Secret Service says security plan worked -- massive street closures "appropriate"

who tv ^ | Associated Press

[zzen01]

WASHINGTON While the partisans and partygoers are still basking in the afterglow of yesterday's inaugural celebrations, the Secret Service is evaluating the performance of the scores of agencies that provided security. Secret Service spokesman Tom Mazur (MAY'-zur) says the agency considers the security plan "an overall success." It is especially pleased with the way its joint communications center worked. The high-tech nerve center, located in northern Virginia, was staffed by representatives of each of the federal, state, and local agencies participating in the security plan.

Massive street closures may have caused grumbles among many of the inaugural guests, but Mazur says in a post Nine-Eleven world, "I think they were appropriate."

[Redleg Duke]

I was commenting to my wife as we walked to the McPherson Square Metro Station last night from the Free Republic Ball, "We will probably never know the threats that were defeated today."

[bvw]

We should know of all or most of them. That is part of LIBERTY too -- a DUTY to be an informed public. The security expense was MASSIVE, and a great intrusion. It must be accounted for to the public.

Who was the greatest safety gained? To quote that true football wisdom -- By a strong offense!

I'd rather the money and personnel go to carrying the war to our enemies and ridding the world of them.

[Redleg Duke]

Many comments passed through my mind as I read your posting. Rather than start a flame war, I will merely state that I disagree with you. You have a right to your opinion, but I cannot accept it credibility.

[steve86]

"We will probably never know the threats that were defeated today."

Bigger snowballs?

[bvw]

Blissful ignorance is no virtue.

[Charlotte Corday]

I think that "bvw" is mostly right.

While I understand the current threats, nonetheless it is upsetting to me to see our leaders surrounded by phalanxes of guards similar to those we have seen in newsreels from totalitarian states.

Still more it upsets me to see every entrant into an airport, courthouse, or even a museum treated as a potential terrorist.

We cannot accept the sort of security measures seen in America today as permanent intrusions.

The watchword should be: defeat our enemies, so that we can then return to the sort of openness that characterizes a true "free republic".

[Irish Rose]

I saw that headline on Drudge, and I thought, "Well, obviously..." Nobody was assassinated. Isn't that the definition of "Secret Service success"?

[bvw]

I honestly think it bugs our President too. That's why he and his wife walked awhile rather than ride in those ghastly coffin-like limos.

The Secret Service and Presidential protection are a fine non-accountable racket -- a racket for no other reason than no one is holding them to account. With each new assert of "protective authority" that very presumption of authority grows -- with no one to check it.

Yet we know what happens to anything in man's orbit when a man or group of men or some organization is held to be beyond account. History is full of examples. Heck, most people of any adult years have fallen prey to it in some small way -- a overeach against them by someone they trusted but didn't bother to verify.