acknowledge their errors, they never learn from them. When their history is reviewed, a pattern of repeating the same errors is almost always present.
* Andrew Stacks are irresponsible: When they fail - and they usually do, for the reasons listed above - it is always somebody else's fault.
* Most of all, the Andrew Stacks of the world are greedy.
#4 may not apply, and at first I thought #5 didn't apply, but upon a little further reflection, I realized it does, in spades. You're greedy as all get out (and as envious as the day is long), but in a totally pussified passive-aggressive way, by working to get the government to provide you with what you see as your fair share, masked by a loudly professed concern for others. Your type make me ill.
And blk, all your "what ifs" only remind of the endless idiotic "what ifs" one airman in my flight in Basic Training at Lackland AFB was constantly asking of the TI. Finally TSGT Klein shut him down in perfect R. Lee Ermey style by asking him, "What if? I've got a 'what if' for you. 'What if' the Starship Enterprise traveled back in time, and tonight Spock and Scotty beamed down into your bunk and butt-f***** you??!! WHAT IF??!!" We laughed our asses off at his look of shock. Got yelled at and threatened punishment for laughing, but not too badly. More than worth it to hear the end of the inane "what ifs".
Larry
I liked it when Clint Eastwood said "Get off my lawn".
With examples of right-wing violence, you're 0 for 2, Marky. Third time's the charm, though, right?
BTW - where does Amy Bishop fit in your continuum of politcs/violence?
She's in education so that must mean she's a leftist.
She's a leftist by her own words Jeff. To answer Kevins question, she flew under the radar somehow.
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