Not-So-Secret Service Code Names Revealed
Obama's Code Name Is Renegade; Biden Is Celtic Trailblazer and Tempo are making way for Renegade and Renaissance. The not-so-secret code names used by the U.S. Secret Service for the president-elect and his family have been published. President-elect Barack Obama --aka Renegade -- had a say in choosing the code name that his protectors use when they're whispering into those microphones in their sleeves. He was given his choice of several names starting with R. As for President George W. Bush and wife, Laura, whatever else their new lives hold for them, they can take their alternate identities as Trailblazer and Tempo with them. They're still entitled to Secret Service protection. Ronald Reagan, who cultivated the brush-clearing cowboy image, was Rawhide. Some code names haven't worked out as well. When Jesse Jackson was assigned the code name Pontiac during his 1988 run for president, some thought the name had racial overtones. "Pontiac" is the set-up for a well-known racist joke.
The Secret Service said there was no racial motivation in selecting the name and offered the candidate a new one. Jackson said he had no problem with it.
There's no word on why Obama selected Renegade.
But it's a sure bet he wasn't thinking about the word's origins. According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, Renegade's earliest meanings had to do with deserting one's religion, coming from the Spanish word "renegado," originally "Christian turned Muslim."
http://www.local10.com/politics/17972885/detail.html
Obama's Code Name Is Renegade; Biden Is Celtic Trailblazer and Tempo are making way for Renegade and Renaissance. The not-so-secret code names used by the U.S. Secret Service for the president-elect and his family have been published. President-elect Barack Obama --aka Renegade -- had a say in choosing the code name that his protectors use when they're whispering into those microphones in their sleeves. He was given his choice of several names starting with R. As for President George W. Bush and wife, Laura, whatever else their new lives hold for them, they can take their alternate identities as Trailblazer and Tempo with them. They're still entitled to Secret Service protection. Ronald Reagan, who cultivated the brush-clearing cowboy image, was Rawhide. Some code names haven't worked out as well. When Jesse Jackson was assigned the code name Pontiac during his 1988 run for president, some thought the name had racial overtones. "Pontiac" is the set-up for a well-known racist joke.
The Secret Service said there was no racial motivation in selecting the name and offered the candidate a new one. Jackson said he had no problem with it.
There's no word on why Obama selected Renegade.
But it's a sure bet he wasn't thinking about the word's origins. According to the Online Etymology Dictionary, Renegade's earliest meanings had to do with deserting one's religion, coming from the Spanish word "renegado," originally "Christian turned Muslim."
http://www.local10.com/politics/17972885/detail.html