As some of you might have heard, one of our customers (embeddedart.com) is allegedly a participant in this morning's incident in Texas. If you want to see the original letter, please see the archived version at http://www.thesmokinggun.com/archive/years/2010/0218102stack1.html.

Please keep all feedback/comments/discussion to this thread.

Thanks... It took us a little while to get a hold of the situation, but we now have a link to the original article as archived by thesmokinggun.

I read it, I didn't actually see grounds for censorship or even that the FBI was implicated in any way, am I missing something? What were their grounds?

Alex, indeed it shouldn't be overlooked that you did provide the link at the smoking gun.  Kudos to you for that.

Quoted for truth.
Even though his attack on the govt. was outrageous and unnecessary, trying to silence Joe (figuratively speaking, obviously; "dead men tell no tales") is a blatant violation of the 1st Amendment.

Even though his actions were dangerous and hypocritical (calling out the govt. for their wrongdoings and then trying to kill IRS workers is pretty hypocritical IMO), his words are protected by the 1st Amendment, and should NOT be silenced.

Thank for you posting that link.

By the way, I live in Austin, TX, and I could see the smoke coming from his house from my classroom's window.

All the data has been backup ed and copied. This account was not hacked.

Here is a good link as well to the suicide letter;
http://www.businessinsider.com/joseph-andrew-stacks-insane-manifesto-2010-2

Don't know how long it will stay up though.

I understand, the FBI had it removed by asking you to do so.

I don't think he tried to kill anyone.

thank you for keeping his freedom of speech alive even in the advent of his death. (with link to smoking gun) i think you should keep the original up.. that text page uses very little bandwidth. you are afraid of the FBI.

what a nationalist garbage attitude we have in this country.. anyone that has an intellectual viewpoint is a terrorist? are you serious?
yes Joe shouldn't have put anyone at risk, he was wrong at this. What he had to say made sense.

FBI, i know you will probably read this, and you are cowards.(collectively) what does taking this down do for anyone but you?

it is our right as American citizens to question authority(not destroy it).

Democracy is only destroyed by small ignorances. It is eaten from the inside out. Joe's actions were not very "patriotic" but in an American Ideal sense.. what he wrote is as patriotic as it gets. besides the violence, i dont identify with that let me make that clear.


is it normal to feel a bit of fear creep up my spine when i practice "free speech".. like if there were to be some sort of punishment for what i said?

I'm not going to really comment on the event specifically.. but just wanted to say that Joe was a customer with us for a long time (over 6 years) and had never had any issues. Always paid his bills on time, always a good customer. I'm still really shocked by everything that happened.