#Beast

In the past, when a sitting president has hit the campaign trail, they’ve leased their own campaign bus which the Secret Service would then retrofit with all the latest security features. But no longer, as Talking Points Memo reports that the presidential bodyguards are buying their own bespoke campaign bus, reportedly from Hemphill Brothers Coach Company. Secret Service spokesman Jim Mackin explains

We’ve never been fully comfortable with the security provided by a bus we lease and then try to retro-fit. This would be just like other vehicles we’re adding to our fleet. We’d use them for the campaign, but they’re not for campaign purposes. They would be part of our fleet — just like our limos, just like our follow-ups, just like our emergency vehicles.

And this isn’t just for President Obama: one of the two new buses will be made available to the Republican candidate as well. And because the buses are government property, they won’t be allowed to have campaign logos and both campaigns will have to reimburse the Secret Service for their use. There’s no word on what retrofits the new buses will receive, but we’d be disappointed to find there’s not at least one minigun turret. Because you can never have enough miniguns on the campaign trail… [Hat Tip: Dan Licht]

Headed for the G8 summit in France, President Obama left Britain today on Air Force One. He left a pile of unpaid traffic tickets behind. London’s Mayor Boris “BoJo” Johnson announced that he will bill the U.S. government 10 pounds for each car in the presidential motorcade, including The Beast that either did or did not get stuck in Ireland. The money is for the London congestion charge, abbreviated to C-charge. “Our roads were not closed during the President’s visit so his motorcade will pay,” the Mayor told London’s Evening Standard. “The Beast will pay the charge, I’m delighted to say.”

While it looks like The Beast will be billed, payment is a completely different matter.

Isn’t the idea of President Barack Obama’s truck-turned-limo that it can get out of a situation real fast? Instead, it caused howls of laughter all over Europe by getting stuck as it emerged from the gates of the US embassy in Dublin.