Luigi,
I am glad that you picked up on the reason behind what I posted, the "Recon Troll" was not an accidental reference.
I, like you, suspect he is here to ruin the enjoyment most people get from this forum. A lot of his posts should be in alt.home.repair (floor finishes, crown moulding etc), a number of them are inane, the tool purchase posts reflect a full workshop has been purchased but, other then claiming to have made some workshop cupboards his output has come mainly from his keyboard - a "legend in his own mind", so to speak.
If you look at his responses to challenges, he will bait, inflame, ignore - anything other than to answer the actual question. He will introduce a strawman argument and generally use all the tools of the troll whilst being careful not to be overtly hostile. He will NOT engage in reasoned discussion to explain his behaviour, his recent response to Silvan is just one example of this, his response to Tom in this thread is another, attempting to use humour to avoid answering the question. With the regulars, he has attacked each one at some stage or another - Charlie, Keith, Tom, Larry and a host of other highly valued posters. This appears to be a deliberate ploy to upset the 'balance' of the newsgroup, and it's working. When he first came in the group in 1 year ago, he complained bitterly at how people treated him because of his posts. Funnily enough though, he is the first to pounce on a newbie and tell them to 'go google', or to deride them in some way. The only effect of this is to make the newbie want to leave - why else would he do it?
Note that after having argued with one of the regulars he will fairly quickly respond with some sycophantic inanity in an attempt to maintain his audience. He is 'fishing' with them, this drains the pleasure people generally derive from the group and some leave. Although Larry quickly identified him as a troll, I think Larry erred by assuming immediate plonking was the answer, not everyone will, and therefore his posts continue to surface. The way to get rid of him is for members of the group to become aware of what he is up to, then ignore him or stick to just the WWing side of the posts he makes and ignore the deliberate flames he attaches as bait.
Now, Tail Gunner may be just some dumb ass somewhere who is too emotionally immature to accept that people don't like him because of his online demeanor, that's possible, even likely perhaps. But from our point of view, as lurkers and contributors to this forum, it really doesn't matter, because the ultimate effect is the same.
Dave, I know you're reading this, I invite you to jump in and engage in reasoned debate on the matter.
Greg