Brian Beutler recalls "Nancy Pelosi catching hell for the 'excessive' security detail she enjoys on her trips to and from California" and points out that it's nothing compared to what Bush and entourage took to Australia. Apparently, Air Force One plus two backup jumbo-jets wasn't enough, so they also brought two giant military transport planes to accommodate helicopters, a fleet of cars, etc., etc., etc. And this was for a trip to Australia, a small, rich, pleasant, friendly country. The possibility that this is just SOP for a presidential traveling party seems apparently, but Brian says at least one former Clinton aide he's spoken to says "that this sort of thing didn't happen when he worked at the White House."
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Ugly American
06 Sep 2007 09:10 am
Comments (22)
China is not Australia. We almost went to war with China in 1996 over Taiwan (they got mad we gave the Taiwanese president a visa to visit the US). People I've talked to who have lived in the same neighborhoods Cheney and Rumsfeld live in now for years say they've never seen anyone shut down the entire neighborhood like those two have anytime they take a drive.
Well, Matt, as you yourself have frequently pointed out, Bush is very VERY unpopular, and there really are an awful lot of people who want him dead - far more so than Clinton, surely. Therefore more security would seem to be necessary, and this saves the Aussies paying for it.
Alternatively, one could say that Bush is engaging in diplomacy - which he inevitably translates as "the activity needed to drive friendlies into the neutral camp and neutrals into the unfriendly camp". Sending a message to our friendliest ally that their security services suck compare to ours could be a small but important component of his diplomatic strategy.
I'm pretty sure it's SOP to bring at least one Air Force One backup, and the Globemasters for Marine One and the cars and trucks and has been for quite a while.
I know the eurocentric model that 2d maps of the world follow distorts the size of the continents, but isn't Australia a rather huge country?
Oh population wise. Sorry, jumped the snark.
What, there's more security after 9/11 than before? Shocking.
For what it's worth, the Australian Prime Minister rides in the front seat of a modest limo, and on an official trip maybe has a couple motorcycles leading the way. Aussies are bemused, annoyed, and (underneath it all) a little impressed to see a convoy of 25 specially imported cars and buses ferrying the President, to say nothing of the helicopters above and security agents on rooftops lining the route. I saw Clinton in Sydney in 1996 and he had a pretty enormous entourage too. Wow - American power! - was the reaction. But also: thank god we don't do this, or have to do it.
"What, there's more security after 9/11 than before? Shocking.
Posted by Al | September 6, 2007 9:55 AM "
I didn't realize terrorism and assassinations were invented on 9/11. Coincidentally, didn't JFK have a great second term?
Remember that one of Bush's campaign promises in 2000 was to reopen to traffic Pennsylvania Ave in front of the White House, which the terrible Clinton had closed because of an irrational fear of terrorism.
In Jan 2001, I bet a colleague that Penn Ave would still be closed in Jan 2005. I won.
Australia is not a "small" country. It's about the size of the 48 contiguous United States, according to the Dept. of State.
http://www.state.gov/r/pa/ei/bgn/2698.htm
They certainly have a tendency to overdo it a bit :
Bush's eight-hour trip to Mainz, about 40 kilometers (25 miles) west of Frankfurt, for talks with German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, led the authorities to halt river traffic on the Rhine, Europe's busiest waterway, suspend takeoffs and landings at Frankfurt airport, Europe's second biggest, and close four motorways for periods of up to four hours. (...) Twenty-four kilometers of the River Rhine and 15 kilometers of its tributary, the Main, were closed for traffic yesterday. The BDB Inland Shipping Federation said in a statement on its Web site the day before the visit it estimated losses would amount to 500 million euros.
"Coincidentally, didn't JFK have a great second term?"
He would have, if it weren't for those anti-war hippies protesting his escalation in Vietnam at the same time word leaked that he and his bro were both boning Marylin Monroe.
"Coincidentally, didn't JFK have a great second term?"
After a communist sympathizer got him, is when you saw the escalation in Presidential protection on trips overseas.
We are at war now with radical Islam.
Maybe SOP for overseas visits is overdoing it for a great, solid nation like Australia, but uncovery of a massive bomb ploy in Germany and presence of many more Islamist cells in Europe seems to indicate tons of security is prudent.
Clinton brought a boatload of people to (really) smal Ireland while I was in the embassy there. Basically, presidential trips always entail: AF1 plus a back-up; at least two C-5As with cars, commo stuff and Marine 1 (and back-up, sometimes), if the POTUS is going to shuttle by air at all. Plus you got the bomb detectors, bomb-sniffing dogs, etc. (I've often wondered why the Secret Service can't at least trust Canadian or UK dogs and detectors.) Clinton's motorcade in Limerick was at least 50 cars long, several of which were SS and commo cars brought from the US, not to mention the limo (plus back-up). That Clinton staffer must never have taken a trip with him. Perhaps Bush's entourage is larger than previous presidents, but whoever the Prez is, he comes with everything but the kitchen sink in. Which is why many foreign service officers, myself included, absolutely dread the prospect of a presidential visit!
But Pelosi needing massive security, as the Nation's "1st Female"? Blame Eisenhower for laying out a dumb Presidential succession plan that included the the possibly opposite Party Speaker as 3rd in line and then the oldest Senator of the majority Party as 4th.
Eisenhower did that in an era when he had 30 minutes heads up that nukes were headed in from the Soviet Union. Now it is quite conceivable that a nuke could have wiped out DC in 2000 with no warning, taking say: Clinton, Noble Algore, Hastert out and leaving 93-year old Strom Thurmond in charge of the nation.
When people elect a President, they are also voting for a Party, and a Party Platform. The succession should be only of the Party that was elected nationally to the Executive, not Congress. Many in Congress are great there, but absolutely unsuited to executive leadership.
Time for a new Presidential excutive order that designates a new succession line after VP that consists of high-ranking cabinet members, governors, persons of either Party that have served in high office, even a bipartisan choice or two. But someone like Pelosi, highly partisan and opposed to everything the current Party wants, (right or wrong) and someone like doddering 89-year old President Pro Tem Byrd are not anyone's idea of a President.
Also, since JFK's unusual election from Congress to the Presidency, voters have seen 59 members of the House and Senate declare their candidacy for President and rejected ALL of 'em.
Maybe SOP for overseas visits is overdoing it for a great, solid nation like Australia, but uncovery of a massive bomb ploy in Germany and presence of many more Islamist cells in Europe seems to indicate tons of security is prudent.
But if you just don't care how people are affected by such ridiculous measures and Bush only makes an irrelevant speech in front of a select groups of dignitaries or US soldiers what was the purpose of such a visit anyway? 75% of Europeans hate his guts already - is your goal to piss off the remaining 25%? Next time, he should just pick up the phone - it's cheaper too.
Again, notice the trappings of imperial power and the degree to which he holds himself above and apart from the people he pretends to serve. Indeed, the president is surrounded by the regalia of state and privilege perhaps more than any modern royal, and arguably more than any modern ruler. This is not something we should be comfortable with in a republic.
George:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harold_Holt
Austrailia once lost a sitting prime minister - I mean he just vanished! While swimming... A sitting head of government...vanished..... while swimming...they never even found the body...
Remember how Bush tried to bring his own cook to London? Presumably he was afraid that the cook at Buckingham Palace might try to poison him. Tried to get authority for the Secret Service to shoot people in London without fear of prosecution... it's ridiculous. Has there been a single attempt on Bush's life throughout his presidency? No. For heaven's sake, radical Islamists have tried to kill me three times so far - they haven't gone after Bush once.
Actually, Truman, not Eisenhower, is to blame for the current presidential succession reaching into Congress. One of his bigger mistakes in my opinion. His rationale was that they, unlike a Secretary of State, were at least elected by some constituency.
Comments closed September 20, 2007.
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Heads in the Sand
Not that it really matters how big Bush's or Pelosi's entourages are, but does that Clinton aide remember how big a group Clinton brought on his trip to China? If memory serves, it was over a thousand people.
Posted by Fred | September 6, 2007 9:21 AM