Around the Horn: Reaction to the Aerial Attack on the IRS Offices in Austin

As many of you are aware, yesterday a man named Joseph Stack flew an airplane into an IRS building in Austin, Texas. The crash killed Stack and one other person who was in the building.

Stack left behind what is being called a suicide manifesto where he railed against the government, taxes and the bailouts.

I thought that this would be an appropriate topic to take a look at reactions from around the blogosphere.

Curt at Flopping Aces:

From a quick perusing of the letter it appears the guy is quite good at blaming everyone and everything instead of the poor decisions he made.

He blames “the puppet” George W. Bush and capitalist greed for his downfall. Good enough reason to try and murder your wife, kids, and those just trying to do their jobs eh?

How long until the left starts blaming the tea party movement for this? I know….crazy, since it appears the guy was anti-Christian and a communist but why let facts get in your way.

The Angry Anarchist:

These aren’t the words of an unintelligent lunatic IMO, he actually comes across as being very well educated and extremely aware of the hypocrisy and injustice occurring everyday in America. What makes this so upsetting is that everything that drove him into the side of that building will now be heightened for those of us that are still here on Earth. I can already see the ‘Patriot Act’ being warmed up by the government in an effort to “save good Americans from the terrorists that walk amongst us on our own streets and boulevards”.

Glenn Greenwald:

All of this underscores, yet again, that Terrorism is simultaneously the single most meaningless and most manipulated word in the American political lexicon. The term now has virtually nothing to do with the act itself and everything to do with the identity of the actor, especially his or her religious identity.

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In sum: a Muslim who attacks military targets, including in war zones or even in their own countries that have been invaded by a foreign army, are Terrorists. A non-Muslim who flies an airplane into a government building in pursuit of a political agenda is not, or at least is not a Real Terrorist with a capital T -- not the kind who should be tortured and thrown in a cage with no charges and assassinated with no due process. Nor are Christians who stand outside abortion clinics and murder doctors and clinic workers. Nor are acts undertaken by us or our favored allies designed to kill large numbers of civilians or which will recklessly cause such deaths as a means of terrorizing the population into desired behavioral change -- the Glorious Shock and Awe campaign and the pummeling of Gaza. Except as a means for demonizing Muslims, the word is used so inconsistently and manipulatively that it is impoverished of any discernible meaning.

Kempite at Politics 24/7:

Let’s make this pefrectly clear from the onset. Any acts of viloence are inexcusable, unaceptable and intolerable. Nothing can legitimize ones attempt to carry out revenge or try to carry out their own personal sense of justice on society. Therefore, no one….no one…….should see the events that took place today in Texas, as anything but tragic and deplorable. It was to a great degree, an act of terrorism.

That said, before anyone tries to claim that the Tea Party protestors or those on the right condone, excuse or prompted the insane flying of a private plane into an IRS building in Austin, Texas by one Joe Stack , let it be known that that such is not the case. I do not believe that any rational person could ever reach such a conclusion.

E. Messamore at The Humble Libertarian:

As the Editor-in-Chief of The Humble Libertarian, I unequivocally and without qualification, condemn this brutal, senseless, and stupid act of violence. As a libertarian, I am incensed that Joe Stack took it upon himself to take innocent lives in the name of less government spending and lower taxes.

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Joe Stack committed his violent crime just a few short hours after I published these words at The Humble Libertarian: "We need to be good representatives of libertarianism. Ultimately people are concerned about whether a libertarian society will be a good society, and we must show them it will be a good society by being good people." Joe Stack doesn't speak for me or the millions of other Americans who correctly support more fiscal responsibility in Washington. We are good people, law-abiding citizens, and peace-loving activists.

Around the Horn: Reactions to Yesterday's Shooting at Ft. Hood

I thought that this would be an appropriate time for us to take a look at a snapshot of reactions on this awful case.

Details are beginning to trickle out to provide a little more clarity as there was much initial misinformation reported yesterday.

The New York Times has a good profile of the shooter, Nidal Malik Hassan, that you can read by clicking here. Here are some reactions from around the blogosphere:

Mitch Berg at "Shot in the Dark":

It’s hard for me to know what to say about atrocities like Fort Hood, other than the obvious; I pray for the people of Killeen, the troops in the First Cav and the Third Armored Cav and the 41st Artillery and the other units stationed there. Getting shot at in a combat zone is something they train for and expect; getting shot at on home turf, allegedly by one of their purported own, is not.

Glenn Greenwald:

Perhaps most irresponsible of all is the unverified claim that Hasan had written on the Internet in defense of suicide attacks by Muslims, even though the origins of those writings are entirely unverified. Similarly, certain news organizations -- like NPR -- used anonymous sources to disseminate inflammatory claims about Hasan's prior troubles allegedly grounded in activism on behalf of Islam. Much of this may turn out to be true once verified, or it may not be, but all of the conflicting, unverified claims flying around last night enabled many people to exploit the "facts" they selected in order to create whatever storyline that suited them and their political preconceptions -- and many, of course, took vigorous advantage of that opportunity.

Larry Johnson at "No Quarter":

The murder and wounding of more than forty soldiers is bad enough. If a cell of muslim extremists have infiltrated the U.S. Army then this is going to cause some major blow back throughout the military. Muslim officers and enlisted personnel will fall under suspicion. Most of this will be unfair and unwarranted. But human nature is what it is and the suspicion engendered by this kind of act will reverbrate for some time and probably hurt our ability to do a better job on winning hearts and minds overseas when there is such distrust in the ranks.

Firehand at "Irons in the Fire":

The L.A. Times will bury this as long as they can — probably until they’re embarrassed into revealing it due to its clear relevance. They will applaud themselves for being sober and cautious — something they would never do if the shooter were an aficionado of Rush Limbaugh instead of Allah and anti-American rants." From what I'm hearing and reading, a lot of other major media is refusing to mention these non-pc things; so much better to blame the Army and the other soldiers for 'bullying', etc.

Arsalan Iftikhar of the "AC 360" blog:

First of all, as an American, my heart broke into two pieces tonight when I heard of the tragic mass murder at Fort Hood, Texas earlier this evening when a U.S. Army soldier opened fire on a military processing center at Fort Hood in Texas on Thursday; killing at least 12 people and wounding at least 31 others, according to Army officials in a report to CNN.

Secondly, as a Muslim, my heart further broke into another two pieces when it was learned that the Fort Hood shooter was a Muslim mental health care professional medical doctor who (similar to the April 16, 2007 Virginia Tech massacre) used two handguns during his mass murder rampage.