The President Obama buses are causing quite a stir. Tricked out with special paint, and some serious high-tech gadgets the Secret Service will barely even allude to, these bad boys are apparently able to get on down the road if necessary.
Drawing from what is known about “the Beast” – the Presidential Limousine, we can deduce that the Bus has some pretty serious armament, possibly including 8″ thick armor plate, to go along with the “bulletproof glass” windows. The interesting thing is that it is designed not to show much on the outside.
One of the interesting things about the two vehicles (there is a red one and a black one) is that no markings or stickers are allowed on the vehicles.
They are now saying they are going to let the Republican Presidential candidate ride in one of these?
I hope the interior is designed to be hosed out.
$1.1 million bus used by Obama has high-tech defenses – but what are they?
The Secret Service refuses to give away many details on the design, but has said it has similar features to Obama’s regular ride, The Beast. The tricked-out Cadillac known as The Beast looks like a regular limousine, but is built more like a tank.
If the Obama Bus is similar to The Beast, it will have tank-like armor and cutting edge technology. For example, The Beast has 8-inch thick armor-plated sides, special bulletproof glass, and Kevlar-reinforced tires. The tires are mounted on specially designed rims that can continue to drive even if the tires are missing.
Like The Beast, the bus is probably airtight, and likely has an advanced fire suppression system, oxygen tanks, and is built to withstand a chemical attack.
In case of a medical emergency, bags of Obama’s blood are likely carried onboard just as they are in The Beast.
With more room than The Beast, the bus will probably have more defensive tricks up its sleeves than The Beast’s night vision cameras, shotguns, and tear-gas cannons.
The electronics and communications are no doubt state of the art, and are sure to replicate The Beast’s direct satellite phone line to the Vice President and the Pentagon.
The Secret Service used a fund for transportation and armored vehicles to buy two of these buses from the Hemphill Brothers Coach Company for a total of $2,191,960. No word on whether the company will make more, but Cadillac said they would not make The Beast for any private customers or foreign country saying the design is “very private and secretive.” Chances are these buses are two of a kind and will remain so.
While $2.2 million may sound expensive, it is expected to be cheaper than the normal leased buses over a ten year span, and a Secret Service official implied leased buses aren’t safe enough, saying, “we have not been satisfied with the level of protection offered by leased buses.”
And they aren’t just for the President. The second bus is expected to be used by the Republican presidential candidate and both will eventually be used for visiting dignitaries and future officeholders and candidates.
But until the Secret Service releases more details, the real technology inside the Obama bus will remain a mystery.
Filed under: The Post-Racial Life Tagged: | motorcade, President Obama, Secret Service, Security, the beast, The bus, transpotation
BT, I thought about the frustrations we have mutually expressed as I read this article from Andrew Sullivan.
Excerpt:
Obama acts entirely within the tradition of mainstream African American political strategy and tactics. The epitome of that tradition was the non-violence of the Civil Rights Movement, but goes back much further in time. It recognizes the inequality of power between whites and blacks. Number one: maintain your dignity. Number two: call your adversaries to the highest principles they hold. Number three: Seize the moral high ground and Number four: Win by winning over your adversaries, by revealing the contradiction between their own ideals and their actions.
MLK’s dilemma then was in asking men with pride to turn the other cheek, suppressing a normal human reaction to fight back. This is why so many men sat the marches out, leaving it to women and children, who were less likely to be lynched.
One of the march strategies was to put women and children on the outside edge of the march, under the theory that white segregationalists would be much less likely to commit violent attacks. Unfortunately, that was naive, and even in that day the attack on Emmit Till proved that that small group of folks who were the most virulent racist weren’t capable of any level or moral restraint.
That has not changed.
What has changed is that the majority of white people in this country are no longer willing to lay down for the bigots. The Tea Party and conservative movement are trying hard to change that – but I think that horse has left the barn.
I think it is time to kill this rabid racist dog once and for all – but President Obama being mamby-pamby about it just isn’t going to get it done. He needs to go after their media, their foundations, their donors – and eliminate their ability to propagandize. Hang Murdoch high on he criminality of his enterprise in committing crimes such as invasion of privacy and theft of information. He needs to turn Congress loose on putting that portion which are criminals in jail – for long sentences. He needs to move on the Judicial Appointments – allowing or ordering Reid to utilize the “nuclear option” to appoint ALL of the missing Federal Judges with Progressives.
“By any means necessary.”
Do you think showing a temper would have worked for him or against him, in the context that he wants a second term?
I think the “angry black man” thing always was a false canard. Getting pissed off on behalf of America is what Presidents are supposed to do. Right wing nutjobs protesting about that would be perfect political fodder.
Second, Obama doesn’t quite seem to understand the awesome power he does wield as a President by controlling the Federal apparatus. I mean -Congress can appropriate funds for the Eric Cantor Center for Sociopathic Misfits and Serial Masturbation all it wants to… If HUD or whichever Federal Agency never gets around to dispersing that money – it just isn’t going to happen.
Obama should have turned the Justice Department and the investigatory powers loose a long time ago. Nothing seems to clarify a group of Congressmen’s thinking like one of them getting a long jail term for having their hand in the cookie jar. So far, Obama has been willing to force his own Party to clean up…
why not the Republicans?
The other day, Bezos of Amazon said that corporations should boycott politics and not give to anyone. Sounds good in theory, because clearly elected officials worry less about the regular folk and more about BIG MONEY donors. But I doubt he’ll get much traction; people holding purse strings like the power that comes with that.
If the President raises $100 million again, I sure would like to see him prove he is “a different kind of politician” by putting that money to better use than buying ad space. Though my children are no longer in school, I sure would like to see the counselors who were cut in the latest budget of my local school district get restored. I credit my son’s counselor with being a fabulous resource when he couldn’t get along with his parents or teachers, but she probably is back in the classroom. $3 million will get it done.