The Man on the Roof
Posted on July 15, 2024 by Baron Bodissey
In his customary pithy fashion, Mark Steyn asks the pertinent question:
Let’s cut to the chase — the US Secret Service: In on it? Or just totally crap?
He then provides an excellent (and witty) analysis of what we know so far about the fiasco at the rally in Butler, Pennsylvania. Excerpting it wouldn’t do it justice; go over and read it yourself.
The thing is, more news about the shooter on the roof has been coming in all day since Mr. Steyn posted his notebook item, and none of it makes the Secret Service look any better. First there’s this story from NBC News (hat tip Vox Day):
Rooftop Where Gunman Shot at Trump Was Identified as a Security Vulnerability Before Rally: Sources
The rooftop where a gunman shot at former President Donald Trump during a campaign rally was identified by the Secret Service as a potential vulnerability in the days before the event, two sources familiar with the agency’s operations told NBC News.
The building, owned by a glass research company, is adjacent to the Butler Farm Show, an outdoor venue in Butler, Pennsylvania. The Secret Service was aware of the risks associated with it, the sources said.
“Someone should have been on the roof or securing the building so no one could get on the roof,” said one of the sources, a former senior Secret Service agent who was familiar with the planning.
Understanding how the gunman got onto the roof — despite those concerns — is a central question for investigators scrutinizing how a lone attacker managed to shoot at Trump during Saturday’s campaign event.
[…]
Investigators will want to examine the Secret Service’s site security plan for the rally, said Cangelosi, the former Secret Service agent. He expects they’ll discover one of two things: Either officials failed to make an effective plan for keeping potential shooters off the building Crooks fired from, or officers on the ground failed to execute the plan.
“I don’t like making any assumptions, but it does look like some mistakes were made, that this was preventable,” said Cangelosi, now a lecturer at John Jay College of Criminal Justice in New York.
Although it’s common to task local law enforcement agencies with patrolling outside an event’s security perimeter, Cangelosi said, the ultimate responsibility for ensuring that all vulnerabilities are covered rests with the Secret Service. [emphasis added]
This is absolutely clear: The ultimate responsibility for ensuring that all vulnerabilities are covered rests with the Secret Service. Which means that even if local law enforcement screwed up, the Secret Service is responsible for the catastrophic failure that led to President Trump’s Van Gogh ear, a dead fire chief/hero, and two other gravely wounded civilians.
Responsibility, yes. But is it accountable?
One may be forgiven for doubting that anyone with a high level of authority will be held to account. This is, after all, Washington D.C. we’re talking about.
I’ve heard various panjandrums of the Biden administration express their confidence in Secret Service Director Kimberly Cheatle, a diversity hire par excellence. I’m not sure what their confidence is based on — it seems to me that there are two possibilities: either (1) Ms. Cheatle is as massively incompetent as her subordinates who botched the Butler rally, or (2) she has no real control over her agency, and those subordinates acted without her supervision.
Neither of those is a good look.
Chances are, however, the congressional hearings and “independent” investigation will run their course, and Kimberly Cheatle will be given only the mildest of reprimands before being shunted off into some other well-paid high-level sinecure. That’s the way Washington works.
And new black marks against the Secret Service just keep coming in. According to the Pittsburgh TV station WPXI (hat tip Conservative Tree House), local law enforcement were aware of the presence of the man on the roof half an hour before the shooting started:
Alleged Trump Shooter Spotted by Law Enforcement Nearly 30 Minutes Before Shots Fired, Sources Say
BUTLER, Pa. — Channel 11 news uncovered dramatic new details Monday in the moments leading up to the assassination attempt on former president Donald Trump. According to multiple law enforcement sources, Thomas Crooks was spotted by law enforcement on a roof nearly 30 minutes before shots were fired that injured Trump, killed a former fire chief, and injured two others in the crowd.
Channel 11's Nicole Ford confirmed that Beaver County’s ESU team had eight members at the rally, including snipers and spotters. According to Ford’s sources, one of them noticed a suspicious man on a roof near the rally at 5:45 p.m., called it in and took a picture of the person. We have learned from our sources the person in that picture is Thomas Crooks. We’re told it’s not clear if Crooks had a gun with him at that point.
According to multiple sources, a law enforcement officer had also previously seen Crooks on the ground and called him in as a suspicious person with a picture prior to 5:45 p.m. Our sources tell us an officer checked the grounds for Crooks at that point, but did not see him where the first picture was taken.
Once again: “The US Secret Service: In on it? Or just totally crap?”
Each additional news item makes the USSS look worse; there are no mitigating reports as of this writing. I can’t imagine what new ghastly headlines will await my attention when I wake up tomorrow morning.
Concerning the presence of Thomas Matthew Crooks on that rooftop, we are essentially left with only two possibilities: either the United States Secret Service is grotesquely incompetent, to a degree never seen before in history, or it is complicit in what happened in Butler on Saturday.
Take your pick. Each new piece of data that comes in keeps pushing the planchette closer and closer to the second choice.
|
