Anger in the Nation: Was Joe Stack a Hero or Terrorist & Did We Mourn Vernon Hunter?

There’s no excuse for taking an innocent life especially in the manner that has been attributed to Joseph Andrew Stack, the Austin pilot who rammed his plane into a seven story building in North Austin near where the IRS office was housed. By now we've all heard the reports about him setting his house on fire. We heard about the rantings he left in what appears to be a suicide note of sorts that was posted on his now disabled website. We heard all these different things and at the end of the day what we have is a disturbed man who was so angry at any number of things he decided to lash out. Is it wrong? Yes. Is it cowardly? No doubt.


Equally as cowardly is the fact that Stack has all but disappeared from mainstream news coverage. Well at least on Friday he did, the day after he committed his act of terrorism... less than 24 hours after he flew his plane into the building, all of us from coast to coast were treated to the circus surrounding Tiger Woods and his staged apology. That was followed by one of his distraught porn star mistresses who was upset and held a press conference of her own because she never got an apology and according to her she had quit her job in porn industry to mess around with a married Tiger Woods. It was a sight to behold as regular news coverage was interrupted to carry Wood’s apology. Urban radio stations including some owned by San Antonio based Clear Channel had live streaming coverage of Woods while ignoring important, easily more impacting issues. News pundits and experts were brought in to speak to Tiger’s bad behavior and access whether or not he redeemed himself. We did all this before we even knew the name of the IRS worker Stacks had killed in his attack.

What was also lost in the sauce were all the troubling questions around Stack’s actions. Why did he do it? Was his anger at the IRS and government isolated or is it part of a larger emotional trend being expressed by Americans but not playing itself out to such extremes yet?

I found it interesting that no one wants to talk about Fausto Cardenas, the 24-year-old Houston man who was arrested just a month ago for shooting his gun off in front of the Texas Capitol building. He had just visited the office of state senator Dan Patrick where he made members of his staff feel uncomfortable. Cardenas left the office and then busted off shots. Luckily no one was hurt due to the fact police pounced on him, but we’re still left wondering why he did it? Was Cardenas angry at the government? Was he a guy who just had a bad day?

Say what you will, but when I see or hear of two incidents around government buildings I wanna first acknowledge them and see if there are any dots connected. After all, we do this all the time with shootings. We ask, is it gang related? is there a connection? Is this the jump off for more things to come?

Stack’s so called rambling letter or manifesto can not be swept aside as some mumbo jumbo by a lunatic. He was quite clear that he had a lot of anger and felt the government that all of us are supposed to trust was out to get him. It’s the same type of anger I saw at early Tea Party rallies. It’s the same type of anger I saw at Healthcare Townhalls this past summer. It’s the anger I see and hear people expressing both from the political left and political right about everything ranging from bank bailouts and bonuses, to fat greedy executives, to the government doing too much, to the government doing too little to protect folks at a time when we have a jacked up economy and high unemployment. People are angry - very angry. They’re so angry that a website was set up where several thousand people immediately joined praising Joseph Stack as a hero. Hell, we took a break from all the Tiger Woods coverage this morning to grant Stack’s daughter Samantha Bell a platform on Good Morning America where she praised her father as a hero for standing up to the system.

Meanwhile punk ass news pundits have been besides themselves debating whether or not to call Stack a terrorist. Nevermind the fact that we have gang members and undocumented workers sneaking into this country routinely being called terrorists by these same pundits as well as by some in law enforcement. But like I noted when it comes to Stack, it’s a debate. Sadly many of these overzealous pundits have not been too besides themselves to call attention to Vernon Hunter, the 68 year Black man who was killed when Stack smashed his plane in the building. We didn’t hear a clarion call to even offer our condolences...

Nope, not too many of our esteemed news pundits and politicians were to quick to call for our country to honor a real hero who served two tours of duty in Vietnam. He worked for 20 years at the IRS. Why didn’t we highlight this victim of domestic terrorism the way we did Tiger Woods? There was some local coverage here in the Austin area, but most people around the country who eagerly read Stack’s suicide note/manifesto and debated with folks about whether Stacks was a right winger or an Obama supporter, never heard of Vernon Hunter. One can only imagine how his wife and kids feel…

And still all the nagging questions remain... Was the Stacks incident isolated?
There are many that wish to dismiss this. I heard from them last week. They, like so many of us here in this country, want a neat ending to a messy situation. Many have been dismissive when attempts were made to see if this anger Stacks was feeling was connected to the anger Cardenas may have been feeling when he fired shots on the Capital, and if those two incidents of expressed anger were  connected to the anger felt by Hasan who wound up shooting and killing 12 people and injuring 31 on nearby Fort Hood. We also need to include the sentiments behind the rash of church burnings - 11 in all since the beginning of this year throughout East Texas. Suspects Robert Bourque, 19, and 21-year-old Daniel George McAllister were arrested over the weekend... How angry do you have to be to burn 11 churches?

Looking over the recent events here in Texas, it's hard not to be concerned about exactly how much anger is out there. I can’t help but wonder if some of that angst was stoked when you have a sitting governor - Rick Perry - calling for the state to secede from the rest of the Union. How much does that feed into the anger and angst that’s obviously festering out there?

Maybe those who like to have happy ending can brush all this aside and try to make it seem as if all this is a series of strange coincidents. Such is not the case for Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitan. It was just yesterday that she announced that one of her main priorities is dealing with domestic extremism. She spoke at the annual governor’s convention where she said this problem needs to be ‘drilled down and analyzed’.

I’m not quite sure how Napolitan’s assessment will translate into policy. With so much anger, I worry that the government will use this concern as an excuse to clamp down on people versus trying to address core issues of concern and dissent. With anti-establishment politicos like Congressman Ron Paul winning the straw poll for who the Republicans want for president this past weekend at the CPAC convention, and Democratic voters crossing over to vote for a Republican Scott Brown over Democrat Martha Coakley in last month’s special election in Massachusetts senate race, we definitely know people are making it clear they are not satisfied.

Adding to all that is the concern that this economy is weakening. Soon we will have troops returning home after doing 3 and 4 tours of duty which will definitely have left a major impact in their thinking. We already know that's a concern from the Fort Hood incident. We also have a bunch of folks from jail that are steadily coming out only to find there’s no job or anything out here for them... With all that's going on, one has to wonder if there will be anymore Joe Stacks.