The Secret Service, Presidents, and Me

CSPAN aired an interview this morning with Ronald Kessler about his recent book: In The President's Secret Service. I will give you a few "bites" from the interview.

1. The Secret Service.

It sounded as though Mr Kessler feels that the management of the Secret Service is too old fashioned to run such an important function.

The first female agents appeared in 1971 and there now are over 300. The public doesn't see many of them, because it might be too distracting to see women hovering around the President as he speaks. Female agents watched over President Bush' daughters and wore jeans so they would look like teenagers.

Secret Service agents know that they must protect the President and his family at all times and even take assassins' bullets aimed at their charges.

I was interviewed for a job with the Secret Service. I'll mention that in part 3 of this entry.

2. The Presidents (and the Secret Service)

These are some items that the author mentioned about the Presidents and their interaction with their protectors that I found interesting:

George W. Bush' first Secret Service name was "Tumbler"... however, he had it changed to "Trailblazer" instead, because he thought that "Tumbler" was too related to drinking.

Dick Cheney had his name changed to "Angler" because he liked to fish. (I think it is more appropriate because of the word's other meaning.)

President Carter refused to even say "Hello" to his protectors. In fact, it sounded to me that he was rather "nasty" to them. Supposedly, to look more Presidential, he carried an empty brief case when he went on trips.

Presidents Reagan, Bush (x2), Clinton and Obama have all been friendly to their protectors and sometimes Secret Service guys have been invited to private functions at the White House.

Jenna Bush often raced her car off at high speeds to escape her protectors.

Threats to President Obama are up 400% since he took office and most of them are based on race.

President Johnson liked to parade around naked in front of family, friends and protectors. He also was known to urinate in front of female interviewers.

President Kennedy opted not to use a bubble top car in Dallas because the bubble was not completely bullet-proof. However, it could have at least deflected a bullet.

President Lincoln wanted no protection at all, even though the Civil War was raging. What would have happened if he had allowed agents to watch over him?

3. My Connection to the Secret Service

After my graduation from Boston University, a job with the National Security Agency fell through and I applied for a job with the Secret Service. I passed a test and was later interviewed by two guys from that Office. They spent a long time with me, and at what I thought was the end, they welcomed me into the Government. However, just as I was about to leave, one of them told me to wait and said that they had forgotten to ask me one question.

The question was: Have you ever done anything you are ashamed of?

One of my many jobs while I went to Boston University was with a telemarketing firm, where a group of us went through the Boston phone book calling people with offers of special coupons. After we talked on the phone, we would visit the people and sell them coupon booklets. Some of the people I visited were disabled and could not take advantage of the coupons, which, for the most part were "come ons". I became disgusted with the job and quit.

I told the Secret Service guys this and they left the room for thirty minutes to discuss my answer. When they came back, they said that based on my answer they could not offer me the job. I have always wondered what kind of career I would have had if I had become one of their agents.

My only other interface with the Secret Service was a couple of years ago when Elaine and I went on a visit to the White House. Because of a knee operation, Elaine had to use a White House wheel chair. Since the wheel chair could not manage the high stairs, and because the main elevator was loaded, an agent allowed us to go to the next floor by using an elevator in the kitchen... this was not normally allowed. It was quite an experience to see how the chefs worked and I'm sure they thought that we were visiting dignitaries.

Later in the tour, I happened to glance out one of the windows to see a group of nattily dressed Secret Service guys wrestling a scruffy looking interloper to the ground. Very interesting.

Once, when President Johnson visited the Social Security Administration in Woodlawn, the whole staff relocated to the outside where we sat in wooden chairs in the middle of dirt lanes that had been quickly painted green to look like grass. When the President arrived, he was surrounded by what seemed to be hundreds of Secret Service guys. They all appeared to be six feet nine and 300 pounds and all (every single one of them) wore grouchy looks and as a disguise each had a big bright yellow flower sticking through the lapel of their black suit. (How the hell would I have ever fit into that group?)

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