West Point, NY, May 23, 2009 – Defense Secretary Robert Gates attended the 2009 U.S. Military Academy commencement in West Point on Saturday during the Memorial Day holiday weekend.  We noted that Secretary Gates was very accessible to photographers at the West Point graduation, and we wondered if that had anything to do with the change of administration – during the Bush administration, government officials for the most part turned a cold shoulder to the media at the West Point graduations.

Gates jokingly told the crowd that he’d been doing this long enough to realize that his speaking was keeping the graduates from partying.  The traditional hat-toss followed soon after.

At least Gates was on time for the graduation ceremony – a couple of days earlier, he arrived several hours late for the Salute to Freedom dinner aboard the Intrepid Sea, Air & Space Museum in Manhattan.