Posted on 09/23/2014 5:36:11 AM PDT by afraidfortherepublic
President Obama is supporting the Secret Service in the wake of a deeply troubling incident in which a disturbed man jumped the White House fence, sprinted across the North Lawn, and actually entered the White House Friday evening.
The man, 42 year-old Omar Gonzalez, had a folding knife in his pocket and had left 800 rounds of ammunition in his car not far from the White House. Gonzalez had also drawn the attention of authorities at least twice a few weeks ago — once in Virginia, when he was found with a sniper rifle, a sawed-off shotgun, and a map with the White House circled on it, and a second time when he walked near the White House fence with a hatchet in his waistband.
On Friday, Gonzalez was briefly in the White House itself.
Nevertheless, the president had nothing but praise for the agency responsible for his security. "The Secret Service does a great job," Obama said during an Oval Office meeting Monday. "I'm grateful for all the sacrifices they make on my behalf and on my family's behalf."
White House spokesman Josh Earnest added that the president has "complete confidence" in the Secret Service.
Despite all that positive talk, it appears something is very, very wrong with the Secret Service.
After the incident, the organization began to leak proposals for some major security changes around the White House. Some reports suggested the Secret Service would clear the area around the current White House fence and erect another barrier farther out. That would presumably make it impossible for a fence jumper make a long run to the White House door without being caught.
But the key question arising from Friday's incident is not whether the White House perimeter should be expanded, but why Secret Service agents did not act more quickly when Gonzalez jumped the fence and began running toward the mansion. Why was no agent able to catch him outside? Why did agents not release the dogs that are trained to stop intruders? And why did agents not lock the White House door once the perimeter had been breached?
Those were human failures, not design shortcomings. And to some members of Congress, those human failures have been going on for quite a while at the Secret Service.
Calling the breach "totally unacceptable" and expressing amazement that the White House door was open, Republican Rep. Jason Chaffetz of Utah, a member of the House Homeland Security Committee, hinted there is more trouble than the public knows about. "This is not the first time Secret Service has shown too much vulnerability," Chaffetz tweeted after the incident. "There are other unreported incidents. I will continue to push."
"Been investigating the Secret Service for some time," Chaffetz continued. "Frustrating. Good men and women but HUGE question marks for their leadership." Lawmakers could hold a hearing on the matter soon.
House Intelligence Committee chairman Mike Rogers, a former FBI agent, also believes the Secret Service's problems go deeper than a new fence. In an interview Sunday, Rogers suggested that a guard's attention can wane when he is stationed in one place for long periods of time — a lapse that cannot be tolerated when the president's security is involved.
"It happens frequently in other places where there are static security forces," Rogers told CBS. "And it's just a matter of the Secret Service upping their game to make sure that they can maintain that every detail matters. A door locked, a quick reaction when somebody hits the fence and over the gate. I think they're going to have to reinstate some of these ongoing checks ... self-audits on their security."
Secret Service director Julia Pierson, appointed last year by President Obama to clean up the agency after the 2012 Colombia prostitution scandal, is starting an investigation. Pierson's boss, Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson, is trying to calm things down while asking for time to look into the incident.
"I encourage all of us to not rush to judgment about the event and not second-guess the judgment of security officers who had only seconds to act, until all the facts are in," Johnson said in a statement Monday.
But members of Congress are right to express deep concern. The Secret Service knew about Omar Gonzalez, who might as well have carried a sign saying "I AM A THREAT TO THE PRESIDENT." And yet he made it through the White House door.
It's not enough for the president and his aides to express confidence. They need to find out what is wrong with the Secret Service and fix it, fast.
Well hell look at the progress we have made.
Went from the White House being an open house to several square blocks of Washington DC being a war zone.
Well done.
Low morale, no respect for the President.
Nice to see the government talking about the effectiveness of a double fence in keeping out illegals.
He was an obvious plant (astroturf) like Hill and Billory did for some speeches. They would laugh at planted turf hecklers instead of turning red, wagging fingers and wetting their pants.
Hey, the jumper’s name is Omar Gonzalez. He was just trying to plant a big sloppy kiss on the Bamster - he’s a MuzMex.
“The Secret Service does a great job...I’m grateful for all the sacrifices they make on my behalf and on my family’s behalf.”
Spoken like a first-class idiot.
Do you think they were holding fire because they have been ordered not to shoot?
What would happen if suddenly 20 or 30 terrorists managed to jump the fence at one time? Would the SS try to tackle them?
Anyone know the background of julia pearson, the SS head appointed by Clown Prince nobama? Is she a political? Is she incompetent? Has she been fired?
They also have dogs trained to intercept intruders.
The dogs were not released.
What about the rooftop snipers? Not even a warning shot.
And a guy with the last name of Gonzalez, but first name Omar. Yes, that is a Spanish first name alrighty.
But walls do!
That’s a big “perhaps”....
dingdingding
You get the documentary “Olympus Has Fallen”.
Gonzalez only jumped the fence out of love!!!
There are a lot of people in both Spain and South America who have names like Omar. Remember that a good portion of Spain was under Moorish control for a couple hundred years.
Said he just wanted to warn the president that the sky was about to fall.
Omar is a very common first name among Latin Americans; this guy was Puerto Rican born, had served two hitches in the US military and had PTSD, although there was some suggestion that he had had mental problems even before that. His wife divorced him because she couldn’t stand his paranoia and the fact that he talked to himself, although he didn’t appear to be violent. He claimed that he came to the WH because he wanted to warn Obama that the “environment was collapsing.”
So this has nothing to do with Islam, nothing to do with Hispanics, and actually, nothing to do with environmentalists. The guy was just a nut.
As for how he got that close, I’d say morale in the SS is probably at rock bottom and I’m sure a lot of their better people have probably taken early retirement or anything to get away from Obama’s poisonous atmosphere.
The best and most expeditious remedy would be for the President to appoint a select committee composed of qualified and security cleared experts to review the Secret Service and make recommendations for improvement. The committee's mandate should provide that recommendations be made both on an ongoing basis and in a final report.
Even Obama ought to see the need for and wisdom of this approach and to consult with Congress in carrying it out.
I think it started with the Columbian prostititon scandal. They got rid of a lot of the white guys.
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