M-1s without bolts at the Inauguration? This does not seem to have been the usual thing until the most recent ceremony.
What, suddenly we're Egypt?
You keep it classy, Mr. Obama -- or whoever it was that decided the armed forces of this country had better not be trusted with intact ceremonial rifles around the President.
I keep invoking Richard M. Nixon -- another President who neither liked nor much trusted the American people (and whose thoughts on private ownership of firearms* ran parallel those of the current Occupant of 1600 Penna.) -- but the level of paranoid distrust seen here makes Tricky Dick look like a babe in the woods, a piker with a clumsy PR team.
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* It's so cute that some antis assume that if a well-known Republican, like Presidents Nixon and Regan, can be shown to have said something favoring gun control at some point in their careers, Second Amendment supporters will somehow be converted or silenced by it. Wrong; it doesn't work that way -- and what does it say about the people who think it will?
During Johnson's visit to Viet Nam, they lined up marines and soliders shoulder to shoulder for his drive by pictures.
ReplyDeleteNot a military person had a single round of ammo for the weapons showing.
...But did they yank the bolts, too? I'm doubtful the troops carrying rifles at such ceremonies have ammo for 'em on-hand (the Secret Service would flip out!), but at lest they carried intact rifles until now.
ReplyDeleteI would say "disgusting" but I've used that word so much lately, I'm giving it all a break and going to the range instead.
ReplyDeleteSimply pathetic... Nothing else to be said.
ReplyDeleteSame guy who didn't trust Middies with swords at an Annapolis graduation.
ReplyDeleteLike they teach 'em enough about swords for them to go all Samurai on someone...
This also happened in 2008, as your roomie noted at the time.
ReplyDeleteWhen W. visited Camp As Saliyah Qatar in 2003 right after the invasion of Iraq (when he was riding high I may add) we had to not just pull bolts, but to lock up our rifles in a CONEX.
ReplyDeleteThis has a lot more to do with the USSS than POTUS I would imagine.
If he anticipated any loyalty from future troops, it's best to say he crapped his pants. I doubt many would walk across the street to pee on him, if he was on fire.
ReplyDeleteThis, from my friend the former Marine:
ReplyDeleteWhen GH Bush came to Somalia they had us do the same thing, in Somalia. I think it's SOP.
I had a SAW, I had to take the barrel off.
So, in keeping with George in KS, yeah, sounds like SOP.
Apparently the Secret Service has been requiring this since Regans day.
ReplyDeleteDon't want what happened in Egypt to happen here ya know....
...Except please see source, this appears to be the first time they're had to remove the entire bolt assembly of the guns carried by military personnel in the Inaugural parade.
ReplyDeleteMakin' 'em remove the firing pin, ensuring there's no live ammo, okay, we don't want Corporal Once-In-A-Lifetime to do some nervous trigger-clench and send off a round; but enuring the rifles are *visibly* defanged bespeaks a serious lack of trust. Probably on the part of the USSS, but who do they work for?
It's just sucky, a visible mark of the decline of trust between the elected and the electorate and I don't expect it to be rolled back by the next poor sap who gets stuck with the job, no matter what his party.
...If there is a next POTUS of all 50 or 51 states....
I have run into the Secret Service thinking only they stand ready to defend the only person in America worth taking a bullet for... they don't have a clue. Do they really think only Terrorists know how to take out large areas of people? I am with keeping our Armed Forces fully armed and capable. If you don't trust them, leave them far away - oh, they do don't they?
ReplyDeleteRemember the story when McCain was visiting a Gun Show and the SS had a Hissy?
ReplyDeleteIn your footnote, you noted the antis trying an "appeal to authority" logical fallacy, and wondered what it says about them. Not being able to pass up the chance to shoot fish in barrels, I'll say that the typical anti is so uncomfortable with the concept of everyone having freedom of choice/action/movement/whatever that they long for all sorts of control. It prevents them from succumbing to their own secret failings, which they usually project on others. And since authority is so important to them to guide what they should do and believe, they (again) project that desire-to-be-controlled onto us.
ReplyDelete"This has a lot more to do with the USSS than POTUS I would imagine."
ReplyDeleteThis.