Non-random thoughts about Hasan

In response to Matt Yglesias's post on Hasan's Powerpoint presentation, I wrote:

You know, in the pre-9-11 days we had a phrase for what Hasan did. It was called “going Postal.” This guy could be viewed a an islamic terrorist, or as a disgruntled worker. (I suppose there are other ways too, but let’s look a just these two for a moment).

One of these ways of viewing him fits the worldviews of people who want permanent religious global war (neo-conservatives, right bloggers, and real live islamo-fascists) and the other fits the worldview of, well, me. Which is the right interpretation? Which one is supported by available evidence?

This is a guy who reprotedly suffered discrimination at the hands of his co-workers. Supervisors were unhappy with his work at Walter Reed. His PowerPoint file demonstrates poor communication skills, which are certainly a liability for someone who is supposed to faciliate communication so that soldiers can get through emotional crises. He improved a bit at Walter Reed, but was shipped out of that safe environment into a less safe one so that he wouldn’t be a blight on WR Army Hospital. Once at Fort Hood he received orders to deploy overseas.

This looks like the sort of profile we might expect from someone who is disaffected at work. He was a failure at his chosen profession, unable to relate to his coworkers, harassed by them (which would undercut his ability to feel the necessary empathy to do his job well), all of which makes him a prime candidate for going Postal. If his skin were lighter and his name Christian sounding, he would be labeled a disgruntled worker.

This is not to say that his religion played no role. It may very well have made him feel secure in his belief that he would be rewarded in the afterlife. Heaven knows that plenty of Christians have killed with that same belief. If the evidence ultimately shows that Hassan was in the thrall of some Islamic extremist and was acting in furtherance of a big anti-american conspiracy, I’m happy to change my belief as to what happened. But until then, I choose to believe what the evidence supports — that Hasan went Postal.

(note: I understand that a more thorough treatment would require an analysis of the terms “terrorism” and “going Postal” because, well, one is horribly ambiguous and the other is kind of offensive to the many US Postal service employees and their supporters who are not shooting each other up. See Greenwald for more on this.)