Because I work across Lafayette Park from the White House, I experience the already oppressive security around it every day. The street in front of the president's residence is completely blocked off from traffic; uniformed secret service swarm, both on foot and in patrol cars out front; inside the fence motion and other sensors should warn of any intruders, and Lafayette Park is likely under constant surveillance. Thus, the "people's house" in the "freest nation on earth" is already a mini garrison state.

Yet security agencies regularly use any incident as a way to enhance their reach and constrict the freedom they are supposed to be protecting. Despite all of these security measures, the intruder was able to enter the White House through an unsecured door. Perhaps the Secret Service should merely lock the door, much as hundreds of millions of Americans do, and call it a day.