Posted on 11/28/2009 1:02:58 PM PST by Schnucki
WASHINGTON: This time, the picture is the story. After the Secret Service insisted that US president Barack Obama was never endangered by a security breach that allowed a couple to crash his first state dinner, the White House has released a photo showing that not only did the pair get close to Obama, they actually shook hands and talked to him.
The revelation underscored the seriousness of the security breach and prompted an abject apology from the Secret Service.
A White House spokesman said that the couple, Michaele and Tareq Salahi of Virginia, met and shook hands with the president and the first lady in the receiving line in the Blue Room, as the Obamas greeted each of their 400 invited guests on Tuesday night before moving to a tent on the South Lawn for dinner. That disclosure coincided with a statement from the director of the Secret Service, Mark Sullivan, saying that his agency was “deeply concerned and embarrassed” by the events. Secret Service officials said the agency wanted to interview everyone connected with the episode, including the Salahis, and had not ruled out criminal charges.
Secret Service on Friday acknowledged that its officers never checked whether the two were on the guest list before letting them onto the White House grounds. The Salahis were not on the guest list and should have been barred from entering last Tuesday’s dinner on the White House South Lawn for the Prime Minister of India, said Sullivan.
“Although these individuals went through magnetometers and other levels of screening, they should have been prohibited from entering the event entirely,” Sullivan said. “That failing is ours.”
Secret Service do your job: Save American from the martyr statues or pictures of Obama on every street corner
No jam—no jelly.
More bothered by illegal aliens crashing the USA. Politicians getting a taste of their own medicine equal just deserts
They can plead down to theft by deception if they ate or drank anything.
Give me time...I’ll think up more charges.
Yeah—it could have been Boris and Natasha—different outcome.
Plus rename every school, park, and boulevard in the USA after him!
“Barack Hussein Obama Middle School, Bumflick, New Jersey”.
Airports, too.
Oooh, nasty. Reminds me of those chickens they cook on a beer can.
This is one angle that I (frustratingly) haven't seen addressed in the news - not only can't we protect our own president but we host a foreign head of state and can't even keep unwanted (and potentially very dangerous) guests out of the room. Nice job, SS.
That kind of result seems to be out of style now. If George Tenet didn't have to dust off his resume on 9/12/01, this guy probably doesn't have to worry.
Things could really spin out of control on the Indo/Paki border. At the least the U.S. and India would have ice cold relations for a long time to come.
I recently read, “In the President’s Secret Service: Behind the Scenes with Agents in the Line of Fire and the Presidents They Protect” by Ronald Kessler, and if what Mr. Kessler is saying is correct, this is only the beginning. The Secret Service is underfunded, undermanned, and so stretched that the agents don’t have time to do the training needed to do their job well. It’s actually a very good read and upsetting at the same time.
I’m surprised he didn’t bow to them.
Shouldn’t the Bummer have been clued in on his teleprompter that “this person is: [blank]”
Bush was not a hasty one to pin blame. The Democrats are made of a different sort of stuff.
With this administration, I just can’t help feeling that barry was in on the “reality tv” joke?
Two agents working together would make it a slam dunk. Unlike most Soviet agents today’s enemies have no problem dying “for the cause.” Even better, “give us a show trial.”
I sorta had thoughts along that direction too... What if this was on purpose to fire the Secret Service and bring in their own security?
Somehow, Secret Service needs to stay in charge of OUR nation’s pResident whoever he is. To bring in another security team would REALLY keep Obama away from the American people.
Course, part of me wants to think it was a “trial run”
I’ve done this myself.* It probably happens all the time. Though mine was way before 9/11.
* post 34 http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2394728/posts?page=34#34
I wish that I could say how I really feel about him......
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