(Presidential Dog Bo, accompanied by his walker, four Secret Services Agents, a Navy Lieutenant, the Presidential basketballs and assorted luggage, arrive at Martha’s Vineyard via the new MV-22 Osprey flown by US Marine Presidential Support Squadron HMX-1).
I got all the answers this morning.
Well, not ALL the answers, but a couple good ones, but of course the answers just cause more questions. I wish I had a good recipe for you, but it is just that sort of morning.
I was listening to WTOP this morning- the mindless traffic-and-weather-on-the-eights outlet- rather than KRCC, the public radio outlet in Colorado Springs, which plugs me into the BBC in their early morning hours. With everyone, including the first family on vacation, I thought it might be fun to listen to the local traffic, since we have bands of rain coming through, and it makes me feel good that I am already well inside the Beltway and able to do anything I need to do without traffic imposing on my movements.
Anyway, I-66 was the topic of interest this morning, early. An personal injury accident was referenced that had closed the right two lanes off the eastbound concrete, just at the place where the road narrows from four lanes to three, except for rush hour, when the shoulder is permitted to be used for through travel.
Apparently a man was on foot on the Interstate, and was struck and killed just before five AM. That is the time I used to be on the road, heading in to the Pentagon to try to secure a decent parking space. I don’t know more about the accident, except how surreal it must have been to be ambling along in the darkness and then transition to eternity on the bumper of a commuter doing seventy miles and hour.
Apparently whoever hit him did not stop to render aid.
I wondered who it was, and how they came to be afoot in that place. Was it a drunk, coming back from somewhere and not realizing there would be high-speed traffic on what appears to be the shoulder of the road? A motorist walking away from a disabled vehicle?
It is amazing how one individual problem can cause the alleged capital of the Free World tie itself completely in knots.
As I said, I do not know the answers, only the consequences, which is that the vast road is snarled for twenty miles back out past Manassas, and that could be me, attempting to get to Blue Arlington from Red Culpeper. Life is a very strange thing, isn’t it, and disturbingly finite.
Oh, I mentioned that aside from that mystery, some of the other great questions have been answered. I will save you the effort of having to listen to weather-and-traffic on the eights to divine the news:
Yes, Bo the Presidential Dog got a lift to Martha’s Vineyard on a brand new V-22 Osprey tilt-rotor aircraft. It was not a wasted trip, and certainly not just for the dog. The Dog-walker was along, plus four secret service agents, a Navy Lieutenant, and the Presidential basketballs. I could only count eight, but it has been a while since I did detailed imagery mensuration.
I am not going to be one of those who clucks about the President taking a $100 million trip to Africa for no discernable national security purpose. I am sure there were pressing issues there, and the first family needs a break from travel by traveling. I support Bo’s traveling independently, too.
Imagine if everyone was on the same plane and something happened?
Which is of concern, since another bit of information is floating around this morning. I was not present that night in Benghazi, when the reaction to that amateur video caused a heavily-armed jihadi group…oh, wait, I am getting this all mixed up with the initial response to the murder of a US Ambassador, and then the revelations that there were 40-odd CIA officers doing something in the annex to the Consulate.
It was all a long time ago, as Mr. Carney reminds us all the time.
Still, it appears to be one of the things that has presumptive Presidential candidates and their pals a little nervous, and conducting weekly polygraphs on people who actually know what was going on.
It is all sort of queer. My suspicion from the git-go was that there was an active operation to get deposed-dictator Muammar Qaddafy’s arsenal out of Libya before it fell into the hands of the crazies.
There is one likely destination where they could have been useful, wink wink, and that of course is the other crazy bunch of rebels, the Syrian Opposition. They are the only ones who could possibly make Bashir al Assad look reasonable. Given the Administration’s policy in favor of them, I have no idea why that would be such a deep dark secret, but the word floating around this morning is that the guys who took the consulate, murdered four Americans, and are still at large also managed to get away with a few hundred man-portable surface-to-air missiles.
That would be sort of bad, you know? But on the other hand, if that were true, would the Secret Service let the dog fly on his own?
Sometimes the more you know, the more confused you get.
Copyright 2013 Vic Socotra
www.vicsocotra.com
Twitter: @jayare303