“It’s Pakistan. Many people there have swords.”

June 23, 2010 4:28 PM

Gary Faulkner, an unemployed construction worker from Colorado, has been deported from Pakistan after attempting a Rambo-style mission to assassinate Osama bin Laden.

Carrying, among other things, a Bible and plastic handcuffs, Faulkner arrived June 3 in the town of Bumburate and set off into the forest to hunt down the terrorist mastermind. "We initially laughed when he told us that he wanted to kill Osama bin Laden," [police official Mumtaz Ahmad] Khan said. But when officers found weapons, including a 40-inch sword and a pistol as well as night-vision equipment, "our suspicion grew." Gary's brother believes that he could have finished the job: "“It was a logical plan,” Scott Faulkner says. “I felt he had a good chance.”

posted by Despondent_Monkey (74 comments total)

He's been described as seriously ill and in need of dialysis.
posted by emilyd22222 at 4:31 PM on June 23, 2010

In other news, an incompetent NSA operative no longer exists.
posted by clockzero at 4:31 PM on June 23, 2010 [1 favorite]

logical, that is, except for an apparent lack of savvy in getting through the border.

"That's not mine."
posted by randomkeystrike at 4:32 PM on June 23, 2010

We initially laughed when he told us that he wanted to kill Osama bin Laden

It's funny because he's been dead for 8 years.
posted by mr_roboto at 4:32 PM on June 23, 2010 [2 favorites]

Fatal flaw: forgot to get Mr T to drink the mikshake before boarding the plane.
posted by GuyZero at 4:33 PM on June 23, 2010 [9 favorites]

Despondent_Monkey: "Gary's brother believes that he could have finished the job: "“It was a logical plan,” Scott Faulkner says. “I felt he had a good chance.” "

The man has kidney problems and requires dialysis. Do you simply hate him to let his body poison itself in Pakistan? What the fuck is logical about his goddamn plan, Scott?

Where's my phone book, I need some answers.
posted by boo_radley at 4:34 PM on June 23, 2010 [3 favorites]

Now, watch this drive.
posted by weezy at 4:35 PM on June 23, 2010 [5 favorites]

Bin Laden, who is also reported to have kidney problems...

To think, this could have been the beginning of a beautiful friendship.
posted by sallybrown at 4:35 PM on June 23, 2010 [14 favorites]

It looks like he had announced his plan on 4chan a while back.
posted by zardoz at 4:36 PM on June 23, 2010 [6 favorites]

No seriously, Pakistan, you can keep him.
posted by chillmost at 4:37 PM on June 23, 2010 [2 favorites]

Let's see...doesn't speak Urdu or Arabic, has no contacts, no clue where to start looking, and no real tactical idea on how to mount his attack. Was he counting on a disembodied voice to tell him where to look? At least he scored some hash while he was on his little trip abroad.
posted by Burhanistan at 4:38 PM on June 23, 2010 [1 favorite]

This is a kind of colossal, awe inspiring, gut wrenchingly accurate metaphor.

"Logical plan," plastic handcuffs and bible indeed.
posted by fire&wings at 4:39 PM on June 23, 2010 [10 favorites]

Wouldn't it have been hilariously awesome if he had succeeded?
posted by brundlefly at 4:43 PM on June 23, 2010 [13 favorites]

Well, I've left him (Scott) a message.
posted by boo_radley at 4:45 PM on June 23, 2010 [3 favorites]

"Logical plan," plastic handcuffs and bible indeed.

When you've got the bible and the word of god on your side, handcuffs are a mere formality.
posted by Tavern at 4:46 PM on June 23, 2010 [1 favorite]

Was he counting on a disembodied voice to tell him where to look?

Per zardoz's comment, he was relying on motherfucking 4chan!

How goddman bad-ass is that? Hopefully he at least saw some bad photoshops before he left. For all we know, he's hunting Bert.
posted by GuyZero at 4:46 PM on June 23, 2010 [6 favorites]

Let's see...doesn't speak Urdu or Arabic, has no contacts, no clue where to start looking, and no real tactical idea on how to mount his attack.

He was pretty enamored of our military's strategery.
posted by Evilspork at 4:54 PM on June 23, 2010 [19 favorites]

"...and I would have gotten him, too, if it hadn't been for you meddling kids!"
posted by Pecinpah at 4:55 PM on June 23, 2010 [3 favorites]

For all we know, he's hunting Bert.

I'm alone in a college lab, and when I clicked on the Bert link my hee-haw laughter echoed up and down the halls.
posted by angrycat at 4:56 PM on June 23, 2010

His brother is a doctor, but apparently not a psychiatrist.
posted by lukemeister at 4:58 PM on June 23, 2010

Unemployed construction worker, huh? If I was out of a job, I'd at least call myself an unemployed philharmonic orchestra conductor.
posted by UbuRoivas at 4:59 PM on June 23, 2010 [1 favorite]

Unemployed construction worker, huh? If I was out of a job, I'd at least call myself an unemployed philharmonic orchestra conductor.

I think he must've felt that the image of him whacking bin Laden over the head with a hammer and a 2x4 must've been stronger than poking him with a little conductor's wand...
posted by flapjax at midnite at 5:06 PM on June 23, 2010 [1 favorite]

officers found weapons, including a 40-inch sword

Gary, I hate to be blunt, but you're two to three times too old to be hardcore LARPing.
posted by Halloween Jack at 5:12 PM on June 23, 2010

Is a person an "unemployed X" based on the last job they do? Or the job they've held the longest? Like, if I were a stock broker for twenty years and things went real bad and I had to work at a McDonalds and got fired and shot up the place, would I be "Unemployed Fry Cook Griphus, Esq." in the news?
posted by griphus at 5:14 PM on June 23, 2010 [5 favorites]

Carrying, among other things, a Bible and plastic handcuffs

In all fairness that would have been a fuck of a lot for MacGyver -he would have been able to make a stealth bomber out of that. So, what we're really lamenting, is that our have-a-go-hero isn't a fictional TV character with awesome skills. Sometimes real life just sucks so hard.
posted by ob at 5:17 PM on June 23, 2010

Given his amazing ignorance and naivete, I'm actually surprised this guy even made it to Pakistan.
posted by DU at 5:21 PM on June 23, 2010 [1 favorite]

I wonder what it would be like to be so confident.
posted by Neofelis at 5:23 PM on June 23, 2010 [6 favorites]

I like the comment on "Wait Wait Don't Tell Me", the NPR Comedy/Quiz show - "So, he didn't catch Osama, but he's also in an even tie with the entire American armed forces."

You know what's really sick? What's really crazy? Believing that a trillion-dollar, decade-long conventional war in a nation with two hundred years worth of guerilla war expertise would be a better idea than sending in smart and cautious law enforcement experts.
posted by Slap*Happy at 5:26 PM on June 23, 2010 [2 favorites]

The Denver Post said it's his sixth trip, DU. I'm kind of surprised they keep letting him do this.
posted by fairytale of los angeles at 5:26 PM on June 23, 2010 [1 favorite]

"our suspicion grew."

Classic! I'm guessing Pakistan learned understatement from all those years of British rule.
posted by IndigoJones at 5:44 PM on June 23, 2010

I keep thinking about what the farewell at the airport must have been like.

"Ok, well good luck with Osama."

"Thanks."

"You have your snacks for the plane?"

"Yeah."
posted by orme at 5:45 PM on June 23, 2010 [9 favorites]

He looks like a Grant Morrison character.
posted by Drexen at 5:45 PM on June 23, 2010

/b/ has been weaponized. Soo, is that a good trade for eliminating Osama?
posted by NortonDC at 5:51 PM on June 23, 2010

In typical fashion, /b/'s recommendations for capturing Osama were to bring "niggers" and child porn.
posted by Kraftmatic Adjustable Cheese at 5:53 PM on June 23, 2010 [2 favorites]

He looks like a Grant Morrison character.

Or Earth-2 Matt Groening
posted by griphus at 5:54 PM on June 23, 2010

I would have loved to see 4chan capture Osama. That would have immediately become my favorite historical event of all time. The moon landing would have been deposed.
posted by painquale at 5:59 PM on June 23, 2010 [30 favorites]

You can't win if you don't play.
posted by StickyCarpet at 6:02 PM on June 23, 2010

Like, if I were a stock broker for twenty years and things went real bad and I had to work at a McDonalds and got fired and shot up the place, would I be "Unemployed Fry Cook Griphus, Esq." in the news?

You would be classified as a burger broker.
posted by mannequito at 6:03 PM on June 23, 2010 [2 favorites]

for a split second, I read his name as Eric Faulkner, and I thought that perhaps bin Laden was about to be brought down by the almighty power of THE BAY CITY ROLLERS.
posted by scody at 6:05 PM on June 23, 2010 [2 favorites]

Indy: Brody's got friends in every town and village from here to the Sudan, he speaks a dozen languages, knows every local custom, he'll blend in, disappear, you'll never see him again. With any luck, he's got the grail already.

Brody: Does anyone here speak English?
posted by SPrintF at 6:06 PM on June 23, 2010 [16 favorites]

You would be classified as a burger broker.

"Mostly, I trade in beef derivatives"
posted by UbuRoivas at 6:07 PM on June 23, 2010 [6 favorites]

For all we know, he's hunting Bert.

And with that, the great hand that controls everything reached for the lever marked "Internet" and with a mighty plunge pulled it down to "OFF", and knowing there were no more lolz to conquer he shed a single, solemn tear.
posted by Senor Cardgage at 6:16 PM on June 23, 2010 [2 favorites]

(The camera turns on. Grainy Hi8 footage shot in some bunker. A bloody, beaten OSAMA BIN LADEN sits in a chair. Clearly in pain, he is clearly too exhausted to move. GARY stands, holding a sword. He addresses the camera.)

GARY: Citizens of the world, I have done the impossible. I have succeeded where others have failed. I have captured Osama bin Laden.

(Osama grunts, too weak to speak.)

GARY: I have captured him, and I will execute him with my sword, for the crimes he has committed against not only America, but also Spain, England, and wherever else his terrorist network has sown fear and violence. This man is an enemy combatant. He has no rights. He has chosen the way of the animal, and he will be treated as such. I will execute him through beheading.

OSAMA: (barely audible) Do your worst, pig.

GARY: I will execute Osama bin Laden tonight. I will execute him...unless. Unless Osama can do one thing. I will free Osama bin Laden if he can meet this one request of mine.

(Gary grins broadly, impishly.)

GARY: Osama bin Laden, do you have a copy of...Battletoads?

(Osama appears shocked)

OSAMA: (hoarse, spitting out blood) Is this another one of your idiotic American Internet jokes? Because I will have no part of this. Kill me now. I will not merely play a part of this farce.

(Gary grins. Then Osama starts grinning. Then Gary frowns. Then Osama grins even harder, looking into the camera.)

HARD CUT TO:

Aboveground. Osama has been bandaged. He appears well and happy. Gary holds a copy of Battletoads.

GARY: Well, a deal's a deal! I guess he had Battletoads after all. Why don't you go free...Osama bin Laden.

(Osama bin Laden shrugs and snaps. Sunglasses appear in his hand as if by magic.)

OSAMA: What can I say. I like...(he puts on the sunglasses)...easy video games.

(Osama calmly walks off in the horizon. As Gary speaks, a red convertible muscle car picks him up and screeches off.)

GARY: Oh well. I guess it was easier than we thought to capture Osama bin Laden. Too bad he'll probably be gone forever, now that I have my Battletoads. I guess it was really dumb of me to predicate his execution on his presumed failure to live up to a several-years-old Internet meme.

(Gary grins so hard that he becomes trollface.jpg)
(explosion tears apart the screen)
(cue "Larger Than Life" by the Backstreet Boys, set to still images of Gary and Osama hanging out and having a great time)
posted by Sticherbeast at 6:37 PM on June 23, 2010 [12 favorites]

WHOO CRAZY PEOPLE FROM MY STATE

I haven't been really paying attention to the local-ish news lately (thanks, dissertation), but I could just feel, even without looking, that this guy was from Colorado. We've really been racking up the nutjobs as of late...
posted by heurtebise at 6:51 PM on June 23, 2010

Isn't the anosognosia thread still open?
posted by BrotherCaine at 7:03 PM on June 23, 2010 [2 favorites]

Let's see...doesn't speak Urdu or Arabic, has no contacts, no clue where to start looking, and no real tactical idea on how to mount his attack. Was he counting on a disembodied voice to tell him where to look?

Bush or Beck as role models?
posted by juiceCake at 7:05 PM on June 23, 2010

"Is it out the norm? Yes it is. But is it crazy? No," Scott Faulkner said. "If he wore a uniform and called himself special ops, would he be crazy?"

Possibly even crazier, yeah.

I don't know, though. I don't know if it's just because I've been playing a lot of Shadowrun lately, and that seems like the sort of thing a shadowrunner would do, or what, but I kind of admire the guy.
posted by Caduceus at 7:15 PM on June 23, 2010

As long as this guy filmed a montage of himself lacing his boots, putting on a headband, sharpening his knife, and gearing up; than he should've been good to go.
posted by P.o.B. at 7:27 PM on June 23, 2010 [8 favorites]

I think he was just going over there for the hashish, mainly.
posted by Burhanistan at 7:42 PM on June 23, 2010

And the lulz.
posted by Sailormom at 7:56 PM on June 23, 2010

painquale - I would have loved to see 4chan capture Osama.

It will happen. Or something similar; disparate and mostly anonymous civilians will comically achieve some goal that military/law enforcement had painfully and prolongingly failed to achieve.

Look at flashmobs, and stories like how Metafilter helped a couple of girls out of a skeevy situation.

If more 4chan users were based in the Pakistani wilderness it might have worked. I'd give non-ridiculous odds that if Osama was hiding out in Chicago and Gary Faulkner went after him with the help of 4chan, we'd end up with a captured/dead Osama (but more likely, a dead Gary). Has there been a high profile manhunt, that had be stymying law enforcement, that has been solved either directly by or with the help of an online community?

Sounds like a made for TV movie, though.

Hm, is/are there a/ geographic concentration(s) of 4chan-ers?
posted by porpoise at 8:30 PM on June 23, 2010

painquale - I would have loved to see 4chan capture Osama.

It will happen. Or something similar; disparate and mostly anonymous civilians will comically achieve some goal that military/law enforcement had painfully and prolongingly failed to achieve.


METAFILTER ENDS DRUG WAR, STARTS DRUG PARTY





woooo party
posted by The Whelk at 9:25 PM on June 23, 2010 [6 favorites]

So a high, crazy sick guy under orders from God he received in a dream was going to walk into Bin Laden's cave and kill him with a sword? That's so cool. The Pakistanis should take him out for dinner and drinks.
posted by longsleeves at 9:44 PM on June 23, 2010 [1 favorite]

You can't deny it's a totally solid plan, Longsleeves....
posted by ph00dz at 10:16 PM on June 23, 2010

Worked for Joan of Arc.
posted by UbuRoivas at 10:28 PM on June 23, 2010

I think he was going to steal Bin Laden's portable dialysis machine.
posted by Goofyy at 10:43 PM on June 23, 2010

I think the only reason they stopped him is that they feared he would kill someone that slightly resembled bin Laden instead.
posted by ymgve at 10:58 PM on June 23, 2010 [1 favorite]

Isn't the anosognosia thread still open?

Gary Faulkner was suffering from a similar, but related condition.

Anusagnosia: The inability to recognize that you're just some asshole.
posted by evidenceofabsence at 11:03 PM on June 23, 2010 [1 favorite]

I wonder what it would be like to be so confident.

Probably exactly like what it would be like to be so ignorant.
posted by motown missile at 11:08 PM on June 23, 2010

Worked for Joan of Arc.

Yeah, more or less.
posted by electroboy at 11:51 PM on June 23, 2010 [2 favorites]

Watch CBS for later developments. David Letterman wants to have him on.
posted by Cranberry at 12:17 AM on June 24, 2010

This is how bad healthcare is in our country. A desperate man has to go all the way to Pakistan, to get kidney dialysis from a terrorist mastermind hiding out in --wait, what?

Nevermind.
posted by wobh at 2:13 AM on June 24, 2010 [1 favorite]

You know who else was an unemployed construction worker?

Yeah.
posted by longbaugh at 2:36 AM on June 24, 2010 [2 favorites]

If only he had gone to AskMefi instead of 4Chan and got some proper advice he would have done it
posted by fearfulsymmetry at 4:07 AM on June 24, 2010

Hm, is/are there a/ geographic concentration(s) of 4chan-ers?
posted by porpoise at 11:30 PM on June 23 [+] [!]

Do their parents' basements count?
posted by orme at 4:22 AM on June 24, 2010

If only he had gone to AskMefi...

Yeah, no. The plan would have bogged down right then and there in the resulting MeTa thread.
posted by aught at 5:53 AM on June 24, 2010

Yeah, no. The plan would have bogged down right then and there in the resulting MeTa thread.

Yeah, but how often do new OP's actually find the MeTa threads they spawn?
posted by edbles at 6:15 AM on June 24, 2010

The Case for Calling Them Nitwits

Oh, no, wait, that's the other side.
posted by storybored at 8:43 AM on June 24, 2010

If only he had gone to AskMefi instead of 4Chan and got some proper advice he would have done it

Yeah, but then he'd dispose of the body so well nobody would ever know.
posted by Saydur at 9:20 AM on June 24, 2010 [1 favorite]

It looks like he had announced his plan on 4chan a while back.
posted by zardoz at 7:36 PM on June 23

Not to spoil the lulz, but that 4chan image is faked.
posted by Who_Am_I at 10:51 AM on June 24, 2010

Carrying, among other things, a Bible and plastic handcuffs

Clearly, this man secretly had the full we'll-give-you-everything-you-need-but-deny-we-ever-spoke-to-you backing of the CIA.
posted by straight at 11:09 AM on June 24, 2010

CNN interview
posted by Bwithh at 3:46 PM on June 24, 2010

Seriously? Strangely enough the guy in the CNN interview, if it's legit, is crazy enough to make the plan sound downright reasonable.
posted by GuyZero at 4:07 PM on June 24, 2010

He does go off the rails a bit at the end.
posted by electroboy at 6:52 PM on June 24, 2010