As you know, Joseph Stack flew his plane into an IRS building in Austen:
"The man, identified by federal law enforcement officials as Joseph Stack, 53, was a software engineer who had a long-running grudge with the Internal Revenue Service."
Terrorism is usually an act of idealogical, religious, and/or political motivation. Stack left a suicide note that indicates his motive was political/idealogical, specifically targeting the federal tax system in general and the IRS in particular. The note is vehemently anti-government, specifically hostile to the IRS, and paranoid. But it does show a lucid mind and a violent act well thought out, making all of this that much more eerie:
"If you're reading this, you're no doubt asking yourself, "Why did this have to happen?" The simple truth is that it is complicated and has been coming for a long time. The writing process, started many months ago, was intended to be therapy in the face of the looming realization that there isn't enough therapy in the world that can fix what is really broken. Needless to say, this rant could fill volumes with example after example if I would let it.
<snip>
I saw it written once that the definition of insanity is repeating the same process over and over and expecting the outcome to suddenly be different. I am finally ready to stop this insanity. Well, Mr. Big Brother IRS man, let's try something different; take my pound of flesh and sleep well.
The communist creed: From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.
The capitalist creed: From each according to his gullibility, to each according to his greed."
Enter sort-of-journalism stage right, left, and way out there
Fox News does not seem to consider this attack an act of domestic terrorism. Presumably, this is because no Muslims were involved.
Then there is the new Republican Senator from Massachusetts, Scott Brown - also appearing on Fox News (surprise)- seems to sympathize with Stack:
"You don't know anything about the individual," Brown said. "He could have had other issues. Certainly, no one likes paying taxes obviously."
On the other side of the great divide, WaPo columnist Jonathan Capehart decides that the suicide note sounds like Tea Party talking points:
"But after reading his 34-paragraph screed, I am struck by how his alienation is similar to that we're hearing from the extreme elements of the Tea Party movement."
Is this terrorism? Yes. Is there evidence that this a Tea Party nut? No. There are plenty of possible groups of thought Stack could have belonged to, including anarchists, Libertarians, and yes, Tea Party lunatics. But let's not jump the gun here.
Then there is the ever paranoid (The Commies are coming) NewsBusters - that spends its time hunting Commies in the media when not busy being paranoid about a Socialist media conspiracy:
A trend is beginning to develop in the media reports concerning Joe Stack, the man who allegedly smashed a plane into an IRS building in Austin, Texas: his disgust for capitalism and support of communism must be ignored at all cost.
As NewsBusters previously reported, both Time.com and a blog posting at the Washington Post have conveniently skipped two crucial sentences at the end of Stack's suicide note:
The communist creed: From each according to his ability, to each according to his need.
The capitalist creed: From each according to his gullibility, to each according to his greed.
Clearly, Stack was no friend of capitalism.
So, not being a friend of capitalism automatically makes one a Commie? Yes, Stack included one line about Communism in his note, but that is hardly evidence of his Commie connections, interests, and such. Just as there is no evidence tying Stack to the Tea Party movement, there is also no evidence tying Stack to some grand Commie conspiracy. But telling these people that is like explaining physics to a flea. I urge you to read the comments there as well to get a good understanding of just how deranged, paranoid, and confused these people are.
And finally, there is Glenn Beck, who actually thinks that the POTUS is close to allowing radicals like Stack into his inner circle:
"Later, Beck took to the chalkboard and came thisclose to suggesting that President Obama is very close to allowing radicals like Stack into his inner circle, though he did manage to note that Van Jones “hasn’t killed anybody.” He also emphatically suggested that the country needs to “get away from anybody who’s calling for a revolution…whether it’s a Tea Party revolution or a communist one.” No more Tea Parties for Beck? Not sure I buy that, unless Stack’s anti-government extreme put the scare in Beck (many would argue Beck has a ‘chalkboard manifesto’ of sorts…is he trying to distance himself?). It will be interesting to see how much of this “separation of radicals” is going to make it into his CPAC address this weekend."
Yes, Beck and his glue-sniffing are the stuff of legend. All in all, the term journalist or pundit does not seem to sufficiently depict the type of crazy we are seeing. We need a whole new other word that describes the reporting of news from within a paranoid bunker: parajournalism.


