The White House Gate Crashers: What Went Wrong?

It could have been a terrorist or an assassin.

in reference to:

"At least two people who weren't invited, we now know. Just how reality-TV-wannabes Michaele and Tareq Salahi managed to crash last week's first State Dinner (See TIME's photos here.) has been the subject of back-to-back front page stories in the Washington Post and another one in the New York Times. The story raises some serious questions about White House security, given how close they got to the President and the Indian Prime Minister, as well as so many other high-ranking government officials. As of now, the Secret Service is blaming the debacle on a breach at a single checkpoint, though they are being vague on the details. My own experience with these things is both limited and dated. Back in 1999, I attended a similar dinner the Clintons threw in honor of Chinese Premier Zhu Rongji. (According to the Washington Post account of that dinner, I got invited under the "White House always throws a bone to reporters who follow the president" exemption. Whatever. I was very, very happy to be there for what turned out to be a very cool experience.) But what I know from that dinner tells me there were a number of places where things went wrong: The first thing to know is what makes entering the White House for one of these big social events different from, say, getting in for a routine interview or a briefing. For state dinners, invited guests are allowed to drive a car up to the building. The guards go over your vehicle, including putting something that looks like a gigantic dental mirror under it, and then you are sent up the driveway to the White House, where a uniformed military officer takes your keys and parks your car."
- UPDATE: Guess Who Came To Dinner? - Swampland - TIME.com (view on Google Sidewiki)