News-Record.com

As thousands of motorists discovered Wednesday, when the president comes to town, movement stops. Green lights no longer mean go.

Traffic backed up on West Cornwallis Drive as far as the eye could see as President Bush's motorcade neared the intersection of Cornwallis and Cleburne Street, a block from the Louis DeJoy house, site of the Republican fund raiser.

As people who have been caught up in presidential visits before know, logic doesn't prevail. One would assume once the motorcade passed and reached the DeJoy home, officers would wave their arms for traffic to resume on Cornwallis. Nope, cars didn't budge.

U.S. 220 South was said to be a nightmare Wendesday when the Bush motorcade traveled there to Victory Junction near Randleman.

The inconvenience and the expense of all those Greensboro police officers, sheriff's deputies, state troopers and Capitol police posted evrywhere could have been avoided, with help from the Marines.

Where was Marine One, the president's chopper? If it had been here, the president could have flown from Piedmont Triad International Airport to his first stop, lunch with the common folk at Stamey's Barbecue across from the Greensboro Coliseum.

The helicopter could have landed in the Coliseum parking lot, with Bush and his entourage of gun-toting Secret Service agents crossing High Point Road to Stamey's.

Afterward, instead of driving, he could have taken the helicoper to his next stop, Waldo Falkener Elementary School, across town on Franklin Boulevard.

The school stands across from a National Guard Armory, which for many years was home base of a helicopter outfit. Choppers in those days stayed parked on a grassy hill that slopes from the armory to Franklin Boulevard.

From Falkener, the president could have whirliebirded down to Level Cross to Victory Junction, then flown back to Greensboro and landed on the golf fairway across from the DeJoy home.

Perhaps, the White House strategy was to tie up traffic so people could stand in yards - and they did - to watch the motorcade.

But what was there to see? The two presidential limousines - one is a decoy - had tinted windows. It was hard to see who was inside.

The motorcade moved fast, too, passing in the blink.

One on-looker who stood next to the curb near the DeJoy home for several hours waiting for the motorcade, summed it up perfectly once it had come and gone.

"Pretty, anti-climatic, isn't it?"