Tuesday, May 22, 2007

Bomb Plot Thwarted at Falwell's Funeral

From ABC News:
Student Arrested With Homemade Bombs, Three Other Suspects Sought

May 22, 2007 —

Even in death, the Rev. Jerry Falwell rouses the most volatile of emotions.

A small group of protesters gathered near the funeral services to criticize the man who mobilized Christian evangelicals and made them a major force in American politics -- often by playing on social prejudices.

A group of students from Falwell's Liberty University staged a counter protest.

And Campbell County authorities arrested a Liberty University student for having several homemade bombs in his car.

The student, 19-year-old Mark D. Uhl of Amissville, Va., reportedly told authorities that he was making the bombs to stop protesters from disrupting the funeral service. The devices were made of a combination of gasoline and detergent, a law enforcement official told ABC News' Pierre Thomas. They were "slow burn," according to the official, and would not have been very destructive. more

To stop protesters from disrupting the service? I see this guy winning a Darwin award someday.

Note to those mentioned in the article:

1: You don't protest at funerals.
2: You don't counter-protest people protesting at funerals. It's marginally less stupid and rude than actually protesting.
3: Nowhere is it written that the memory of recently departed ministers is always best served by showering their casket and their loved ones with the flaming body parts of the deceased's opposition.
4: You don't protest at funerals.

The only way this article could have had more people behaving badly is if the cops showed up and arrested the mourners by mistake.

H/T to Midtopia