monmouth
Obama says Air Force One travel is ‘not my choice' in sharp exchange
President Barack Obama on Thursday firmly rejected any criticism that his worldwide travel on Air Force One or his family's vacations have left him out of touch with Americans' struggles, saying flying aboard the famed official plane is "not my choice."
"The fact of the matter is, I think if you look at my track record, I'm raising a family here. When we travel, we got to travel through Secret Service, and Air Force One, that's not my choice. I think most folks understand how hard I work and how hard this administration is working on behalf of the American people," Obama told KMOV of St Louis. The interview was one of four sessions the White House arranged with local TV in states expected to be battlegrounds in November.
KMOV reporter Larry Conners had told Obama that some of the station's viewers "are complaining, they get frustrated, even angered, when they see the first family jetting around, different vacations and so forth, sometimes maybe, they think, under color of state business and that you're out of touch, that you don't really know what they're experiencing right now."
"Well, I don't know how many viewers you're talking about that say that," Obama countered. "We do hear from some," replied Conners. "I hear from all kinds of viewers about everything," Obama shot back. "I'm sure you do," said Conners.
Rest of article: http://news.yahoo.com/obama-says-air-force-one-travel-not-choice-001915991.html
http://www.democraticunderground.com/125129442He is out of touch. How many of us can hop on any plane every other month for some lavish vacation?
He really could show some restraint and cut down the amount of pleasure trips.
The left blasted Bush for going to Crawford every summer, yet when he was there we weren't paying for him and his wife to book entire floors of hotels that most of us couldn't afford to spend one night in. Is he really that clueless?
Retrograde
1. Obama's taking vacations now?
He goes off to his native Hawai'i once a year, and I think Martha's Vineyard in the summer, but that's hardly anything compared to some of his predecessors!
Lawlbringer
4. Bush was at his Ranch for what seemed like 70% of his Presidency
and even Bill (My personal favorite President) Clinton seemed to be at Camp David all the time lol
Which leads me to believe that the White House isn't a very fun off-hours place. Wouldn't they want to make it a little more homey? Take a little break from working and go play some pinball or something.
Yeah Bush was at his ranch not expensive hotels, and I don't recall them having to use a separate plane for the first lady everytime they went somewhere.
PotatoChip
7. I know. Isn't it funny how repugs conveniently 'forget'
- or never acknowledged in the first place- how much time GW spent vacationing... or claimed to be "working" at 'The Western White House'?
I doubt President Obama comes within 1/4 of the amount of time GW took for himself.
Raven
8. If some of these assholes stopped threatening his life
maybe he could fly commercial.
Maybe if you moonbats weren't constantly dreaming of executing Bush, he could have flown commercial.
wandy
9. Just goes to show how dumb some of our red footed friends are.....
Obama and family have NO choice other than Air force 1.
We would not let the President of the United States go tramping around on a Gray Hound Bus.
No matter who the president is at the time.
And the whole security thing has got to be a real bitch.
My bet is Obama can't even go out in the back yard without 3 to 5 secret service agents hovering around him.
As it should/must be, no matter who the president is at the time.
If our red footed friends had to put up with that they'd be screaming about government intrusion.
But yes, Limpballs will tell them what a wast of taxpayer dollars it is.
And they all will echo the same Meme.
He does have a choice on whether he goes every other month on an expensive vacation though.
