Written By : Donald Douglas

You can’t have a bigger security breach, and if this were a Republican White House the press would be hammering the administration for it’s near-catastrophic security lapse, but there’s almost a breathless fawning over Michaele and Tareq Salahi, who crashed the White House state dinner on Tuesday night. See the New York Times, “At the First Obama State Dinner, the First Crashers,” and the Washington Post, “Off the List, But Somehow on the South Lawn.”

But this blogger is kind breatless:

Tareq and Michael Salahi of Virginia dressed in a formal Indian gown, and tuxedo respectively, and walked right past security, high-fiving one reporter, and mingled and snapped pictures with various high profile dignitaries in attendance. Among the many who did have their pictures taken with the Salahis were Rahm Emanuel, the White House Chief of staff, and Vice President Biden. Reportedly, the President and the Prime Minister were never in danger.

The Times‘ report notes that the couple “went through magnetometers and other levels of security, as did all guests attending the dinner.” But the Post‘s piece is fawning:

On a rainy night like Tuesday, with a crowd of 300-plus arriving, security might have lost track of or granted a modicum of sympathy to a pair who certainly looked as though they belonged there. If their IDs didn’t send up any red flags in the screening process, they would be sent through the magnetometers and into the White House.

Yeah, gotta cut that Secret Service detail some slack. The couple just belonged there! Man, if they could just cruise in so casually, it’s not far-fetched to think that someone, somehow, could have stashed a cache of small-arms weapons.

But we don’t want to jump to any conclusions.

More at Memorandum, plus some of the news reports:

Cross-posted from American Power.

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