Meet Adam P. DuPont

Adam P. DuPont is a student at the U of Mass-Amherst majoring in middle eastern studies. Born in May of 1978, the 30-something Mr DuPont blogs and comments under the moniker "tas."

His blogs have included Loaded Mouth (now defunct); Sugarland is Dreaming (now defunct); and now Talk Radio is Stupid (which he registered at the domain palinnude.wordpress.com, hoping to make advertising money by pulling in readers under false pretenses. Unfortunately for him, he decided to host with a company that doesn't allow advertising. Oops).

Adam P. DuPont has made a specialty out of attacking "wingnuts" -- those he identifies as "right wingers, though often times the people he picks wouldn't self identify that way -- from behind his internet handle, careful not to reveal his own name.

Of course, it takes tremendous bravery to attack people from behind an internet handle, without having to worry yourself -- as many of those he's attacked have -- that such attacks lead to real-world problems and have real world consequences.

Perhaps the middle eastern studies dept at Amherst condone such anonymous cyber fatwas, of the kind Mr Adam P. DuPont is quick to launch, generally unprovoked and always with an ear toward earthy language.

This, you see, marks Mr. DuPont as a raging rebel fighting against the HATERS in the language of the streets!

And yet, at 30, this perennial student has known little of real life; low on money, he rejoices that his daddy still sends him coffee. Quick to rail agains the iniquities of the system, this part-time waiter lives on student loans and government cheese, even as he sniffs at rightwing blog readers who have time to comment, asking why they aren't out finding jobs.

Do as I say, not as I do. That's Mr. Adam P. DuPont, the erstwhile anonymous internet tough-talker.

The thing is, lots of people on the internet feel it is honorable to attach their names to their opinions -- particularly if they are going to call people out, or make remarks about the families of those people (who, to be clear, are entirely innocent bystanders).

And while some people remain anonymous out of legitimate fear that they could lose their jobs over their opinions (and the PC culture adopted and supported by those who share Adam P DuPont's ideological positions has much to do with that incremental attack on free speech), Mr DuPont (or "tas," or Adam, to those in meat space) doesn't have that concern.

Now, maybe an argument could be made that in the event Adam ever does get off of food stamps and student loans and goes looking for a job, he doesn't want a collected record of his various personal attacks and indiscretions of decorum collected for any potential employer to peruse.

Which would be fine, if in fact Adam P. DuPont didn't spend time consistently linking to and otherwise promoting such compendiums when they are aimed at his "enemies."

Again, this is easy to do when there are no consequences except upon the person you have attacked -- generally one who has the courage of convictions such that s/he has attached his name to his writings.

People like Adam P Dupont are nothing less than internet snipers attached to an ideological army. Inasmuch as they hide their identities, they are, like other shadowy ideological armies, nothing more or less than internet terrorists looking to explode the lives of those they attack.

But no longer.

Adam P. DuPont, now of Northampton Mass, is "tas." "tas" is Adam P. DuPont, 30 as of March 2009.

A part-time waiter, a long-time student, and a full-time internet thug whose political output consists almost entirely of foul-mouthed attacks on "wingnuts," many of them no more important than ordinary bloggers -- at least two of whom have had to deal with real-life threats resulting from Adam P. DuPont's prefered brand of online activity.

The time has come to flush these people out, to insist that they not be given cover to launch their attacks against "real" people for whom the consequences are also very real.

Perhaps Adam P. DuPont will learn to understand how the internet works once it is "him," and not his online persona, who begins to feel the effects of his actions.