Secret Service

Twitter users sent more than 6.5 million Tweets during the third presidential debate Monday - and a few of them were death threats against President Obama and Republican presidential nominee Mitt Romney. Less than 24 hours later, the Secret Service took to Twitter in what the department calls a new tactic to gather information on potential threats against the people they protect. “To report a tweet that concerns you,” @SecretService wrote Tuesday in its first such Tweet , “call the nearest field office in your state.” The agency posted a similar message Wednesday morning.

Colorado resident Lee Mulcahy discovered that there are limits to the discussion when it comes to political signage outside your home in this presidential election year. The phrase “Fire Obama” is permissible and such placards adorn some yards. But “Kill Obama” is not, and Mulcahy, of Aspen, received a visit the other day from both local police and the U.S. Secret Service. “We felt this was pretty serious -- anything that has to do with the president of the United States is serious, so we immediately contacted the Secret Service,” Blair Dweyer, a community relations specialist for Aspen police, told the Los Angeles Times.

It might be all my fault. Again. Something I wrote years ago about the goings-on in Clint Eastwood's beloved Carmel evidently helped to influence him to run for mayor of that town.That office brought him into a higher profile political orbit, and that ultimately leveraged him onto the stage in Tampa, Fla., last week, costarring with an empty chair in the train-wreck schtick at the Republican National Convention. VIDEO: Watch the RNC speeches Carmel, in the mid-1980s, was a jewel box of a town - quaint, lovely, a longtime artists' Eden.

TAMPA, Fla. - A gun was left unattended on Mitt Romney's charter plane by a member of the U.S. Secret Service on Wednesday as the GOPpresidential nominee flew to Indiana for a campaign rally. During a flight from Tampa to Indianapolis, the weapon was discovered in the lavatory by a CBS News reporter, who alerted agents on the flight, according to an account posted on the television network's website. An agent immediately retrieved the gun. It's unclear how long the firearm was left unattended.

It was billed as the first-ever Kids' State Dinner, but it wasn't.  This was lunch. And the 54 winners of the competition, dreamed up by Epicurious and created in conjunction with First Lady Michelle Obama, made lunch fare: Scrumptious Salmon Salad Lunch and Strawberryana Smoothie, for example. There was also Fish Fueled Pepper Rocket with Kale Chips and Quinoa. And Yummy Cabbage Sloppy Joes. Cabbage on a bun?  It had better be yummy. The 54 lucky winners joined the first lady in the East Room of the White House on Monday, right about brunch time.  The event was streamed live on her Let's Move website, which also has a list of winners and some select recipes, such as Secret Service Super Salad . President Obama crashed the event , according to the Chicago Tribune, where he admitted he was not a great cook -- just an "OK" one.  "I don't cook that often these days," he said, "but I remember cooking.

OXFORD, Ohio - He can rouse large crowds to giddiness, ascend private jets two steps at a time, and catch a baseball with one hand, sign it, and throw it back to an adoring fan. Can Paul D. Ryan leap tall buildings in a single bound? Not yet, though his swarms of adoring fans might find it plausible. It was only a week ago that Ryan was a congressman from a district of 700,000, known - if he was known at all - for his controversial budget plan. Now, he drives in motorcades that close down miles of highway and can't walk down a street in Iowa without being cheered.

A Secret Service official said Newport Beach city administrators are asking the wrong people to pay for police protection at presidential campaign events. It's the service that is responsible for the candidates' security, not the campaigns, said Max Milien, an agency spokesman. Any cost concerns should be directed to the agency. Newport Beach City Manager Dave Kiff billed the campaigns of President Obama and presumptive Republican nominee Mitt Romney for police security at their separate fundraisers this year in the city.

When can you be arrested for talking to someone? When can you be arrested for touching them? When the person you're talking to or touching is the vice president of the United States, it seems. On June 16, 2006, Steven Howards spotted Vice President Dick Cheney, who was coming out of a shopping mall in Beaver Creek, Colo., and chatting amiably with several people. Howards approached the vice president and allegedly pushed or touched him on the shoulder as he told him that his "policies on Iraq are disgusting.

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court shielded two Secret Service agents from being sued for having arrested a Colorado man who confronted former Vice President Dick Cheney on the street and said his "policies on Iraq are disgusting. " The justices said citizens are not protected from a "retaliatory arrest" if police or federal agents have probable cause to take the person into custody. In the Cheney case, a judge said the agents had reason to arrest Steven Howards, the protester, because he had bumped the vice president.

WASHINGTON - The prostitution scandal that has embroiled the Secret Service is not evidence of a wider culture of boozing and paying for sex among those who are trained to take a bullet for the president, the director of the agency told skeptical senators. The senators challenged Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan to explain how it was possible, without an atmosphere of permissiveness among the agency's supervisors, that 12 agents could go out in separate groups on April 11 in Cartagena, Colombia, independently decide to bring women back to their hotel rooms, and then sign the women in at the front desk next to the agents' real names.