Secret [Dis]Service

It's become so commonplace that it's hardly news. The U.S. Secret Service agents behaving badly, especially, abroad. This time it was in Amsterdam, where three of them went on a drinking binge which left one of them passed out in a hotel hallway hours before he was to go on duty. To make matters worse, these agents had been warned by a supervisor not to get into trouble. Obviously, there is very little self-discipline in the agency and very little regard for the chain of command.

To say the least, the Secret Service has become a public embarrassment for the American government all around the world. The U.S., which loves to boast about its institutions and lecture the rest of the world on how to conduct official business, gets another black eye at the highest and most visible level.

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