Thread: Bush's visit to El Paso

I found it very interesting that the bevy of El Paso news reporters who had to go to the airport to prepare for the President's visit before daylight today weren't allowed to say a word until the President was about to board AF-1 on the way out of here!

He never said a word to the press here and nobody could get near him. Evidently someone was appointed as a spokesman to tell them where he went while he was here. For the most part he stayed between the limos and his plane at the airport. He stuck his head out to wave one time but was immediately whisked back out of there by the looks. I flipped bewteen four different local stations and it seemed like none of the cameramen could get a good enough angle to film the President himself.

I'm assuming he's probably already heard that he has about ninety million letters and faxes telling him what he can go with his guest worker program. I told him once again what I think about it but I did thank him for at least looking at the border for a change. As far as I know, he has never done that before.

It was said that he went to walk on the border near the Bridge of the Americas. I'm not sure when or IF he actually did go to the Border Patrol HQ as they said he was planning to do. Nothing was mentioned about that at all. Perhaps there will be more on the evening news or in tomorrow's El Paso Times. He was in the city for less than an hour and a half total.

Streets all around the section of the airport where his plane was waiting were closed until the President was safely on his plane. I find it frightening to think that Bush is THAT afraid to face the people of this nation or that the people assigned to protect him are that afraid to allow it.

Chertoff and Gonzales were here, too, as was TX governor, Rick Perry. Overall, it looked like a massive waste of taxpayer dollars to me. You all probably already know this stuff but that about sizes up the local coverage, which amounts to nothing at all.

I LOVE your first-hand account of your visit from YOUR PRESIDENT!!! Isn't that just TYPICAL? He is literally scared to death that some reporter will actually ask him a question. He would be so flustered that he wouldn't be able to get out a coherent sentence. Well, he can't even do THAT when it's scripted so I'm not sure HOW he would handle a spontaneous news conference. To my knowledge, he's only had one in 5 years. That was the DEBATES! He has not had ANY regular press conferences EVER like ALL of the other Presidents in MY memory. If that doesn't speak volumes about the man, I don't know what it would take. I guess it doesn't take him but 30 minutes for one of his famous photo ops.

Mabey he did, it just wasn't an American.

ROFLMAO! Bootsie, he's YOUR President, too. Aren't you just so proud?

I was trying to pull a fast one on you!!! You got me! OKAY--he's mine by DEFAULT. At least I can say I only voted for him ONCE!!!

Unfortunately he is the President to all of this country. Aren't you glad he can't run again? I sure am.

JuniusJr, that WAS a great account. It was totally honest too, which is the something that we all noticed. Thanks a lot, JJ !

UPDATE: they must have talked to him at some point because they showed some clips on the 5 PM news with him tripping over some of the same kind of barf he spewed in Tuscon. But you could tell it wasn't a prepared speech and it's hard to say who he was talking to. I guess he repeated what he could remember or something LOL

We wondered who he was supposed to be waving at from the plane becuse the only people the cameras showed were Chertoff, Gonzales and Perry. Must have been those gazillion cops!

Interesting side note: one of the stations took particular pains to point out how much trouble it is to gather up enough cops, close down streets, and take all the security measures involved in protecting the President when he comes here only for an hour and a half and wants to ride through downtown to the bridges.

I was amused that the officials on the other side of the bridge were complaining because they weren't warned about the "surprise visit." I guess they aren't on Sylvestre Reyes' mailing list because he told me two weeks ago. That's a good sign, at least.

I need to go to Lou Dobbs' site and find the transcript of the description of his visit to the border where they said he actually spent THIRTY MINUTES and I THINK they said he didn't even get out of his vehicle.

JJ--I started a separate thread that addressed Bush's visit to your LOVELY town! There were three different segments on Lou Dobbs so I decided they needed a separate thread! Sounds like he barely even SAW your city!