How Not to do a Photo-Op

courtesy (yet again) of the Bush Administration (as relayed in this Washington Post story).

1) Show up at Howard University (a prominent black university) after being accused of not caring about blacks in the wake of Katrina. Not a bad move in and of itself if one is looking to patch up one's shoddy image.

2) Make sure to hold your op at the Blackburn Center, which is where the dining hall is located. Standard operating procedure is to lock down the area where the president is. Unfortunately, this means the dining hall had to be closed.

3) Make sure you show up on Soul Food Thursday night. After all, what would be better than picture of you eating fried chicken and collard greens and cornbread with black students? Of course, Soul Food Thursday is most student's favorite night to eat dinner in the dining hall, and they are rather unhappy that the dining hall is now closed.

4) Have campus security tell the hungry students they'd have to come back when Bush and Laura were gone, "then go to a SERVICE door at the REAR of the dining hall and ask for a chicken plate to go". How long has Rosa Parks been dead?

5) Have campus security try to remove media persons interviewing students from the ensuing protest. Despite the fact that this is supposed to be a photo-op.

6) Threaten students that if they don't move their protest because it's in a forbidden area, secret service snipers on the rooftop might open fire on them.

Yes, this is a true story. Un-fricking-believable.