Steven Chu spoke at my daughter’s graduation from college, and there were SS and snipers all over the place. It was a little unnerving to see snipers with guns at the ready pointed down at the crowd. Everyone behaved themselves though.
Living in NH I get to see a lot of these people up close every four years. Especially when they walk in the July 4th parade.
I have also been to a Trump rally and a GW Bush rally when both were POTUS. My wife shook W’s hand. There was an SS agent on each side of him. Plus one right next to my wife and between me and W. They all have ear pieces and the DEATH STARE.
A friend is chairman of the summer carnival fund-raiser at his church. They have become a fairly large two-day event in our town, and now they must have a DHS and state police audit on their security plan every year. Yes, if you look carefully you can see decked-out seal-team six types on the school roof.
What disconcerting is not their presence, rather, he said that if this event hadn't already been going for 40 years, the red-tape, planning and bureaucracy involved means they wouldn't/couldn't, as a small church group, start such an event today.
Its the death of free and independent civil society by 1000 small cuts
If you're ever in DC for lunch or dinner, the Hotel Washington (est. 1917) on 15th St NW is directly east of the White House. The hotel has a rooftop restaurant that overlooks the Washington Monument and the Potomac, and also the Vue bar and grill that overlooks the White House roof—which is lined with snipers in swat black. From the Vue, you can see the AF1 helicopter landing in the back garden among the trees, but the trees also hide the President as he walks up to the back door. It's tempting to take photos looking down from there onto the White House, but I'm always careful when I lift any object in my hands across from that much firepower and surveillance.