Just look at this sniper eating a banana on a rooftop during the inauguration.

Just look at him.

Noticed some snipers hanging out on the roof during the inaugural parade. Zoomed in to find him enjoying a banana. (Thanks, Richard!)

I write books. My latest is a YA science fiction novel called Homeland (it's the sequel to Little Brother). More books: Rapture of the Nerds (a novel, with Charlie Stross); With a Little Help (short stories); and The Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow (novella and nonfic). I speak all over the place and I tweet and tumble, too.

MORE: bananas • dc • just look at it • not food • politics • wide

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http://twitter.com/eksith Eksith Rodrigo

Spotting bad/crazy guys makes you hungry
- Jake0748
  
  If he did spot a bad/crazy guy he was gonna throw that banana peel on the ground right in front of him.
  Yucks would have ensued all around.
  
  Talk about your non-lethal weapons.
  - Brainspore
    
    No, he already apprehended the bad guy and forced him to drop the banana. He is now eating the banana, thus disarming him.
Hirsty

The skin makes a great elbow rest
hobomike

Good thing inaugurations aren’t like fishing boats…
- Boundegar
  
  Good thing they aren’t like subway tracks – Cory woulda got tazed.
  - http://pulse.yahoo.com/_YDTN7MUIUZNGTVOYR7ZJSXZAN4 kid_a_ok_com…
    
    My thought exactly.
flappy

Clearly a tactical banana. The peel can be used as the first line of offense against a perambulating perpetrator.
http://twitter.com/hoffasaurusx Michael Hassall

Maybe he had that thing where your muscles twitch, a dangerous ailment for a sniper. Old wives cure is to eat a banana, and he’s doing just that.
- flappy
  
  Did not realize there was a cure for old wives…
  - ocatagon
    
    It’s called divorce.
- Jonathan Roberts
  
  It’s more dangerous for anyone the sniper’s aiming at, IMHO
Bruno Cardoso

Can’t see a sniper rifle, though. Can’t see how “secret service on the roof checking stuff out” == “sniper”.
- http://profiles.google.com/joshuabardwell Joshua Bardwell
  
  I agree. I would speculate that these guys are spotters and/or are guarding the rooftop.
  - t3kna2007
    
    Or on the lookout for unauthorized photography. You can’t take pictures here. We’re gonna need you to delete those photos.
    - http://lemoutan.blogspot.com/ Lemoutan
      
      Or on the lookout for Scolopacidae, authorised or not.
- http://glitch.tl/ Michael Smith
  
  My impression is that the secret service have done the sums and worked out that keeping guns away from the president, as well as installing barriers is the best way to keep POTUS alive.
  - Bruno Cardoso
    
    Agreed. So, no need to call this two gentlemen snipers.
  - Charlie B
    
    Your impression is likely wrong. I used to drag my VT-100 terminal out to the roof of the Academy of Natural Sciences on the Logan Square in Philly in the summertime and work outside where I could smoke cigarettes and enjoy the sunshine. When the President came to town, large men hung all about with equipment banned me from the rooftops for the entire day, but I saw them setting up sniper rifles longer than my leg at the roofedge. They made me get away from the window when they saw me looking at them and talking on the phone.
    
    Looks to me like one of these guys is probably a radio officer, equipped with extra comm tackle for city work, and banana man is either a spotter or off-duty. But I’m just guessing.
    
    I saw even more interesting things when I worked in a building overlooking the airfield where the President’s plane used to land whenever he visited Delaware.
- Jake0748
  
  Can’t see how that matters to the joke Cory was making, and the rest of us were trying to play along with, buzzkill.
  - Bruno Cardoso
    
    Sorry, I keep forgetting this is the internet.
  - Antinous / Moderator
    
    buzzkill
    
    I can’t hear any buzzing and no one seems to have been killed, so I don’t know why you’re calling him a buzzkill.
    - oasisob1
      
      That sound you don’t hear? It’s the buzzing that was killed?
      - http://twitter.com/chriscoreline chris coreline
        
        your all monsters.
      - http://www.xradiograph.com/ OtherMichael
        
        Two Roman senators are sitting in the back, chatting as the speaker drones on and on. One of them is clearly impatient and bored, so after an hour his friend asks “Why don’t you leave?”
        
        “Because I’m waiting for the verb.”
      - cellocgw
        
        Actually in reply to OtherMichael but not allowed to reply to deep replies (?). Anyhoo, I would have laughed but I had to translate Cicero’s orations in high school. Still gives me the shakes.
- http://twitter.com/AdamDavechick Dave
  
  Photo one, not zoomed in, about one man length in front of them, the barrel of a rifle is silhouetted against the sky. These are counter-snipers, looking for snipers or (hopefully not) to react to and find the source of a shot.
- http://twitter.com/chriscoreline chris coreline
  
  maybe he is just a really really good sniper.
rattypilgrim

It seems like a distraction from his duty. What if he had a bag of pop corn in his hand?
- DreamboatSkanky
  
  Or what if he had been juggling? Or had had his hands in a cat’s cradle? Or a bucket of quick-drying cement? What if?? Very irresponsible.
  - Charlie B
    
    Or one of those big pots of glue like the Katzenjammer Kids!
    
    It’s irresponsible of us not to pre-emptively punish anyone that we can imagine might do something unsavory.
- marilove
  
  They are up there for hours at a time. I’d imagine his stomach growling and he being hungry would be a far bigger distraction, wouldn’t you? Or do you think snipers are robots who don’t get hungry?
http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=504242836 Jon Harris

That’s a direct line to the President on that Banana Phone!
- http://twitter.com/writebastard Ian Wood
  
  ring ring ring ring ring ring ring obama phone
  - Antinous / Moderator
    
    Hello? Yes, this is Banana.
    - Wreckrob8
      
      Canaan Banana?
http://twitter.com/HubrisSonic HubrisSonic

That’s your Tactical Banana there, those things are lethal. Buddy of mine lost an eye just playing around with one. He wasn’t apeeling after that…
- http://www.gyrofrog.com/ Gyrofrog
  
  Is that like the gorillas.bas banana?
M Turk

It’s important to be prepared for the possibility of gorilla warfare.
crimpers

/Gay Agenda 21?
- That_Anonymous_Coward
  
  I’ll admit sometimes my agenda does involve handcuffs… but I think beyond that we aren’t on the same path.
http://profile.yahoo.com/MWNNAJTTXSXFUN4A6FLTKAT264 Michael

But where was he storing the banana?
- http://twitter.com/Friendorfoe10 Reasonable Doubt
  
  he was storing it in a banana case- http://www.amazon.com/Banana-case/dp/B0063J5GAG
- Charlie B
  
  It was in a sling.
That_Anonymous_Coward

HOW DARE YOU!
Your giving aid to terrorists!
Noe they know they just have to poison the banana’s before big events to render random dudes on a roof incapable of standing there looking like they are doing something important!

for the impaired… yes its humor…
Michael Vilain

Keep Calm. And always bring a banana to a party.
sam1148

It’s a tactical banana. The peel can thrown ninja like into the path of a suspicious person tripping them up, a non-lethal method and perfectly fine.
bzishi

Sadly, two minutes later the other gentleman slipped on the peel and fell off the roof. After hitting several flagpoles on the way down and bouncing off an awning, he was trampled to death by a marching band followed by a steamroller.
Finnagain

You’ve got to wonder just how further advanced their banana slicing technology is though.
xgad

What about pointed sticks? http://youtu.be/4bCyIAsSid8?t=24s
Preston Sturges

Those rooftop guys are around for every event. They were on the Lincoln memorial for the Glenn Beck rally and there were no weren’t even any elected officials.

The real action is when they spot weld the manholes shut and remove the mailboxes and trashcans on the parade route. I remember reading an old story about someone sweeping their balcony on inauguration day, and the phone rang, and the police said “Please put the broom down, you are making the snipers nervous and you don’t want to make the snipers nervous.”
- oasisob1
  
  Aren’t they around for every non-event, too? I’ve visited DC several times in the last few years and they are there. Sometimes they are eating apples.
  - DreamboatSkanky
    
    Apples? Seriously? Pix or it didn’t happen.
Renoun

“Now that you mention it that is a banana in my pocket.”
caseyd

drone spotters
http://imcravingpresidency.tumblr.com/ SedanChair

THE PEEL IS DOWN, I REPEAT, THE PEEL IS DOWN
peregrinus

Did you check out all the spotters? How awesomely NRA-baiting it would be for POTUS to have ordered the entire security detail to ostentatiously display bananas instead of weapons.
- http://www.aarongilliland.com/ Aaron Gilliland
  
  No, no, this is just Steven Spielberg’s re-edit.
  - cellocgw
    
    You mean, Han ate one first?
http://www.aarongilliland.com/ Aaron Gilliland

Miller… One banana… TWO kills…
ludd

Yeah, it’s an easy mistake to make at this range. It is not a banana. That is a .50 cal Plantain. Standard issue.
Thorzdad

Those guys are stationed up there for hours at a time. It’s “best practice” to pack snacks.
cheshireforhire

The banana is the natural prey of the sniper. You can tell from the photo that he is the alpha of the sniper pack and receives first rights to feed, the others will just have to wait their turn.

Not only is it a good snack, but I would imagine the potassium would be helpful in his line of work. Last thing a sniper would want are muscle spasms or cramps.
Dan Metcalf

Sniper + no gun? = MIND BULLETS
- Felton / Moderator
  
  Scanner snipers?
- Antinous / Moderator
  
  Or ass bullets.
Tonewah

They’re obviously time-travelling nazi’s (note the armbands) come to see how good things turned out, who just happened to bring a snack to eat while watching the future unfold.
http://blog.doomsdayzen.com agonist

I was the sniper eating that banana on that rooftop, you insensitive clod! (Sorry, am I mixing memes?)
http://sorcerersworkshop.org/ Sorcerer Mickey

A clarification: If it’s Bad Guys or Perps, we call them “Snipers”; if it’s Law Enforcement or the Military, we refer to them as “Sharpshooters.”
http://www.xradiograph.com/ OtherMichael

The bananas were a salute to Biden’s hometown of Scranton, PA:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/30,000_Pounds_of_Bananas

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HfFM4Ilt4Rs
http://www.xradiograph.com/ OtherMichael

The Bat-Man (Tony Millionaire and Chip Kidd) has this problem all the time.
fenester

I hear they are chock full of potussium.
CLamb

I find it more interesting that they are wearing red armbands. Reminds me of the Chinese Great Cultural Revolution.
- L_Mariachi
  
  That’s likely the “color of the day,” announced to Secret Service & law enforcement the morning of the event so they don’t get mistaken for bad guys setting up rifles on rooftops. Undercover cops frequently do a similar thing (although not with armbands,) wearing a scarf or hat or something of a particular color so they’re recognizable to other cops.
Mister44

I think the potassium in bananas are supposed to help you not shake – or steady yourself – when shooting. IIRC. He could have just been hungry and some asshole already ate all the doughnuts.
EichaelThe0ne

No, Lieutenant. Your men are already dead.