Yes. I am by nature skeptical but this totally failed the smell test. If I were to want to attack the President, by whatever means or under whatever circumstances, short of dropping a bomb from altitude, I would first want to neutralize his security.
A setting such as this, full of (expendable) officials and celebrities, a semi-celebratory occasion when everyone is putting on a face of goodwill and cooperation, lots of people milling around, and a relative lack of organization and structure, would be the ideal time, in my mind as an amateur assassin, to rush the place with a suicide bomber, a car bomb, and/or a couple of diehards with automatic weapons.
I am also mindful that not more than a couple weeks ago, we had Powell addressing publically the problem of terrorists in Latin America hooking up with Islamofascists.
I'm sure that the Secret Service anticipated all this BTW, they're smarter than I am; but it gives me the shivers nonetheless. I'm also quite sure that this event is far from "resolved," although it will slip down the memory hole as the media moves on.
bookmarking