In a move that’s not totally unexpected, the Rangers today announced that George W. Bush will throw out the first pitch at a Rangers game. I’m surprised he never did this when he was the sitting President of the United States. I know he threw out the first pitches at several other teams games (Yankees after 9/11, Nationals come to mind too), but never here. I know Dick Cheney did that once, I was there.
The security for Cheney’s appearance was insanely tight. I recall when I got there seeing a lot of extra helicopters flying around the stadium. Every entrance into the lower seating bowl had metal detectors, and it was in your best interest to stay there. It made just getting to your seat a nightmare due to the metal detectors in use. I found out that day that if you were not in the seating bowl when Cheney came on the field, the secret service stopped people from entering. I’m going to guess the same deal will be in play here, so don’t be doing the “Gotta go to the bathroom” or “I want to go get this pretzel before he comes out”. If you care about seeing Dubya, sit your backside down in your chair and stay there. Granted, that’s what you should be doing ANYWAY.. :) When Cheney was there, a guy sitting a row away from me was complaining about the security, so I know people were held out when they wanted to see him. Find your seat and stay there before the opening ceremonies get started.
Normally opening day is a fiasco with traffic. Last year it took me TWO HOURS to get home from opening day (almost a full hour to get to I30 from the Ballpark). I expect things to be a lot worse this year with Dubya and all the Secret Service extra security going on.
I do wonder how strong the boos will be. Yeah, it’s Texas and all that, but he left office as a pretty unpopular president.
I looked through my photo archives, I found a pic of the home opener in 2000 where the elder George Bush threw out the first pitch. I’ll probably get some better pics than this, as my digital camera has gotten a lot better in nine years. :)
