Re-thinking secret service protection for nutcases

Of Hugh Chavez’s disgraceful exhibition at the UN, Mike Gallagher had this to say:

Once more, Americans are treated to the ugly spectacle of the United Nations hosting some crackpot, U.S.-hating leader. One day, it’s the lunatic president of Iran; the next, it’s the vermin from Venezuela. Adding insult to injury, we apparently provided U.S. Secret Service protection to these creeps. It makes me think that if the U.N. managed to find Osama Bin Laden, they’d invite him to be the keynote speaker and throw him a ticker tape parade down Fifth Avenue.

I got sidetracked by the point about the U.S. Secret Service protection.  It reminded me of an old, and almost certainly apocryphal story about Teddy Roosevelt’s tenure as Governor of New York.  Apparently a famously vitriolic German anti-Semite was coming to visit New York.  Roosevelt was tasked with providing necessary protection for this vile little man, and did so:  Every body guard that Roosevelt assigned him was Jewish.  The bodyguards carried out their jobs perfectly, and the anti-Semite left American shores in one piece, but he was considerably shaken by the experience.