6 ms·

I hope Donald will stay at home. Every presidential visit brings multi-million city to a halt. It has similar effect as an earthquake, major fire or other natur

I hope Donald will stay at home. Every presidential visit brings multi-million city to a halt. It has similar effect as an earthquake, major fire or other natural disaster. It is recommended not open windows, there is risk of snipers. International airport is closed for several hours for a single airplane. And main roads are closed everyday while president is traveling. I still remember New Orleans. People could not leave flooded city, because Bush decided to do a personal rescue mission :-(

aaronbrethorst 10y ago
http://money.cnn.com/2016/11/21/news/protecting-donald-trump/ http://money.cnn.com/2016/11/21/news/protecting-donald-trump...
cyberferret 10y ago
I agree with the fact that the President should probably not visit foreign cities unless absolutely necessary. In our case, President Obama (and I am a full supporter of his) visited our little town here in Australia (pop: ~100,000) back in 2011 to meet with our Prime Minister to ratify a deal to station about 10,000 US Marines in our town. He was on the ground here for about 6 hours. For the whole day (and most of the day preceding), major roads were blocked and citizens could not get in or out of the city. RAAF fighter jets criss crossed our skies constantly during his stay, and the police kept all the local citizens out of parks and recreational areas near the airport. It was a major PITA, to say the least, as commerce and general activity ground to a halt for everyone in our city. During the same visit, President Obama also met with the Governor General of Australia in Canberra. Watching the televised meeting, I was amused to see that at the end of it, the president was whisked away by his security team in his motorcade, with police escort, whereas the Governor General simply walked back to his home along the river by himself. The irony that the leader of the free world is probably the least free person in it...
- almostApatriot1 10y ago
  Sounds like an overreaction by your government tbh. Not Obama's fault. He comes to NYC fairly often, and there's usually more traffic in certain parts but 95% of people in the city wouldn't realize it.
  - dbaupp 10y ago
    Having a foreign leader (especially that of a superpower) hurt/killed on one's soil is likely to be particularly problematic, diplomatically.
  - ceejayoz 10y ago
    The Secret Service would love to shut down NYC when the President visits. They just can't get away with it. Much easier to do with a 100k person city.
- gcb0 10y ago
  i highly doubt that was the reason. remember that obama magnus opus was copyright enforcement and trade deals with southeast asia. Australia and New Zealand were pivotal for this effort. see TPP and kim dot com being arrested the next year of his visit.
random_upvoter 10y ago
A couple of years back I saw president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran on TV talking to a group of people in Tehran. He just stood on the top of a car with a megaphone and a big crowd of people surrounded him. Sure there were a few bodyguards, but you if you wanted you could pretty much tap him on the shoulder. Now I don't want to overestimate the merits of Iranian democracy, but I was kind of impressed by this. Compare this with the leaders of the Western world. If there's a summit, the city gets under siege as if it's a Hollywood production. People are not allowed to stand on their balcony. If you get within half a mile of Obama, a sniper will put a bullet through your head. There is just something wrong about this ritual of self-importance. Seriously, aside from personal tragedy, what does it matter if some terrorist kills Obama? We just replace him with the next guy in a suit and tie, and the following day it would be the exact same politics. The system runs itself and no longer depends on the individuality of the persons in the top position. In that sense it reminds me of Europe in 1914 where the diplomatic system overruled the kings and presidents. It may be one of the deeper reasons for Trump's election -- people wanting somebody who can shake the tree.
- jankotek 10y ago
  Dont be impressed. Nazi officials also traveled with minimal protection in occupied countries. When Reinhard Heydrich was killed, a few villages were leveled in retaliation. US president should be protected. But it should be protected as other military targets. You would never put a nuclear silo into large metropolitan area.
  - akjainaj 10y ago
    That's a nice Godwin there. Couldn't it be that Mahmoud is simply loved by his people? And it's not like the hypothetical killer of a US president would simply walk away from court.
    - jankotek 10y ago
      You have no idea how this works.
thinkloop 10y ago
I wonder how D.C. is able to handle it, the president needs to leave the whitehouse at some point.
- burkaman 10y ago
  Portions of DC are constantly closing for summits when other leaders come to the city. Day to day, I think the area around the White House is always sufficiently secure that the president leaving doesn't cause much of a disruption.
brynx97 10y ago
Foreign leaders need to meet with other foreign leaders. If US president were to never leave the US, requesting that all foreign dignitaries visit him, that'd be great loss for US foreign policy. Y'all are all overstating the impact of visits on local communities too. It is done the way it is to minimize risk and expediency for both parties...
- tomschlick 10y ago
  Yup, and usually closed routes are announced days in advance to give people the chance to make alternate plans if their day would be affected.
kxd 10y ago
Obama visited Ireland in 2011. I remember the Clinton visit in the '90s. Both shut the city down and increased the presence of security forces everywhere. I worked in the city centre at the time and it was chaos for a few days. Making matters worse was the fact that a week or two prior the Queen visited (arguably a more important state visit, for historical reasons). So in effect, for about three weeks, Dublin was hell to commute in.
- ckinnan 10y ago
  Fun fact -- the Reagan Library in California bought and sort of rebuilt the Irish tavern that the president visited in the 1980s. You can even buy a beer there. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GyJ5qJcHUNA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GyJ5qJcHUNA
JohnTHaller 10y ago
We get to deal with this every day in NYC for the foreseeable future. Hundreds of millions of dollars and quite a few nearby businesses down the drain.
erelde 10y ago
Obama went to Paris (I live in downtown Paris) several times I think, and there have been multiple reunions of numerous heads of state here, I don't remember any particular perturbations, other than 5 or 7 subway station blocked. The most notable was after the november 2015 attacks, there was some trouble because Obama kept changing* schedule. Not to downplay this, but maybe in some cities it is more doable than others. *guessing they weren't "changing" the schedule and they were in fact keeping it very tight and putting out another schedule altogether
- masklinn 10y ago
  I'm guessing it's different when it's a capital city as they are used to handling heads of state and other officials e.g. POTUS in DC and POTUS in LA are different situations.
- pdabbadabba 10y ago
  Yeah. Clearly some cities (like Paris) are more accustomed to receiving these sorts of visitors and, probably, have more permanent infrastructure in place to handle the visits with minimal interruption. I live in Washington, D.C. and, obviously, my city is not shut down whenever the president is in town. At most, we have to deal with a closed road and some loud sirens for a few minutes when the president is literally driving past.
  - Declanomous 10y ago
    I live in Chicago, and the biggest inconvenience is when the weather is bad and they have to drive. That's honestly much more burdensome for people who live in the suburbs than people who live in the city itself. I've not even known Obama was in town until I rode my bike in to a checkpoint a block or so away from where he was eating lunch. I honestly get much more annoyed when the secret service do their thing for presidential candidates, because the candidates tend to travel around a bit more and screw things up that way.
HillaryBriss 10y ago
Westside traffic was often brought to a halt when Obama came to Los Angeles because he tended to visit some extremely wealthy entertainment figure's home (in Bel Air or Beverly Hills or Holmby Hills etc) in order to participate in a fund raiser. It got to the point where a lot of LA commuters, who overwhelmingly supported Obama, would wince when they learned the presidential motorcade would be gumming up the traffic. The LA Times typically reported the route so that LA commuters could stay the hell away from it.
- rconti 10y ago
  It shouldn't matter if you support the person politically or not; their visit is a hassle, and it's not like the visit does anything for you personally. Also, with roads near capacity, it doesn't take much to make it an utter mess. Even a few minutes' closure will have knock-on effects until well after rush hour.
gcb0 10y ago
obama caused that to LA almost montly when raising funds for re-election.

aaronbrethorst 10y ago

http://money.cnn.com/2016/11/21/news/protecting-donald-trump/ http://money.cnn.com/2016/11/21/news/protecting-donald-trump...

cyberferret 10y ago

I agree with the fact that the President should probably not visit foreign cities unless absolutely necessary. In our case, President Obama (and I am a full supporter of his) visited our little town here in Australia (pop: ~100,000) back in 2011 to meet with our Prime Minister to ratify a deal to station about 10,000 US Marines in our town. He was on the ground here for about 6 hours. For the whole day (and most of the day preceding), major roads were blocked and citizens could not get in or out of the city. RAAF fighter jets criss crossed our skies constantly during his stay, and the police kept all the local citizens out of parks and recreational areas near the airport. It was a major PITA, to say the least, as commerce and general activity ground to a halt for everyone in our city. During the same visit, President Obama also met with the Governor General of Australia in Canberra. Watching the televised meeting, I was amused to see that at the end of it, the president was whisked away by his security team in his motorcade, with police escort, whereas the Governor General simply walked back to his home along the river by himself. The irony that the leader of the free world is probably the least free person in it...

almostApatriot1 10y ago
Sounds like an overreaction by your government tbh. Not Obama's fault. He comes to NYC fairly often, and there's usually more traffic in certain parts but 95% of people in the city wouldn't realize it.
- dbaupp 10y ago
  Having a foreign leader (especially that of a superpower) hurt/killed on one's soil is likely to be particularly problematic, diplomatically.
- ceejayoz 10y ago
  The Secret Service would love to shut down NYC when the President visits. They just can't get away with it. Much easier to do with a 100k person city.
gcb0 10y ago
i highly doubt that was the reason. remember that obama magnus opus was copyright enforcement and trade deals with southeast asia. Australia and New Zealand were pivotal for this effort. see TPP and kim dot com being arrested the next year of his visit.

random_upvoter 10y ago

A couple of years back I saw president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran on TV talking to a group of people in Tehran. He just stood on the top of a car with a megaphone and a big crowd of people surrounded him. Sure there were a few bodyguards, but you if you wanted you could pretty much tap him on the shoulder. Now I don't want to overestimate the merits of Iranian democracy, but I was kind of impressed by this. Compare this with the leaders of the Western world. If there's a summit, the city gets under siege as if it's a Hollywood production. People are not allowed to stand on their balcony. If you get within half a mile of Obama, a sniper will put a bullet through your head. There is just something wrong about this ritual of self-importance. Seriously, aside from personal tragedy, what does it matter if some terrorist kills Obama? We just replace him with the next guy in a suit and tie, and the following day it would be the exact same politics. The system runs itself and no longer depends on the individuality of the persons in the top position. In that sense it reminds me of Europe in 1914 where the diplomatic system overruled the kings and presidents. It may be one of the deeper reasons for Trump's election -- people wanting somebody who can shake the tree.

jankotek 10y ago
Dont be impressed. Nazi officials also traveled with minimal protection in occupied countries. When Reinhard Heydrich was killed, a few villages were leveled in retaliation. US president should be protected. But it should be protected as other military targets. You would never put a nuclear silo into large metropolitan area.
- akjainaj 10y ago
  That's a nice Godwin there. Couldn't it be that Mahmoud is simply loved by his people? And it's not like the hypothetical killer of a US president would simply walk away from court.
  - jankotek 10y ago
    You have no idea how this works.

thinkloop 10y ago

I wonder how D.C. is able to handle it, the president needs to leave the whitehouse at some point.

burkaman 10y ago
Portions of DC are constantly closing for summits when other leaders come to the city. Day to day, I think the area around the White House is always sufficiently secure that the president leaving doesn't cause much of a disruption.

brynx97 10y ago

Foreign leaders need to meet with other foreign leaders. If US president were to never leave the US, requesting that all foreign dignitaries visit him, that'd be great loss for US foreign policy. Y'all are all overstating the impact of visits on local communities too. It is done the way it is to minimize risk and expediency for both parties...

tomschlick 10y ago
Yup, and usually closed routes are announced days in advance to give people the chance to make alternate plans if their day would be affected.

kxd 10y ago

Obama visited Ireland in 2011. I remember the Clinton visit in the '90s. Both shut the city down and increased the presence of security forces everywhere. I worked in the city centre at the time and it was chaos for a few days. Making matters worse was the fact that a week or two prior the Queen visited (arguably a more important state visit, for historical reasons). So in effect, for about three weeks, Dublin was hell to commute in.

ckinnan 10y ago
Fun fact -- the Reagan Library in California bought and sort of rebuilt the Irish tavern that the president visited in the 1980s. You can even buy a beer there. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GyJ5qJcHUNA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GyJ5qJcHUNA

JohnTHaller 10y ago

We get to deal with this every day in NYC for the foreseeable future. Hundreds of millions of dollars and quite a few nearby businesses down the drain.

erelde 10y ago

Obama went to Paris (I live in downtown Paris) several times I think, and there have been multiple reunions of numerous heads of state here, I don't remember any particular perturbations, other than 5 or 7 subway station blocked. The most notable was after the november 2015 attacks, there was some trouble because Obama kept changing* schedule. Not to downplay this, but maybe in some cities it is more doable than others. *guessing they weren't "changing" the schedule and they were in fact keeping it very tight and putting out another schedule altogether

masklinn 10y ago
I'm guessing it's different when it's a capital city as they are used to handling heads of state and other officials e.g. POTUS in DC and POTUS in LA are different situations.
pdabbadabba 10y ago
Yeah. Clearly some cities (like Paris) are more accustomed to receiving these sorts of visitors and, probably, have more permanent infrastructure in place to handle the visits with minimal interruption. I live in Washington, D.C. and, obviously, my city is not shut down whenever the president is in town. At most, we have to deal with a closed road and some loud sirens for a few minutes when the president is literally driving past.
- Declanomous 10y ago
  I live in Chicago, and the biggest inconvenience is when the weather is bad and they have to drive. That's honestly much more burdensome for people who live in the suburbs than people who live in the city itself. I've not even known Obama was in town until I rode my bike in to a checkpoint a block or so away from where he was eating lunch. I honestly get much more annoyed when the secret service do their thing for presidential candidates, because the candidates tend to travel around a bit more and screw things up that way.

HillaryBriss 10y ago

Westside traffic was often brought to a halt when Obama came to Los Angeles because he tended to visit some extremely wealthy entertainment figure's home (in Bel Air or Beverly Hills or Holmby Hills etc) in order to participate in a fund raiser. It got to the point where a lot of LA commuters, who overwhelmingly supported Obama, would wince when they learned the presidential motorcade would be gumming up the traffic. The LA Times typically reported the route so that LA commuters could stay the hell away from it.

rconti 10y ago
It shouldn't matter if you support the person politically or not; their visit is a hassle, and it's not like the visit does anything for you personally. Also, with roads near capacity, it doesn't take much to make it an utter mess. Even a few minutes' closure will have knock-on effects until well after rush hour.

gcb0 10y ago

obama caused that to LA almost montly when raising funds for re-election.