Texas Domestic Terrorhick Faces Federal Charges

Well, this is a new one on me.

The 47 year old man, Clinton Udet Pinckert (yes,that’s his real name), from Clint, TX, was trying to disable planes by shining a laser at them as they flew over his home.

He was arrested Tue. night at his home by the FBI’s Joint Terrorism Task Force. If convicted, he faces up to 20 years in the clink.

According to a federal criminal complaint filed today, Pinckert allegedly shined a Class IIIb laser product at a plane flying over his house.

Pinckert is expected to have his initial appearance at today before United States Magistrate Judge Norbert Garney. Pinckert is being held at the El Paso County Jail without bond.

“We take this matter very seriously,” FBI Special Agent in Charge Manuel E. Mora said. “The safety of hundreds of people were at stake had the laser disoriented the pilots.”

I hope CAIR is paying attention. The FBI Joint Terrorism Task Force doesn’t just pick on Muslims, now do they?

H/T: Crime Scene KC

Two Florida Men Arrested For Driving Around With…PVC Pipe Bombs

Is this really such a big hobby? Making potentially deadly bombs out of PVC piping?

The police found the bombs during a routine traffic stop, (isn’t that always the way)? They were in a Taco Bell bag on the floorboard.

Police also found masks, gloves, flashlights, two small knives and about 15-feet of PVC pipe. Investigators found the third bomb and materials when they got consent to search the suspects’ apartment.

(Officer)Haugh said all of the men had their cell phones in water-proof plastic bags.

None of the four men inside the vehicle had any I.D. on them.

The suspects, Raymond Kramer, 22, and Aaron Spoerke, 21, admitted to making the bombs, and said they just liked to throw them into canals and watch them ‘splode.

Hey, everybody’s got to have a hobby.

The pipe bombs, each made of PVC piping, end caps, duct tape, a fuse and gunpowder, could have caused serious injury or death, authorities said.

Spoerke told investigators he got the PVC pipe from his plumbing job. He and Kramer got gun powder at a local gun store and fuses from a fireworks store.

They are not yet facing any federal charges, and federal investigators say they have ruled out any type of domestic terrorism.

H/T: Riehl World View

UPDATE: 

As for my question: Is this really such a big hobby?

Wickedpinto says, yes. See comments for details.

President Huckabee?

A reader of The Corner sent Rich Lowry an interesting email that laid out a series of nine events that could lead to a Huckabee nomination.

#10:

Huckabee easily crushes Hillary in 2008, since he has all sorts of info on the Clintons back from the Arkansas days. He then invites his band, Capitol Offense, to play during his own inauguration. After 8 years of Huckabee, we get 3 conservative SCOTUS appointments, an implementation of the Fair Tax system, and the dying whimpers of Al-Qaeda whose will was broken at the hands of a bass-playing joke-telling weight-losing president named Huckabee.

The End.

Jonah Goldberg took credit for the email, but I think he was kidding.

Lowry thinks a more plausible scenario would be for Huckabee to get some “VP buzz”, if Giuliani is the nominee, to balance out the ticket.

UPDATE:

CNN.com writes that Huckabee is reporting a big bump in fundraising, following his second place showing at last week’s IA straw poll.  He’s also seeing a flood of phone calls to his campaign headquarters, as well as a “dramatic change” in traffic to his campaign website.

“We’re doing more almost daily, like 30,000 (hits) a day as of Saturday night, which would be more than we’d get online normally in a week,” he said at a roundtable interview with reporters. He said more than 1,000 first-time donors to the campaign contributed from Saturday night through Tuesday morning online, and “the phones have not stopped ringing.”

Not too shabby.