I normally enjoy Leah Garchik's daily column in the San Francisco Chronicle; it reminds me that people are still really strange. Today, however, she published a snippet that set me right back on my heels. You can read the entire column (don't miss the Public Eavesdropping section at the bottom), but I'll quote the section that stopped me:
Thanks to Monty Sander for calling my attention to a Napa Valley Register report about the four-course meal catered by Meadowood, listing such ingredients as Belgian endive and Kettle chips. Caterers told that newspaper that dinner was in "sandwich form," because organizers felt silverware could "pose a potential security threat to the President."Excuse me? Readers of this blog know that I have my opinions about President Bush, and they're not especially complimentary; but I did assume he was capable of using a knife and fork. (Still, this is the man who choked on a pretzel while watching a football game...)
Or did they fear that one of the guests at this extremely exclusive and high end entertainment would grab an olive fork and have at him? This level of official paranoia surpasses anything I've ever heard. If I remember the news reports, this was a Republican Party fundraiser; it was a room full of people who were willing to give money to the GOP. And yet they served finger food, because "organizers" were afraid to have silverware available.
This is beyond embarrassing. Let's tell the world that the President of the United States is afraid of forks. Did they also use paper plates and cups, lest someone should break a glass or a plate and attack the President with the shards?
And I haven't even begun to consider the weirdness of a menu including both Belgian endives and Kettle Chips...
Jeopardy seems to follow certain public figures around more than others. I've always felt that anarchists could serve a useful social purpose in certain cases. In this instance, however, the man in charge has never really been anything but a puppet, and his ventriloquist would be at least three times worse.
ReplyDeleteWe'll have to wait at least a decade to be told the whole truth about all the corruption and malice that have gone on the last eight years, and by that time we'll have forgiven all these naughty little boys for all the stuff we sort of really knew they were doing but were afraid to talk about--IF we even have a free press by that time.
How much mischief can people in high places do?
A lot.