This post analyzes an apparently deliberate security breach at the Obama rally held in Reunion Arena in Dallas on Wednesday, 2/20/08.

DALLAS -- Security details at Barack Obama's rally Wednesday stopped screening people for weapons at the front gates more than an hour before the Democratic presidential candidate took the stage at Reunion Arena.

-- Fort Worth Star Telegram, 2/22/08

WASHINGTON, Feb. 22 (UPI) -- The U.S. Secret Service Friday denied reports that security measures at a recent Barack Obama rally in Texas were relaxed or deviated from established plans. [This would certainly be true if the breach came off according to plan.]

-- UPI Sports Section, 2/22/08

Failing to inspect purses and packages that might contain weapons is, obviously, a security breach.  According to the Star Telegram, the breach occurred when Secret Service personnel were ordered to stop searching, showing that the breach was deliberate at some level.  The fact that the Secret Service is denying the incident, rather than investigating it, indicates high-level culpability.

But what could be the purpose of such a deliberate security breach?  One possibility is that, after the successful assignation-by-security-breach of Benazir Bhutto, elements in the Bush administration are now planning a similar fate for Barack Obama.  Since there was no actual assassination attempt on Wednesday, it would appear that the purpose of Wednesday's action was merely to test the security-breach mechanism, which failed by the way.  Their operation contains stooges, and they will have to be eliminated before the plan goes live.  After that, all that remains is to insert a secretly groomed assassin, as for example, an embittered Klu Klux Klansman with a terminal illness.

Does this mean Obama is just another dead man walking?  Or is there a way out?  There is.  To begin with, the Obama campaign will have to insist on reviewing all security plans in advance.  Assuming a plan is acceptable, campaign observers with cell phones must then watch every Secret Service agent to ensure that the plan is actually being followed, while reporting to a central control station that will whisk Obama to safety if the plan isn't followed, or if the observers are obstructed (as for example, by jamming their cell phones).