No, I don’t want to congratulate him for anything, I just want to shake his hand. Maybe exchange brief pleasantries, and have that experience to relate to future generations.
I don’t have the bread to go to a big fundraising dinner, but I am willing to undergo any sort of security check. So, what’s my best plan for making that happen?
Just think: In the course of a year, the POTUS probably shakes hands with 500-1,000 different people. (No cite, just a wild guess.) Assuming 8 years of service, that’s 4,000-8,000 people, out of a US population of 300 million. So…my chances are less than one in 35,000???
Might be possible also to calculate how many people will shake his hand post-presidency.
Mods, is this too factual, assuming there’s a set procedure for shaking the President’s hand? Should we move this to GQ?
That is a way, way low guess. I shook hands with Bill Clinton twice in one day and he probably shook the hands of hundreds of people that day alone. Your best bet is to go to the smallest reelection campaign venues you can find when the next campaign kicks into full gear and try that. If future presidents count, head to New Hampshire to greet the top Republican candidates. It is easy to meet them in New Hampshire because it is a low population state with lots of small towns but it hosts one of the earliest primaries and serves as a campaign test ground.
Work in the kitchen of a place hosting an event attended by a President; they always come in through the kitchen. That’s how my wife shook Bill Clinton’s hand.
I was leaving my office building to go get a coffee and ran straight into Prime Minister Chrétien, shaking hands with anyone on the street within range. Before I realised what was happening, I’d shaken hands with him. It was a bit odd, but I guess that’s how experienced politicians do it.
I went to a speech/rally in Seattle during his re-election campaign in '96. It was outdoors, in Seattle. I found a good spot to watch from, and then noticed there was a row of crowd-control barriers just a few feet away. About 8 feet beyond those, there was a concrete railing and a dropoff down to the next street. Why block off a narrow strip of sidewalk like that? After the speech, the President worked the line, shaking hands.
That’s the difference between live campaigning and the soundbites on the news.
It’s easy when they’re ex-presidents. Met Bush the First when I was singing with my college choir at an American Cancer Society event. So, pick a cause they like.
I drove a car in a motorcade for George H.W. Bush in 1991. I shook hands with Bill Clinton in 1992 right before the election - this was while holding a sign somewhat uncomplimentary of him.
I volunteered for the 2005 inaugural and saw Bush speak the night before the inauguration - this was a bitterly cold and snowy night and attendance was low.
Being a mere peon, your best bet to go to a campaign rally and show up early enough to get a spot right in front of the podium so you can catch him after the speech.
I should also add that a lot of it is luck of draw too. I went to an Obama rally in 2008, showed up six hours early and still ended up about 10 rows back (which actually wasn’t too bad, considering there were 20,000 people in attendance.
Part of the reason for that is that when they set up the metal detectors at the gate, they break up the line near the front into smaller lines of about 20. And some of those lines move slower than others, so even if you’re near the front, there a good chance that someone who was standing 100 spaces behind you will get in first.
Become a cop and make friends with people who are tasked with guarding the President when he visits your state. My roommate in college is a cop, and via his aunt, who is a muckety-muck in the FDLE, he got to be in Bush’s motorcade twice when he was visiting Florida.
Yea, I went to a campaign event for Kerry/Edwards (who obviously didn’t end up President, but same idea) in 2004 and they both walked along the line of people waiting to get in to shake hands. They spent a good chunk of time doing it, so I imagine several hundred people shook their hands in that one event.
That said, I suspect the Secret Service is a little more cautious about letting a sitting Prez running for a second term run around with the plebs then they are with Presidential Candidates who aren’t Prez yet, so you might have a harder time shaking Obama’s hand this way 2012 then you would’ve shaking Candidate Obama’s in 2008.
I shook Obama’s hand at a speech for the Iowa caucuses in 2007 (I didn’t like him all that much, but you could feel the force of his personality when he focused on you), and I also met Hilary at a rally and got a picture with her.