Who Throws a Shoe?

On Sunday, President Bush was holding a press conference in Iraq with Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, when a journalist from the audience sprang to his feet and hurled a shoe at the President. Not just one shoe, but he threw the other at President Bush. As I sit here and watch replays of the video on Fox News, there is one glaringly disturbing thing that the video illustrates to me. Why was the reaction time of the Secret Service Agents in the room so delayed that a second shoe was allowed to be thrown?

Currently on Fox News, there is a Secret Service Expert making excuses for the delay. He is actually saying that egos may have come into play and that because the Secret Service may have viewed the event as a secure area. I am not a Secret Service Expert by any means, but I have been involved in some security training and self defense tactical training in my younger years. And I can tell you without a shadow of a doubt, had I been the man responsible for the security of an individual and that happened while I was on watch and my response been that delayed, I would have been "relieved of my contractual obligations" on the spot.

Now, hypothetically speaking, what if there had been some type of sharpened edge to the shoes? And President Bush had not been proficient at dodge ball. Let's not forget that a few years ago there was a man on a plane that had bombs built into his shoes. And due, mostly to his inability to light a lighter, he was unable to ignite the bomb and blow the plane up. So, shoe technology has grown over the years.

I am not making light of the situation, really I'm not. This is a serious breach in the protocol of the Secret Service and all agents involved in the issue should be brought in and reevaluated before President-elect Obama takes office. If you recall during the Presidential election, there were two men that were arrested for planning an attack to kill Mr. Obama. I told several friends after that incident, "The ones you have to worry about are the ones that aren't bragging about it to their drinking buddies." There are some very dangerous people out there in the world. And they are highly trained and sophisticated, believe me. The attacks in Mumbai are an example of how a few trained men with technology can cause havoc and take many innocent lives in the process.

A shoe is not a deadly weapon, but the human mind can be and has been.