There is a reason we have an organization in this country that calls itself the Secret Service. It’s because there are some secrets that need to be kept when it comes to securing the safety of the POTUS (President of the United States).
I had momentarily forgotten that basic premise when President Barack Obama came to Arcadia University in Glenside Monday morning.
It was not the first time I had covered a presidential speech, so I was well aware of the security drill. But I got caught up in some technological advances we’re trying out here at the newspaper and did something stupid.
See, reporters are now carrying Flip cameras, little hand-held devices that we can use to record video clips that we post with our stories online at www.montgomerynews.com. I decided that I would test out my Flip camera during the president’s appearance.
Once I had cleared the security checkpoint, I did what most reporters do: I started looking for people to interview and scenes to video.
Of course, since I was only a few steps removed from the security checkpoint for media personnel — a checkpoint that included Secret Service agents with metal detector wands and a bomb-sniffing dog — I thought it would be interesting to video the process that we in the media had to undergo to enter the building where the president would be speaking.
We’ll call that “Mike First Stupid Idea of the Day.” (And it was early, so it likely wouldn’t be the last stupid thing I did that day.)
So I held up my little video camera and started taking shots. Within seconds, out of the corner of my eye, I could see a Secret Service agent quickly approaching.
“You can’t videotape security measures. That will end up on the internet. You need to erase that immediately,” said the agent.
Doh!
Unfortunately, I had not yet played enough with the new toy to know how to erase anything on it. So I punched all the buttons and assured the agent that the offending video was gone.
The guy was doing his job and I was doing my job. This time, he was much better at his than I was at mine and given the circumstances, I’m OK with that.

Labels: Arcadia University, Mike Morsch, Montgomery Newspapers, Outta Leftfield, President Barack Obama