The poor performance of the Secret Service of late has been a cause for concern on both sides of the aisle. (And it’s now led to the resignation of the boss.) Member of Congress from both parties have been demanding answers and trying to find ways to plug the holes in the system, particularly considering the most recent close calls. Strangely, though, New York Times writer Peter Baker seems confused as to why Republicans would have a problem with a madman trying to break into the White House.

President Obama must be touched by all the concern Republicans are showing him these days. As Congress examines security breaches at the White House, even opposition lawmakers who have spent the last six years fighting his every initiative have expressed deep worry for his security.

“The American people want to know: Is the president safe?” Representative Darrell Issa of California, the Republican committee chairman who has made it his mission to investigate all sorts of Obama administration missteps, solemnly intoned as he opened a hearing into the lapses on Tuesday.

Yet it would not be all that surprising if Mr. Obama were a little wary of all the professed sympathy.

The idea of the President being “wary” never crossed the mind of Charles C.W. Cooke.

Frankly, it hadn’t crossed my mind that Issa — or anyone in a similar position — would feel any other way. Of course we want the president to be safe. Those who are surprised by this perhaps need to spend some more time with their ideological opponents, or — and this will be harder, I grant — spend a little more time examining what it is about their ideology that led them to conflate political opposition and violence in the first instance.

Perhaps Baker is projecting a bit. I have seen a few cases where people wished harm upon the President, but the most recent examples which come to mind were revenge porn against a Republican. What the author seems to fail to grasp is that an attack on the President would not be simply an attack on Barack Obama. It’s an attack on the office. It’s an attack on the nation. But I suppose projecting your own fears and anger on those you judge to be ideologically inferior is just easier.

If Mr. Baker would like a free hint, I’m happy to supply one. Roughly half the nation did want to see Barack Obama take a beating… but it was supposed to be at the ballot box two years ago.