4um: As Obama's star rises, fears for his safety Memories of 1968 assassinations evoked

Title: As Obama's star rises, fears for his safety Memories of 1968 assassinations evoked
Source: International Herald Tribune
URL Source: [None]
Published: Feb 26, 2008
Author: International Herald Tribune
Post Date: 2008-05-09 15:09:50 by Jethro Tull
Keywords: None
Views: 2487
Comments: 208

As Obama's star rises, fears for his safety Memories of 1968 assassinations evoked

International Herald Tribune

02-26-2008

As Obama's star rises, fears for his safety Memories of 1968 assassinations evoked
Byline: Jeff Zeleny The New York Times Media Group
Edition: 1
Section: NEWS

DALLAS --

There is a hushed worry on the minds of many supporters of Senator Barack Obama, echoing in conversations from state to state, rally to rally: Will he be safe?

In Colorado, two sisters say they pray daily for his safety. In New Mexico, a daughter says she persuaded her mother to still vote for Obama, even though the mother feared that winning would put him in danger. And at a rally here, a woman expressed worries that a message of hope and change, in addition to his race, made him more vulnerable to violence.
"I've got the best protection in the world," Obama, of Illinois, said in an interview, reprising a line he tells supporters who raise the issue with him. "So stop worrying."

Yet worry they do, with the spring of 1968 seared into their memories, when the Reverend Martin Luther King Jr. and Senator Robert Kennedy were assassinated in a span of two months.

Obama was 6 at the time, and like many of his admirers, he has only read about the violence that traumatized and polarized the nation. But those recollections and images are often invoked by older voters, who watch his candidacy with fascination, as well as an uneasy air of apprehension, as Democrats inch closer to selecting their nominee.

Obama has had Secret Service agents surrounding him since May 3, the earliest a candidate has ever been provided protection. (He reluctantly gave in to the insistent urging of Senator Richard Durbin, Democrat of Illinois, and others in Congress.) As his rallies have swelled in size, his security has increased, close to rivaling that given to a sitting president.

His wife, Michelle Obama, voiced concerns about his safety before he was elected to the Senate. Three years ago, she said she dreaded the day her husband received Secret Service protection, because it would mean serious threats had been made against him.

Among friends and advisers, danger is something Obama rarely mentions.

"It's not something that I'm spending time thinking about day to day," said Obama, who has been given the Secret Service nickname Renegade, a way for agents to quickly identify him. "I made a decision to get into this race. I think anybody who decides to run for president recognizes that there are some risks involved, just like there are risks in anything."

Not long ago, his advisers worried that some black voters might not support his candidacy out of a fierce desire to protect him. It was a particular concern in South Carolina, but Obama said he believed the worry was also rooted in "a fear of failure."

Now that he has won a string of primaries and caucuses in all corners of the country and built a coalition of black and white voters, failure would seem to be less of an issue. The fears, however, remain.

Representative Bennie Thompson, a Mississippi Democrat and chairman of the House Homeland Security Committee, raised concerns in a letter in January to officials who oversee the Secret Service. Obama was already receiving protection, but Thompson said the intense interest in the election had prompted him to make sure that Obama and the other candidates were offered adequate security.

"The national and international profile of Sen. Barack Obama gives rise to unique challenges that merit special concern," Thompson wrote. "As an African-American who was witness to some of this nation's most shameful days during the civil rights movement, I know personally that the hatred of some of our fellow citizens can lead to heinous acts of violence. We need only to look to the assassinations of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and 1968 presidential candidate Robert Kennedy as examples."

In an interview, Thompson declined to elaborate on any specific threats that had come to the attention of his committee or the authorities. He said he wrote the letter to the Homeland Security Department without discussing it with Obama, whom he has endorsed.

"His candidacy is so unique to this country and so important that the last thing you would want is for him not to have the opportunity to fulfill the role of a potential presidential nominee," Thompson said. "It's out of an abundance of caution that I wrote the letter, rather than keep our fingers crossed and pray."

Before Obama decided to run for president, he discussed his safety with his family. His campaign employed a team of private security guards before he was placed under Secret Service protection. Since then, he has grown fond of the agents who surround him, inviting them to watch the Super Bowl at his home in Chicago and playing basketball with them on the days he awaits the results of an election.

Obama was reluctant to speak about his security or the period in American history that is often raised, without prompting, by voters who are interviewed at his campaign events. Mentions of the fate that befell President John F. Kennedy and Robert Kennedy only increased after Obama was joined on the campaign trail by Caroline Kennedy and Senator Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts.

"I'm pretty familiar with the history," Obama said. "Obviously, it was an incredible national trauma, but neither Bobby Kennedy nor Martin Luther King had Secret Service protection."

Indeed, the assassination of Kennedy in 1968 prompted Congress to pass a law authorizing protection of major presidential and vice presidential candidates. In this campaign, Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton of New York has had Secret Service protection from the beginning because she is a former first lady. None of the other candidates accepted it during their primary campaigns.

Gerald Posner, author of books on the assassinations of John Kennedy and King, said he did not believe that Obama was under a significantly higher risk than President George W. Bush or Hillary Clinton. The fears are more openly discussed, he said, because he is the first black candidate to come this close to winning a major party's presidential nomination.

"Barack scares those of us who think of the possibility of an assassination in a different way," Posner said. "He represents so much hope and change. That is exactly what was taken away from us in the 1960s."

The nation would be better off if he and his fellow socialists no longer graced this planet.

Anyone who believes our tax dollars should go to help anyone else any where in the world is a commie, so don't tell me they don't exist. A number of them exist on this thread.

There, how does it feel to be honest? Yes, most Americans are communists now, and most representatives and judges as well.

It sucks. I can't wait for this socialist republic to collapse just like the Soviet Union. Only I hope the collapse is much more catastrophic and that we see a major thinning of the communist herd.

That's just the way Hitler talked (in private) about Germany in his last weeks in power.

I wasn't there. I've read a few biographies, and memoirs (by people like Traudl Junge and Henriette von Schirach who were there). Maybe you should inform yourself too.

What I am curious about though, is why Oxford produces so many commies? Is that a commie institution?

Oxford has the reputation of being the more conservative of the two ancient universities of England. Looking back, I can think of one person I knew there that called himself a Marxist.

But just who are these numerous Communist graduates of Oxford that you have in mind?

Communists rarely admit being such. I think they would rather admit to being homosexual, or to being a porn producer, or even a drug dealer, rather than admit they are commies.

Whereas the people who are hinting broadly here about the idea of assassinating a leading candidate for the presidency are real true Americans.

It is time for me to address the issue of "free speech" on Freedom4um. My free speech means that I have 100% control over what I say and everyone else has 0% control over what I say. Now, I understand that there are consequences to exercising my right to free speech, but I still retain 100% control.

Free speech means that I have a right to express or spew thoughts and words of preference, love, hate, or anything with which another may disagree. That said, the rules or policies of this forum, which is my private property (see this forum's Mission Statement), are that members can exercise free speech as long as they (1) do not make a specific threat against an identifiable person or target, (2) earnestly debate or discuss the relevant issues that are part and parcel of this forum's reason-to-be. Let me remind you that these are rules for this forum and, as such, do not necessarily apply off of this forum, as public laws should, in most cases, be even less restrictive than private property rules and regulations.

Again, free speech on this forum means that people can express their love or hatred for anyone, any group, any race, any culture, or any thing, as long as they adhere to the two contingencies listed above. Everyone else on this forum is similarly at liberty to exercise their free speech right to challenge, debate, argue, or agree with the ideas and speech of another.

Even America-hating, thieving, racist, Marxist, Establishment knob-polishers get a voice...!

Oh well, you can always call them names. That's what immature wingnuts do isn't it?

This one is just for you, trip dots. The photo was shot at Che Obama's Texas HQ in Houston:

Wow! You are a conservative. Reagan couldn't manage money either. Neither could Bush.

Let's talk about that, trip dots, but first...you avoided this part, do you have any of your spectacularly brilliant observations to share wrt ?