I'm always astounded that an event like this still takes place as it does if dangers from terrorism are as dangerous as claimed. Why do they gather the entire executive branch (except one token), every member of both houses of the Congress, the entire Supreme Court, the leadership of the military in the way of the Joint Chiefs , basically our entire government and put them in one building at one time? Is that responsible in this day and age?

I don't know but it sounds like the movie 'Eagle Eye'.

Didn't Tom Clancy end one of his novels with a JAL 747 crashing into the Capitol building during a SOTU speech?

I don't read Tom Clancy novels.

Didn't Tom Clancy end one of his novels with a JAL 747 crashing into the Capitol building during a SOTU speech?


yep. thats how jack ryan gets to be president. after the dragon and the bear i lost interest in that mythos.

I'm always astounded that an event like this still takes place as it does if dangers from terrorism are as dangerous as claimed. Why do they gather the entire executive branch (except one token), every member of both houses of the Congress, the entire Supreme Court, the leadership of the military in the way of the Joint Chiefs , basically our entire government and put them in one building at one time? Is that responsible in this day and age?

I wonder how that newsworthy escapee from OZ running North Korea past the point of existance and who is "testing" nuclear weapons in defiance of . . . like, even the CHINESE . . . might attempt to answer that question.

Tough Question . . . How about The Former U.S.S.R, The Democratic People's Republic of China, and the U.S. all simultaneously launch one relatively small missle each at North Korea to prove that The Cold War is Over and Peace Is Here and Now?

(could provide a warning shot in the direction of those pesky targets down around pakistan and india . ..)


Edited to Add (non-autosaved) :
"State of 'The Union'" . . . "address" . . . now there's a puzzler if there ever was one. =)
(some high level semanitcs has t' be goin' on t' make sense o' that! well . . . doesn't they?)

"Debt of Honor" . . . (only Tom Clancy book i ever read all the way through. =)
(paled in comparison to "Sometimes a Great Notion" . . . ken kesey)

Why do we still do it? Tradition. That and, well sheesh, if a nation can't assemble all its high value political targets in one place for an hour or two every now and again, then ya may as well concede the baddies have already done gone & whupped yer spirits lower than the last kid picked in dodgeball.

The Tan Man (Boehner) actually clapped a couple times.