If the VP’s Secret Service detail feel someone is close enough to the VP to constitute a threat, they should obviously intervene. But that doesn’t mean they should arrest the guy for assault or harrassment. They should just ask him to step back, and require him to by force should he not comply. Just as (for example) a policeman might do with a gawking bystander at a crime scene. If the events transpired as described in the story, they might have been justified in pulling him aside after he approached Cheney, but any arrest at all was completely out of line.
Note also that, if the events transpired as the arrested guy says they did, Cheney was actually “walking through the area shaking hands” (emphasis added). Now, if he and the SS were letting the unwashed masses get close enough to shake hands with the Veep, they surely should have been able to tolerate somebody standing two feet away and making a critical comment.
Yes, you want to keep an eye on somebody who expresses hostile sentiments of any kind, in case they’re a nutter about to go berserk, but I don’t see that any physical restraint at all was warranted in this case. Anyway, if somebody’s really planning to assault the Veep in public, they’re not gonna be stupid enough to stand there and insult him; they’re going to pretend to be his biggest fan until they get close enough to shake his hand, and then: powie.
The hell?! Isn’t the SS agent supposed to know whether or not somebody assaulted the public figure he’s supposed to be guarding? If the guy had actually assaulted Cheney, wouldn’t he be dead, or at least severely wounded, the next second? Was there any point at all to this question, or has this SS fellow just been on Cheney duty too long and caught a bad case of aggravated assholishness from proximity to him?
If the events are as reported, I’m glad that the guy in question is suing the agent who arrested him, and I think that if the agent is guilty of the alleged actions then the sentencing judge ought to rip him a new one for being such a jackbooted thug.
Can one sue for wrongful arrest without having the charges pressed?
By criticizing Cheney, this man was clearly giving aid and comfort to our enemies in a time of war. And that, my friends, is treason! (See how easy it is to think like an idiot.)
Am I the only one disheartened to know that actual crowds of American people are willing to shake hands with this man?
Tris
Seems like this scenario has happened before:
Why on earth did the man add the qualifier, “in Iraq”?
Sailboat
And that was wrong too-what’s your point?
I found the lack of contemporary criticism of Mr. Clinton’s nearly identical actions from leftists/liberals/progressives to be remarkable by its absence.
Where were the references to Nazi Stormtroopers and Senator Palpatine (heh) then?
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAnd away we go with “Clinton did it too! Hypocrites!” :rolleyes:
Certain posters around here, you can set your metaphorical thread-shitting watch by them.
Now observe how our “Clinton bad too! Liberals all hypocrites!” yammerhead does its best to shove the thread down an irrelevant sidetrack. A little baiting here, a bit of trollery there, some faux-innocent “but I’m just point out…” disingenuity, and before you know it, nobody’s discussing the original issue, they’re all rehashing ancient arguments with the poker of horseshit-daubed pointy sticks.
But that’s the modus operandi of folks whose moral compass wouldn’t recognize true north if it bit them.
Well, considering that that event occurred 3 years before the SDMB formed, I doubt you’ll find much contemporary flaming on here…and as far as other media at the time, good luck doing a comprehensive survey of pundits from that era to find out if he was or was not criticized by all sides. That is, I doubt the point can be proved or disproved.
Both incidents are reprehensible and indefensible IMO.
I am really getting fed up with this crap.
Who wants to dress up as Native Americans and throw some Dibold voting machines in the bay?
I don’t believe the boards existed then. If you know a way to post a rant to a non-existant board, please, let us know.
:dubious:
Lest anyone be taken in by this attempted tu quoque (I’m getting tired of that phrase too but the’re flying around like mosquitos these days), that woman was arrested by the local police, not by the SS and not by the request of Bill Clinton. She was not arrested for criticizing Clinton but for violating a local ordinance banning profanity in public (she was shouting obscenities in the presence of children).
Context might be the key. There probably would have been more if Clinton had:
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stood down when faced with imminent terrorist threat
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used confusion and fear resulting from massive terrorist attack to consolidate political power and push through legislation curtailing civil liberties
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used same fear, plus hatred toward a minority population, to win reelection
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stood down just before capturing the mastermind of terrorist attack
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gotten drunk and shot his friend in the face (I know what you’re thinking, but Clinton was sober when he and Hill murdered Vince Foster. They may have taken nips off a flask while they dragged Foster’s body under cloak of night into a nearby park. Pat Robertson could tell you for sure)
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gone to war against another country, nearly unilaterally, against the protests of most of the civilized world, on false pretenses–resulting in tens of thousands dead, civil war and chaos with no end in sight
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spied on innocent Americans, without warrant
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set up secret prisons, where suspects are assumed guilty and held indefinitely without charge or trial
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blamed his predecessor for his failures
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conducted town hall meetings with prescreened audiences willing to commit, in writing, to party loyalty
That doesn’t even include Katrina or the energy companies, because in fairness that’s more of a Senator Palpatine thing, and we didn’t really know who he was yet.
Of course, Clinton was frequently accused of wagging the dog, lying about an affair with an intern and getting an expensive haircut. So, yeah, Clinton was a really bad guy, too.
Here in the UK, an elderly man was dragged out of a political meeting for protesting at a Government politician.
‘The “debacle” came during Jack Straw’s conference address on Wednesday. When Straw told delegates: “We are in Iraq for one reason only – to help the elected Iraqi government build a secure, democratic and stable nation.” Straw also compared Iraq to Germany after the second world war, when it had taken four years before elections were held in West Germany.
Wolfgang claims he shouted a single word of dissent – “nonsense” – at Straw, before two stewards, neither wearing the official-looking luminous yellow jacket worn by others throughout the enclosed conference security zone, grabbed the octogenarian.
Labour chairman Ian McCartney initially insisted that Wolfgang had been persistently interrupting Straw, and had been warned to temper his protest before being thrown out and later detained by police using powers under the Prevention of Terrorism Act.’
http://www.sundayherald.com/print52043
Prevention of Terrrorism Act applies, huh?
Thank you so much, President Bush. :rolleyes:
Sorry, but that’s just pathetic. Everyone knows what the correct response for a deputy president/prime minister should be when a critic gets too close, as demonstrated here.
gee, um, sorry 'bout that. Kind of the ultimate ‘white elephant’ gift from us to uk.