Joseph Andrew Stack, Not Crazy

I've boiled down the suicide note left online by Joseph Stack, who flew his plane into the IRS building in Austin today. How many of the first six paragraphs seem reasonable? How much of the eighth paragraph forward seems crazy?

1. Why did I do this? 


2. I was brought up to think that the government is on our side.


3. The actions of politicians show that they do not care for the public good.
4. The rich gamble and steal and the government bails them out. Drug and insurance companies prey on vulnerable citizens, but the politicians only serve wealthy corporations. 


5. I’m fed up. Justice? You’ve got to be kidding!
6. The tax system is too complicated for even experts to understand, but if an individual makes a mistake the system is merciless.
7. How did I get here?
8. I tried to be a good citizen. The government didn’t care. I met other honest people who tried to live by the rules and were ripped off by corporations, unions, cheating financiers. A powerful, corrupt religion got preferred treatment.
Finally, after a lot of time and expense, I thought everything was OK, but the government betrayed me. No matter what happened, they were determined to bleed me dry.
I tried even harder. I couldn’t get a break anywhere. It was like the whole world turned against me. I might have made some mistakes, but my family and I suffered while the fat cats thrived. When the wealthy fuck up, the poor get to die for the mistakes. Even the president is just a puppet of the powerful.
....[V]iolence not only is the answer, it is the only answer. The cruel joke is that the really big chunks of shit at the top have known this all along and have been laughing at, and using this awareness against, fools like me all along.
I have just had enough.

Methodology: The first seven paras correspond to the first seven paras in the suicide note. The long section eight severely abbreviates Stack's grievances with the IRS and streamlines the rest of his general and personal complaints. The italic type is taken straight from the note (with one comma moved for sense).

I don't know if the wiring in his brain was the real villain (altho burning down the house that sheltered his wife and daughter indicates less than perfect equanimity). I don't know how if he was a Teabagger or a Trotskyist.

It doesn't matter.

Any given American plucked off the web or out of a crowd, any crowd, is likely to be in agreement with the assertions in the first seven paras or the sentiments in the eighth. I am. The most common exception would be about the uses of violence... and I think that Stack's conclusion is going to become more common, not less.

More angry people feeling that they have no recourse and nothing left to lose? Joseph Andrew Stack, American.