Technically, once you get elected to any office in America, you don't have to mingle with the people at all. You can sit in your office and give speeches on television or show your face only to your supporters. But most Presidents know better. Two unusual examples of the President mingling with the proles were Richard Nixon confronting anti-war protesters at the Lincoln Memorial during the Vietnam era and Jimmy Carter walking through the decrepit South Bronx in 1977. These stunts may have done some good; maybe Nixon was able to humanize the people whom he had detested for years, and maybe Carter changed his domestic policies after seeing the worst of the urban ghetto.

Nixon and Carter were not good presidents, but at least they were able to confront reality from time to time. President Bush, on the other hand, would rather hide behind his flunkies assigned to shield him from protesters. This tactic is now a matter of government policy, according to a very interesting document unearthed by the American Civil Liberties Union.

While representing some First Amendment victims in a lawsuit against the Federal government, the ACLU got its hands on a top-secret Bush administration handbook for dealing with anti-Bush demonstrators. The handbook actually endorses an illegal scheme, and it makes you long for the days of Richard Nixon, Watergate and all.

This document, available here, gives instructions for how to deal with Bush's public appearances. There's a chapter on handling demonstrators. "Always be prepared for demonstrators," it says on page 33. Of course, demonstrators cannot be killed or beaten. But they can be minimized. According to the handbook, even organizers can ask local authorities to stick the demonstrators far away from the President, "preferably not in view of the event site or motorcade route." (Page 34). The other way to deal with demonstrators is through "rally squads."

Rally squads, according to this document, are made up of local Republican college kids and other volunteers who can counter the demonstrators' message by strategically placing themselves near them. "The rally squad's task is to use their signs and banners as shields between the demonostrators and the main press platform. If the demonstrators are yelling, rally squads can begin and lead supportive chants to drown out the protesters (USA! USA! USA!). As a last resort, security should remove the demonstrators from the event site. The rally squads can include, but are not limited to, college/young republican organizations, local athletic teams, and fraternities/sororities."

The illegal tactic in the how-to manual involves removing demonstrators from the event site. That can only happen if the demonstrators are disorderly. Nothing about disorderly conduct in the presidential manual, however. The Bush administration is not above this response to dissent. For more on that, read here. It seems clear the administration is obsessed with demonstrators who might generate local television coverage and steal the thunder from the bullshit being promoted by Bush at his public appearances which normally garner "gee-whiz" news coverage from local journalists who never have anything interesting to write about. It is this refusal to confront dissent and opposing points of view that has killed over 3,000 American soldiers in Iraq.