I told my co-workers this week that I felt like the Forrest Gump of the newsroom.  Here’s why:

The phone rang on Wednesday and some guy who claimed to be from the White House media office asked me if I wanted to be the local print pool reporter for President Bush’s Oklahoma City visit on Friday.

I had no idea the President was even coming to town, so I took the guy’s phone number and went to talk to my editor. She knew about the visit, so the call was legitimate. She checked with her colleagues on the city desk, and they told me to go ahead and tell the White House I would do it.

So that’s how I ended up standing just below the left wing of Air Force One when President Bush exited the aircraft on Friday morning, straining to hear comments and see who greeted him.  There was Oklahoma City Major Mick Cornett and about  six Air Force officers that I didn’t know, so I was 1-for-7 on IDs.

Then Bush went over and greeted some volunteers that he was honoring in a short ceremony, but I couldn’t hear anything that was said in that, either.  Now I was 0-for-1 on quotes.

But the rest of the day went fine. I rode in the presidential motorcade with Oklahoman photographer Jim Beckel, a local TV reporter and a radio guy, along with the national media pool folks.

There were about 19 vehicles in the motorcade, including two black Suburbans that had “war wagon” written all over them, plus a big black SWAT team-like vehicle, two limos, a regular car or two, two ambulances and about six or seven vans.  

We owned the road because police had every possible entrance blocked off so that  the caravan faced only empty concrete to the Presbyterian Health Foundation Research Park for a health forum. Then we headed up to Britton Road on I-35 and then east to a stunning mansion for a McCain fundraiser.  Lots of people stood in yards and parking lots and waved as we drove past. 

I even waved back a couple of times, hoping none of my colleagues saw.  

After about an hour and a half being sequestered in a game room of the mansion that was the site of a GOP fundraiser, we then rode back to Tinker. Went through a special gate on the east side of the runway, then drove OVER the runway and rolled up just behind Air Force One, which already had its engines running.

President Bush shook hands for about five minutes, then walked up the stairs. He entered the plane at 1:14 p.m. and by 1:17 it was “wheels up,” as we in the presidential pool business like to say.

Then it was back to the reality of the newsroom and a couple of stories to write off the visit.

Best line of the day came from Mayor Cornett after the President’s plane took off. He wanted to know how he was supposed to get back to his car. “They don’t even know who I am now that the President is gone.”  

I’m not sure how the Mayor got to his vehicle, but I was hustled off the base on the media bus.  

Jim Stafford

Business Reporter