Vacationing On Someone's Dime Besides Your Own (Poll)
How many vacations a year has your family been able to afford since Obama took office in January of 2009? More than one a year? Do you feel that you earned it even if you only got to one during that period where the Obama's have taken 16? I don't begrudge anyone their vacation time but I do have certain expectations when it comes to elected officials and their spouses in particular. If you take time off then I expect to see the results of the hard work to earn it. Or maybe you can take the attitude that "If I got elected I didn't do that. Somebody else did that for me." I know where Obama got his penchant for spending other people's money so easily like there is no bottom to the bank account. He got it from Moochelle.
This is not to say that any President won't spend money traveling. It comes with the job. But is Moochelle the President? Here's my rub with all of this vacationing I see going on in the White House. There are about 23 million Americans out of work or underemployed. That's a statistic that is stuck to the Obama reign so don't even go there. He has been unable to bring unemployment down below 8% despite the constant jiggering of the numbers by the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
After all of his bungling on the job he is now known as "The Undisputed Debt King." He has amassed more debt than all of them combined and his vacation costs seem in line with having that title in history truth be known. The media just made a big to do about the Romney's vacationing in New Hampshire. I can bet that Mitt paid for that vacation, not the tax payers.
Judicial Watch just finally got an answer to their FOIA request regarding the tax payer cost of Moochelle's tribes President's Day soiree this past February. The Whine House is known to stonewall FOIA requests being the transparent administration that it is now known to be. I sense a "get it while we can" mentality surrounding the lavish spending I see the Obama's doing in bad financial times for the rest of the nation. I find that a bit disconcerting because Obama likes to talk about tightening our belts, reducing spending and so forth and so on without evidently thinking of how this appears to average people in this nation who are having to forego vacations entirely.
Just the little weekend Aspen jaunt cost the US tax payers a measly $83,182.99 according to records released to Judicial Watch. That may be measly in Moochelle's eyes but that isn't her money she is spending as usual. That's just the tip of the $1 million iceberg that Moochelle has racked up at tax payer expense for just three of the 16 vacations taken so far. Has anyone told these people that our nation is facing an economic cliff? They have to be aware of that.
Congress has been hammering away at a few executive branch agencies for lavish, wasteful spending. Maybe they need to turn the spy glass onto the White House too. In 2011 Moochelle jetted her family and staff to South Africa and Botswana. Why? The trip was "to encourage young people living in the two growing democracies to become involved in national affairs.” According to Judicial Watch just the cost of the aircraft used came to $424,142. This was the trip where the Obama's daughters were listed as "Senior Staff." Along on the free ride were Moochelle's mother, her niece and nephew (on her side) and her hair sytlist and makeup artist. Anyone smelling abuse here besides me? Yeppers! She knows how to milk the cow. Judicial Watch is still waiting for the additional expenses to be released. There's this transparency issue evidently...
Then we have the jaunt to Spain. In August of 2010, the Missus took one of their daughters, two of her friends with four of their daughters and off they flew to Spain. Details made me grab my calculator. Cost of the 17 hour and fifteen minutes of flying time was $199,323.75. Wouldn't first class commercial have been a little more cost effective? We also paid for the 15 member flight crews accommodations to the tune of $10,290.60 and $2,633.50 for their rental cars. Food costs on the ground for the crew was a mere $876.30.But hang on the bill continues.
Secret Service records obtained report costs of $254,461.20. Not bad for one trip huh? Interesting to note the Secret Service was billed $26,670.61 for a chauffered tour of Costa del Sol and even more interesting was billed $50,078.78 for a travel planning company. When this last tidbit was discovered the ownership of the travel agency was looked into. It seems that Uncle George Soros is a 50% owner of said company. Nothing odoriferous about that to my liberal readers I'm sure, just a coincidence.
According to my calculator those costs alone are $517,664.13.
I Know. I Know...
When was the last time you took a vacation?
Folks I don't know about you but I don't think I can afford the Obama clan and their vacation habits. I'm trying to scrape together enough of my own pennies to take a short vacation that I haven't had for a few years. But one thing I do know. Obama is good at preaching austerity. I'd like for him to set the example for the rest of the nation but maybe that is asking too much from the President of the United States.
Or maybe it is that Obama can't control his wife who herself just came around to being proud of this country. Maybe that's too much to ask too...
We can't afford the Obama's any longer. He's added $5 trillion and counting to our national debt and he and his wife spend like a drunken sailor on shore leave every time they go on any type of vacation and 16 times in less than 4 years seems a bit excessive.
As Always,
The Frog Prince