March 19, 2004

OSAMA LOOKALIKE WINS $615

The French are suddenly all jumpy for some reason:

A French artist allegedly traumatized by last week's Spain bombings was convicted of trying to run over a pedestrian he mistook for Osama bin Laden and ordered to pay the man $615.

The 35-year-old, identified as Pierre, was sentenced Tuesday by a court in this southern France city to a three-month suspended prison term. The man he tried to run over was unharmed.

Pierre's lawyer, David Mendel, said his client was the "victim of a hallucination" while driving Monday through Montpellier's historic center.

The victim, a man in his 30s, was able to run from the oncoming car, which crashed along the side of a street.

For the benefit of French motorists, here is Osama in his latest disguise. Remain vigilant! The above is via contributor J.F. Beck, who is sometimes mistaken for Professor Bunyip, who himself is sometimes mistaken for Imre Salusinszky. In other mistaken identity developments:

A 35 year old man in Florida shot his Domino's Pizza Delivery guy because, apparently, he looked like a vampire.

Timothy White, 35, who was described by friends as a born-again Christian with an unusual preoccupation with zombies and vampires, was arrested outside of a church after Friday's shooting.

It’s unusual to be preoccupied with zombies?

Posted by Tim Blair at March 19, 2004 03:11 AM
Comments

Did he use either a silver or wooden bullet on the suspected vampire? Certainly if the shooter was 'preoccupied' by the undead, he'd know normal lead slugs would have no effect on them.

Sad, the state of education in this country.

Posted by: Ken Begg at March 19, 2004 at 03:41 AM

actually, he used a stale order of domino's dots...

Posted by: Mr. Bingley at March 19, 2004 at 03:53 AM

I work with zombies. It is not healthy to be preoccupied with them.

Posted by: dazed at March 19, 2004 at 03:54 AM

Actually, I'm not sure Domino's would be a good job for a vampire in any case. It seems to me they're always giving away free garlic bread with their pizzas.

Posted by: Ken Begg at March 19, 2004 at 04:01 AM

Better a vampire delivery guy than a zombie. At least the vampires aren't always dropping loose body parts on my pizza. Damn zombies.

Posted by: Bryan C at March 19, 2004 at 04:04 AM

yeah, with those damned zombies you order a cheese pie and get a pepperoni delivered.

Posted by: Mr. Bingley at March 19, 2004 at 04:09 AM

You people should try your luck at stand-up comedy, you're so funny.

Posted by: deckard at March 19, 2004 at 05:21 AM

I'm glad that sophisticated old-Europe isn't resorting to racial profiling. Everyone knows that only American cowboys would stoop so low

Posted by: Kevin at March 19, 2004 at 05:43 AM

I suspect that much of Europe, & media & academe more generally, are feeling rush after rush of uneasiness which they’ve had no way to stanch, no way to think it away, & from which they’ve had no sufficiently effective finger-pointing blame game to distract them.

Al Qaeda or its ally has now given them a way to evade reality, with the tentative “truce”—appeasement works! or so it seems—but I’m not sure that people are really taking the emotional bait. Maybe they do see it: now begins Europe’s training—as a camel. Europe already knows well how to spit. Will they cower & drool in terror & strange enchantment before their rising dominatrix Al Qaeda?

Does anybody here have a sense of the mood among leftists, academics, etc.? From my few connections, I think sense worry & exhaustion.

Posted by: ForNow at March 19, 2004 at 08:38 AM

I have the mental picture of a bunch of French Muslims standing in que at the barber shop. Waiting to get a shave.

Posted by: Papertiger at March 19, 2004 at 09:08 AM

The Bunyip = Salusinszky rumours should now be considered buried. Not because the Bunyip denied it, but because it would take a lot of cunning to deliberately misspell your own name in said denial.

Posted by: ChrisV at March 19, 2004 at 10:28 AM

Unfortunately, the French are behind the curve on this one.

True story. I used to be a shift supervisor for a private security firm in Bel Air/Beverly Hills/Brentwood, etc.

Back during the Panama action, after Noriega disappeared from sight and the US put a reward on his head, we get a frantic phone call: "I've captured Noriega! Get down here quick! We'll split the reward!"

This deranged old woman had gone running out of her house, pistol in one hand and phone in the other, and had her neighbor's Latino gardener pinned over the hood of his truck...

Posted by: Richard McEnroe at March 19, 2004 at 10:29 AM

ChrisV: Actually, I read it as a confirmation that it is Imre in the billabong. Gilding the lillyinski like that was one touch too much and gave the game away!

Posted by: superboot at March 19, 2004 at 11:33 AM

Fascinating. Have you noticed, by the way, how the opium production in Afganistan is at an all time high? Strike one down for another of your stupid wars, the war on drugs.

Posted by: Miranda Divide at March 19, 2004 at 11:43 AM

And they still don't get you your order on time? I feel for you, Miranda, I really do.

Posted by: Andrea Harris at March 19, 2004 at 11:56 AM

Miranda, you triple-encrusted, onion-layered dingleberry. More heroin = more jobs for concerned leftoids to counsel them and more spoon-bender grants to the Uniting Church from the Harm Minimisation Authority. You should be cheering, unless your Mum is a junkie and forgets to clean her little boy's room.

Posted by: superboot at March 19, 2004 at 11:58 AM

Miranda — The Afghan heroin goes to Europe and Russia. Aw.

Posted by: Richard McEnroe at March 19, 2004 at 12:38 PM

Actually, now I think about it, it also proves Communism and Islamis fundamentalism can't even push dope effectively. Another testimonial for Christian capitalism.

Posted by: Richard McEnroe at March 19, 2004 at 12:39 PM

Waitaminnute, how come we haven't seen IXLWIX and Miranda at the same time?

Posted by: Sortelli at March 19, 2004 at 03:20 PM

Is IXLNXS Miranda with a canibalism fetish?

Posted by: Spiny Norman at March 19, 2004 at 06:35 PM

Miranda, that's almost as dumb as saying 'at least the Nazis made the trains run on time' and 'at least the literacy rate in Cuba is over 99%'

Posted by: Art Vandelay at March 19, 2004 at 09:35 PM

It’s unusual to be preoccupied with zombies?

I don't think he said that. He said it was an unusual preoccupation with vampires and zombies, as opposed to a normal preoccupation with vampires and zombies.
Just a side thought though, Halloween trick-or-treats in this guy's neighbourhood must be absolute carnage

Posted by: Mad Jack McMad at March 20, 2004 at 12:04 AM

Actually, I'm for the War in Iraq and against the War on Drugs (and I'm not even a potential user). My reasoning if: the first makes sense and promises a general benefit to US citizens, Iraqi citizens, and the rest of the world; the second is stupid, increases criminality worldwide, harms many innocent people, encourages generalized lawlessness, and pumps enormous amounts of money into channels of violence. That is aside from the fact that the first seems likely to increase liberty and the second obviously decreases it.

I wouldn't expect Miranda to understand such sophisticated reasoning, largely because it appears that the sophisticated reasoning part of one's brain has to be missing for one to be a true leftist (Progressive).

Posted by: JorgXMcKie at March 20, 2004 at 02:44 AM

I forgot. It is much simpler to arrange one's policy choices by saying "if Bush is for it, I'm against it, and vice versa" and add that to a simplistic insistence on _your_ particular definition of consistency.

Posted by: JorgXMcKie at March 20, 2004 at 02:45 AM

Where would the world be without opiates? I for one could not live without Exile on Mainstreet. Not to mention it's a tad bit hypocritical of me to enjoy the heroin-inspired synthetic sensations of demerol while condemning the toilers of the field.

Posted by: S.A. Smith at March 20, 2004 at 04:30 AM