Nerve Endings Firing Away

A crazy person tired of living his life blames the government and more particularly the IRS for his woes, sets his own house on fire, rents/steals a plane, and rams it into an IRS building in Austin, Texas. The ever-hyperventilating media that calls any criminal act terrorism had a staid headline – Plane Hits I.R.S. Building in Texas (via Sepia Mutiny). It is almost as if describing a lost plane flying around lazily just happened to bump into a building. Surprisingly the strongest reaction was from Fox News which only went to the extent of calling him a “cowardly criminal”. Was this your wet dream? A guy imitating a previous terrorist attack to protest his woes against the establishment would be a perfect media story to go apeshit over but we have already moved on to covering the apology of a man who cheated on his wife. Yawn!

Correct me if I am wrong but environmental nutcases who blow up empty SUVs and burn vacation homes are labeled eco-terrorists ^[1] but a government-hating individual who pre-plans a dramatic attack that resembles a previous attack on this country is a plain old criminal or a crazy person? If you read his suicide note, it is amply clear that this was an individual hell bent on destroying all systems and hated capitalism as much as he did the government.

What gets my goat is people who sigh and say they understand the man’s frustration and although what he did was wrong, it was the system that failed him. W.T.F. Weren’t similar concerns ^[2] expressed by ordinary folks in the Middle East when 9/11 happened? It was wrong then and it is wrong now. Violence is never the answer to any grievance you have. As I said on Twitter in response to someone who expressed sadness, dancing naked on the street is a crazy act but ramming a plane in a federal building is pure unadulterated terrorism. We called it terrorism when a plane was crashed into the Pentagon to protest the country’s defense policies. So why can’t we call it terrorism when some one does the same with tax policies? If you hate the government, don’t want to pay taxes, and love guns, you are in luck because such a country exists. It is called Somalia. I’m told piracy is a fun vocation in those parts. You might consider moving there.

It may be cool to pick on the I.R.S. for being bloodsuckers but death and taxes are inevitable and even if the tax collecting department was called Charlie’s Chocolate Factory and the tax rate was low enough to only fund wars, it would still be hated ^[3]. But grumbling about paying your taxes is one thing and ramming a plane into a federal building is another ^[4]. The United States had a similar attack against the government when Timothy McVeigh blew up the federal building in Oklahoma City and I don’t think he is still considered a terrorist. No matter how dire your situation is or financial state is, the only right you have is to take your own life.

So that’s why I have to ask, what does it take to be called a terrorist? Just calling him insane is an insult to insane people. Let us call him for what he really is – a murderous cowardly cold-blooded terrorist.

Footnotes:

1. The so-called ‘eco-terrorism has yet to claim a life [↩]
2. “Now the United States knows that its actions have consequences” or the milder “At least now they know what terrorism is” [↩]
3. We would fight a whole lot less wars if that were to happen, trust me [↩]
4. I hope saying it over and over will convey how dastardly the act was [↩]