Octang Frye

President-elect Obama does the school run.

I wonder what it would be like to be the President?
How would you cope with having the Secret Service everywhere? Accompanying you even to the bathroom (allegedly).

For the next four (or eight) years, you'd never really be alone. You'd always be "on-call". Could you stand the pressure?

If you've ever been on-call, it can really suck. I remember carrying a pager and being paged from a pub at midnight on a Friday by some folks in Hong Kong.
Don't get me wrong, it would be amazing to be the President. As a rabid information consumer, I'd be in hog's heaven. Imagine the secrets you'd be privy to.

But then in times of crisis, you'd be alone. It would be you, and ultimately your conscience, that had to deal with sending people into harm's way.
How would you have dealt with the Cuban missile crisis? Or how would you deal with Putin, Medve-whatever, and a resurgent Russia? No wonder you go grey pretty quickly.

Octang Frye

Also, how would you deal with criticism from the press? Would you ignore it?
Could you ignore it? It takes a mature person, a well-seasoned person, a confident person, a thick-skinned person to have deal with this.

Perhaps the two years of campaigning indirectly serves the President-elect well. You do get exposed to powerful and near constant scrutiny, attacks, criticism, what have you. Your mettle is definitely tested.

Bill_S

I'd be really creeped out to see my Secret Service guards wearing Ronald Reagan masks.

Octang Frye

He looks like my Uncle Ray. I don't think he's SS. No earpiece in left ear. Could be wrong. Doesn't look the type. Looks like he's almost cracking a smile.
Secret Service bods have their smiles and sense of humor surgically removed.

I think he's just an aide.

Octang Frye

Apparently the Secret Service gather and dispose of any receptacle the President drinks from, lest anyone gather his DNA. I'm not sure what you could do with his DNA but who knows?

Which led me to another thought. Wherever the P goes, I bet they take their own towels and toilet paper. Anything that might come in contact with the P.
Probably silverware too.

Which then let me to thinking about food. It wouldn't be a problem in the White House, which is a controlled environment. But what happens when he goes overseas? Let's say they're in France. I bet the Secret Service have specially trained people who oversee the production of food which will be served to the P. They probably have a taster too. Man, you could go nuts thinking about this stuff.

Especially if you're a top chef and have to work under close scrutiny. I've always been fascinated with FedEx, and I marvel at their operation. I kind of hold the Secret Service in the same esteem. Organization, logistics. Brilliant.

elfman

so you've never seen The Boys from Brazil?

Octang Frye

Yeah. Good movie. But if you intended to do harm to the President, you wouldn't clone him.

\ I mainly remember the dogs from that movie, and the kid's piercing blue eyes. Creepy. Reminds me of the kid from the Omen.

elfman

but what if you wanted to create a bad Obama who went round the world undoing all the beneficial works of the good one? People would get so confused.

Octang Frye

Well, you'd have to rapidly age the clone. There would no doubt be easily spotted flaws like bleeding from the eye, a third nipple, or a penchant for melodrama. I think we'd be able to spot the bad clone. Or would we?

Sorry. Sorry. No politics from me in this thread. This is just a straight out pondering about the workings of the White House and being POTUS.

Ray

You're Never Alone with a Strand

Mummy in the foothills

If you'd like to try never being alone 24/7 (including going to the bathroom) have kids. Mine followed me everywhere once they could crawl/walk and before that seemed attached either at the hip or boob all day.
You get used to it. and one day they go to school and the quiet is very creepy, so you have more kids

Bill_S

I'd keep asking to see the Big Board. I'd want lots of practice with the nuclear football. I'd want to carry my own MP5K-PDW. I'd get the finest minds at the NSA to come up with an airtight anonymizer so I could post rubbish to web forums all night.

I don't think I'd be a very good POTUS.

Ray

He takes his own chefs

Ray

Regan reportedly phoned people who wrote to him ...

frrussre

Sad lonely guy in rain coat, standing under a lamppost smoking a Strand Ciggy, in the rain. No one wanted to buy them. They changed the name to Embassy, became the best selling cigarette in Europe.

Reg. Frank R.
Ps. Think he was also wearing a trilby & had just left a party.