Over Reacting?

Just look at this photograph:


This is just one of the vehicles in a caravan taking Obama to his gym.

The guy has an automatic rifle with laser pointer and sniper scope, aiming out the back window of his SUV, down an American street in the direction of the automobiles following behind. He may be impressing a few easy-to-scare bystanders, but a serious assassin would only be amused at this grandstanding.

It's more than a bit scary, this overreaction to a possible assassination attempt. Any real attempt would simply bypass these already compromised and highly visible "guards" and take out Obama just like Kennedy was taken out, who was also surrounded by the same sort of heavily-armed, steely eyed, serious-looking young dudes who believed they were actually protecting the president. We all know how that worked out.

Same with Reagan, except Reagan was lucky. His shooter was armed with a puny little .22 pistol, not a 50 caliber sniper scoped rifle with a 3 mile plus range. Keep in mind, that it was James Brady - not any of those highly trained and heavily armed bodyguards - that saved Reagan, by shielding him with his own body. Brady paid a very heavy price for doing someone else's job.

These guys are just like the police... They can only respond after something has happened, so what's with the automatic weapon aimed out the window?

Big question... why do they feel it necessary to act this way? Is Obama really is serious danger?

They must think so. And if they really do think that, they should have Obama in a Bradley armored personnel carrier, not just another lightly armored but cool black SUV. After all, just one RPG into that really cool black paint job and it's all over.

These guys - and their predecessors - never saved a single president. So why do we see them driving around with automatic weapons shoved out the windows?

They must think that are "preventing" any attempt. Sounds good, a nice TV sound bite sort of thing. But try to prove you prevented something that didn't happen.

When push comes to shove, these guys have failed 100% of the time when a president really needed them. Not a good track record at all.

So let's keep the damned assault rifles down on the floor until you actually need to use them.