In fact, if the guards were armed, the secret service very likely required them to be disarmed. They aren't going to let just anybody guard the girls.
Posted on 01/20/2013 6:49:30 PM PST by grundle
The National Rifle Association is airing a television ad (and has on its website this four-minute video) that says the private school that President Obama’s daughters attend, Sidwell Friends School, has 11 armed guards. It doesn’t.
In fact, it has no armed guards. My Post colleague Glenn Kessler, who writes The Fact Checker column, wrote about the issue here and quoted Ellis Turner, associate head of Sidwell Friends, as saying: “Sidwell Friends security officers do not carry guns.”
Parents and students say they have never seen one either.
The president’s children are protected by Secret Service agents, which is required by federal law, but that is not the same thing as armed school resource officers.
The Fact Checker, who hands out “Pinocchios” depending on how accurate — or inaccurate — a particular story is, gave the NRA and its ad the worst possible rating, four Pinocchios. Whereas three Pinocchios are given for “significant factual error and/or obvious contradictions,” four Pinocchios are given for “whoppers.”
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
However, it turns out that I, and many others here, were wrong about Obama's daughters' school employing armed guard. We should be willing to humbly admit that we were wrong on this issue, and try not to make mistakes of this nature in the future.
Jury is still out for me. I never consider the Washington Post a good source for accurate info.
Given that the source is the long-discredited Washington Post, is their assertion on this mattter really the truth?
...since Wednesday.
I would go with this saying “trust but verified”, knowing this is from the Washington Post.
I’m not a fan of the armed guards idea for all schools but the simple fact is that the secret service protects those girls and are very much armed even if the school isn’t.
>>We should be willing to humbly admit that we were wrong on this issue, and try not to make mistakes of this nature in the future.
OMG...we are our own worst enemy. We find ourselves in a bar fight and we’re shouting “fight fair” as we get beat to death with bar stools and beer bottles. Read “Rules for Radicals” and realize that WE are the radicals now.
But they are readily available should the need arise.
I looked up jobs that were open at the time this came out - they do have licensed special police officers, and they have to be licensed to carry guns....
They have an entire armed contingent that follows the Obana’s kids around just like he has, as well as other congress critters.
Why would the school need to hire armed guards when the secret service is armed and at the school.
Notice that they are careful not to say that there are no armed personnel, just that the school itself doesn’t emply any armed guards. All the armed guards are employed by the federal government.
So...the school is already armed by the SS.
These “Journalists” are such A-holes!
I think I saw another version that said that SOME of the guards are ex-police, and may carry arms. I, too, wish that we could have a news source on this that we could trust.
I presume from the name of the school that it was originally founded by Quakers, and may still have some of that element in it. Quakers have a history of refusing all violence, including self defense.
It still appears to have Quaker connections, although I can’t vouch for their position today on such matters. They did apparently bend the basic Quaker rules sufficiently far to take Obama’s kids, knowing that if they did the school would be surrounded by armed Secret Service agents:
http://www.sidwell.edu/about_sfs/quaker-values/index.aspx
May I suggest the possibility that, when the daughters of the President are attending a school, the security is actually managed and dictated by the Secret Service and all armed personnel are ONLY Secret Service. IMHO - When the Secret Service is guarding a principal and the only other person in the room or area is a local cop or security guard, that cop or guard is then considered, by default, the greatest threat.
So they keep them in their cars? I'd parse every word on this one.
Nevertheless, let's assume it's true. They've just advertised that they're a big fat target on any day that 0bama's offspring aren't there.
Oh sure!
Now Sidwell will be crawling with mass murderers.
Do the secret service assigned to protect the 2 children carry firearms?
Washington Post, yeah right.
Speak for yourself.
“In fact, it has no armed guards.”
Now.
Post links?
“...11 armed guards”
Sorry, but I won’t apologize to anyone - in this case for several reasons:
1) If the Secret Service is there, then they don’t need ‘armed guards’, simply because the Secret Service will do that job for them. Anyone that comes within a mile of that school will be tracked and greeted, long before they can pose a threat to anyone.
2) Even when the President’s family is not at the school, there are BOATLOADS of kids of high-ranking government people, including Senators and Congressmen (as well as department heads, etc.). There is simply NO WAY that such a target-rich environment (at least as a kook would see it) would he left unguarded, and it shouldn’t be. In other words, NO WAY!!!
3) Finally, if they didn’t really have armed people there, does one think they would announce it?
So, no, maybe they don’t have ‘armed guards’, but they DEFINITELY have a lot of “armed people” there - maybe janitors, cooks, office workers, etc (who just happen to be plainclothes cops). The official guards, the ones at the TV monitors don’t have to be armed, all they need are radios to reach the right people.
You really think the girls and all the other “special children” aren’t protected by armed personnel? You really think they’re going to tell you security arrangements?
This doesn’t change the fact that *no* Federal employee,past or present...elected,appointed or civil service...should have armed protection of *any* sort.And that goes for the family members of any such employee.
The school doesn’t have to employee armed guards. High profile families employee private armed bodyguards at private schools for their children and I am not referring to secret service agents. Be assured that there is plenty of lead in that school even when the first children are not enrolled.
If so, it’s only because the secret service won’t let them carry...
Personally, I hope those girls have all sorts of guards and protectors at all times.
Imagine what the country would go through if harm came to one of them.
Those girls didn’t pick out their parents-—and for all I can tell, they are nice young girls.
Even a broken clock is right twice a day, and I can see no reason to criticize the parenting they are getting.
One thing I will compliment their parents on is keeping them mostly out of the public view. Remember how sick we were are seeing and hearing about Chelsea Clinton?
Personally, I hope those girls have all sorts of guards and protectors at all times.
Imagine what the country would go through if harm came to one of them.
Those girls didn’t pick out their parents-—and for all I can tell, they are nice young girls.
Even a broken clock is right twice a day, and I can see no reason to criticize the parenting they are getting.
One thing I will compliment their parents on is keeping them mostly out of the public view. Remember how sick we were are seeing and hearing about Chelsea Clinton?
I commend you for wanting to get the facts straight regardless of some embarrassment by doing so.
Pardon my naivety in such issues, but isn’t the Secret Service armed? If so, then I think that the SS would secure the school if they heard shots being fired at the school, regardless if there was no immediate danger to Obama’s daughters.
In fact, if I was in charge of the school then I would look at the SS’s presence as a freebe with respect to not having to use school funds to pay for security. And for all we know, the school might have expressed the same thing to the SS, the SS possibly responding, “we’ll take care of it.” I don’t know.
What am I overlooking?
“Fact Checker”. ROTFL!!! I guess he’s never heard of the Secret Service.
Washington DC Police Department is two blocks away.
I would bet that the SS would not allow anyone at the school to be armed, except SS agents. There’s no telling what the policy was before the Obama children attended the school.
Way to go, WP! Draw a little more attention to the security arrangements of the president’s family. Does anyone believe the SS would allow nonSS armed personnel near one of their protectees?
If Sidwell had no armed guards, then why didn’t they refute the charges when they were first aired? I simply don’t believe the wapo article.
Sidwell administrative types tried to portray their 'police' as doing nothing other than calling the real cops ~ although I kind of wonder if they physically detain the targets of their ire, or what ~ that wasn't described.
Think of Sidwell Friends as like a Target in a toney neighborhood, not like a Wal-Mart in a Houston barrio. They ask you to follow them to the command center to await the cops.
Hmm ~ does not compute. So, I looked up something that might tell us how Sidwell security folks actually work, and this tale gives you an idea ~ >http://www.dcurbanmom.com/jforum/posts/list/105/88425.page
God help those kids. I really mean this.
because when the shit hits the fan at that school the SS has a job to protect 2 girls and get them out of harms way. Something I am 100% sure they are able to do.
However, protecting the rest of the school is not their job and likely low on the list of priorities. My guess is that their first goal is to GTFO of the building with the girls safely.
There's no doubt they knew about this dude all along, but with the Secret Service coming to Sidwell THEY KNEW they had to get rid of their friend ~ and they did that in a NY sec.
Thank you Saint Basil for your insights. I don’t think anybody said anything to contrary. We’re making the point that his kids get security, but Regular Moms and Dad’s are having their constitutional rights infringed upon. Got it?
Sidwell is built like a fortress ~ they aren’t fooling anybody ~
I remember when Reagan was shot ALL of these ginormous weapons suddenly appeared. Where did the SS carry them? They were all wearing suits.
Republicans are weird; in many cases they give off signs of really NOT wanting to win at all. What REALLY gets their pulse racing and their pants all big is the biiiig MORAL VIIIICTORY.
Uh-huh.
They want to “fight the good fight”, but then LOSE, using some stupid combination of loser tactics that show they’re somehow morally SUPERIOR to others.
And so they lose, but somehow in their minds their loser tactics show that they WIN REAL BIG in some subtle way that only occurs to really amazing, really moral people.
And the related fantasy is to REALLY OWN UP TO THEIR MISTAKES —this is huge. It’s like a oogling a whole phalanx of t*tty dancers —gets ‘em SUPER excited...!
I’ve seen this a bunch of times, and I think it’s a smug form of spiritual masturbation, or something. Their early lives in high-school were titty-twisters, noogies, atomic-wegies —picture Marty MacFly, and you’re really close.
Whenever you meet one of these creatures, just pivot on the ball of your foot and break into a sprint, because he/she LOVES for their loser flames to shine really bright with LOTS of like-minded people.
And you DO NOT want to be one of them.
Pardon my naivety in such issues, but isn’t the Secret Service armed? If so, then I think that the SS would secure the school if they heard shots being fired at the school, regardless if there was no immediate danger to Obama’s daughters.
I highly doubt that would be their orders. Their orders are likely to protect the girls at any and all costs. And that does not include hunting down an active shooter unless he is the room with the girls.
Their job would be to GTFO and protect the girls only.
Sidwell is surrounded by at least a dozen embassies.and the Police HQ is two blocks away.
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