I'd posit that 98% of providers from whom you can acquire budget VPS will do the same thing. The practice is not unique to Linode; why should a network you're paying $20-$100 do everything they can to keep a target online and threaten other customers?

Contrary to popular opinion, if you're getting DoS attacked, you're either (a) popular enough to start thinking about adult-size pants for your transit strategy or (b) inviting the attention by your choice of content or activities. In years of hosting, I started to know the targets of DoS attacks by name. You have to own at least a little bit of responsibility, and mitigate on your own end if you're going to be inviting that kind of attention; IRC and controversial blogs are the usual suspects here, but that's probably changed recently as I've been out of the hosting game for a while.

Linode has few options for reacting other than the one they use. I know that sucks, but it's how it is.