Weapons In Their Pants

by digby

I have successfully avoided writing about this “party crasher” story up until now but naturally Tweety has made it impossible not to. He is having a fit, as is half the country apparently, that someone got close enough to the president to shake his hand and as he said, “might have brought in biological or chemical weapons.”(Presumably they would have been smuggled in somehow inside an orifice since they were otherwise searched by the secret service before entering.)

Ok, I get that the White House and the Secret Service screwed up. The idea that someone could actually penetrate the security at the White House is disturbing and it shouldn’t happen. But really, this hysteria is a bit much. After all, the president does rope lines, fundraisers, plant tours and visits to burger joints all the time and he is in the close presence of strangers:

Did they check that guy for biological weapons in his pants? How about these guys?

This “story” is another example of the social corrosion caused by reality TV and the bubble balloon-boy phenomenon and so I suppose it’s worth covering on its own merits. But the idea that people in the White House and Secret Service must be fired because the president could have been killed with a chemical weapon in that woman’s sari is over-the-top.

From what I’m seeing today (Isikoff himself is digging into it, right alongside the Washington Post gossip columnist) it may be leading to another Travelgate style witch hunt in which Michelle Obama’s staff at the very least is going to have to be sacrificed on the alter of Sally Quinn. I hope that makes everyone feel better. It’s been a while.

Update: A former Secret Service agent made the point that they have never assumed that it was impossible for anyone to get close to the president and are well prepared if someone makes a move. Tweety keeps talking about a Clint Eastwood movie about the Secret Service for some reason.

Update II: I don’t mean to suggest that the president isn’t under unusual threat. But this is getting stupid. They’re talking about how this woman could have been wearing an IED.

Update III:

Oh Jesus, now Tweety’s delving into “Tiger’s Troubles.” And I won’t even repeat the tabloid speculation that Tweety and his guests are engaging in. Just read TMZ or the Globe.

Meanwhile, may I assume that the world is no longer going to hell in a hand basket?

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