The Boy in the Bubble is Alive and Well

Since President Bush apparently made it through high school, college, and increasing levels of public service without noticing that pesky First Amendment thing as it applies to speech and peaceable assembly, the White House has an official operations manual explaining how to shield His Nibs from the unpleasant discovery that 70-odd percent of the American public thinks he's a fucktard.

Among other things, any event must be open only to those with tickets tightly controlled by organizers. Those entering must be screened in case they are hiding secret signs. Any anti-Bush demonstrators who manage to get in anyway should be shouted down by "rally squads" stationed in strategic locations. And if that does not work, they should be thrown out.

But that does not mean the White House is against dissent -- just so long as the president does not see it. In fact, the manual outlines a specific system for those who disagree with the president to voice their views. It directs the White House advance staff to ask local police "to designate a protest area where demonstrators can be placed, preferably not in the view of the event site or motorcade route."

Small detail: all public land in the US is a designated protest area so long as those protests aren't incitements to immediate violence. Hurting Dear Leader's feelings isn't enough of an offense to revoke the First Amendment.

To counter any demonstrators who do get in, advance teams are told to create "rally squads" of volunteers with large hand-held signs, placards or banners with "favorable messages." Squads should be placed in strategic locations and "at least one squad should be 'roaming' throughout the perimeter of the event to look for potential problems," the manual says.

"These squads should be instructed always to look for demonstrators," it says. "The rally squad's task is to use their signs and banners as shields between the demonstrators and the main press platform. If the demonstrators are yelling, rally squads can begin and lead supportive chants to drown out the protestors (USA!, USA!, USA!). As a last resort, security should remove the demonstrators from the event site."

Rally squads! With a chant that serves the dual purpose of drowning out dissent and proving that the orchestrated cheerleaders are the real patriots in the room, since they're the only ones mouthing the holy syllables of the 1980 Olympic hockey team's victory over the Russians, which liberal protestors are obviously incapable of uttering, much less hearing, without bursting into flames.

Control the message, baby, and cover up the evidence of anyone being unhappy with the president. Fucking brilliant.