"Dave S" wrote in message
ink.net...
I was wondering at what point secret service kicked in for potential
candidates.. wouldnt that be the epitome of irony...


The Secret Service sends details to each of the likely candidates' homes and
moves in on the nominee the moment the vote is cast, setting up guards and
installing security devices. The nominee is likely to be at the convention,
so he will be surrounded by the SS detail already on station there. The
nominee will not be able to take one step toward the podium to make his
acceptance speech without his bodyguards. The TFR will already be in place
around the convention center and will have been there since before the start
of the convention.

There seems to be this huge misunderstanding that Presidents or candidates
cannot visit airshows without shutting the place down. In fact, they do go
to these events and the Secret Service negotiates security precautions with
the FAA. OSH might be tricky, though. Many aircraft going to OSH are
actually landing at nearby fields. A lot of them have no transponder or
radio, or even any electrical system of any kind. If Kerry or Bush were to
attend an event of this nature it would be over the most vehement objections
of the Secret Service.

If the SS had its way, candidates would only be allowed to campaign from
secure rooms via television feeds with no reporters or anyone else present.
The President would spend his entire career in a sealed box. The Mall and
Capitol Hill would become like Beijing's Forbidden City, with only security
and absolutely essential personnel allowed on the grounds. The Secret
Service understands that this is never going to happen, so they constantly
are negotiating their need for security against the President's need to meet
the public.

Although I voted for him, I have to say that Harry Browne is an idiot. He
believes that the Secret Service is unnecessary and that there would be no
terrorist attacks if the US did not interfere in other countries' affairs.
If government were smaller and less powerful, he believes, then the
President would not be a target for assassins. This is demonstrably stupid.
The government was much smaller and less powerful than what even Browne
advocates when Lincoln was assassinated. I somehow suspect that the United
States would have its foreign enemies no matter what it did.