As the Brush Piles Up in August
Politico covered something yesterday that I’ve been harping on on Twitter all month. Obama (and therefore his staffers) haven’t exactly matched Bush’s commitment to saving the world from overgrown Texas pig farms.
When President Barack Obama heads to Martha’s Vineyard for a little rest and relaxation later this month, it will be his first vacation in the seven months since he took office. And while the boss is away, the West Wing will finally empty out, too.
So far, the Obama administration has been running at a dizzying pace, with jam-packed days and an intense, ever-growing agenda. White House press secretary Robert Gibbs hasn’t missed a single daily briefing at the White House since his boss took office in January. With the exception of a long weekend or two, chief of staff Rahm Emanuel has hung around town. Senior adviser David Axelrod has yet to take a vacation other than a few jaunts to Chicago for Bulls games.
“I don’t think we had any other option,” Axelrod said in an interview with POLITICO. “There’s a lot of work to be done. We’ve got a lot of problems to solve. That requires a lot of energy and a lot of attention.”
But the holidays are here at last. Vice President Joe Biden will vacation on Kiawah Island in South Carolina for the next week. Senior adviser Valerie Jarrett will follow POTUS, her longtime friend, to the Vineyard during the last week in August. Axelrod will head for his lakeside vacation home in Michigan. Emanuel’s aides say he will take some time off, but they were unsure if he would head for Michigan, where he also has a home, or Florida, where he has vacationed, or someplace else.
Aside from a rather self-interested impatience on my part for Axe and Rahm to get to MI and start spending wads of cash, I raise this for a couple of reasons.
First, love or hate what the Obama Administration is doing, they’re working their asses off. It’s something that the press hasn’t covered, really. And in this story, the only comparison with Bush is a mention of the number of days in August 2001–24–that Bush spent clearing brush; by my count, Obama will have 11 vacation days this August, including a 4-day weekend next weekend. It deserves to be mentioned that Democrats once again have a work ethic that Republicans can’t seem to match (the same thing happened, btw, when Dems re-took Congress; Republicans bitched that they would have to work more than 2.5 days a week).
And, for as much as Obama is as good at creating his own mystique as the next guy (probably better), he hasn’t chosen to do so here. He’s going to go to Martha’s Vineyard, a location that has little upside spin, though a real association with Northeast liberals. He hasn’t–yet, at least–created the kind of stage set vacation home that so many of our TV era presidents have done. (That’s probably because any such stage set would be in Hawaii, and Cokie Roberts wouldn’t approve.)
Keep your eyes out next weekend, though. The Obama’s are headed out on the aforementioned long weekend. They’re headed to, curiously, Yellowstone and Grand Canyon.
Interesting choices.
After all, there’s simply no way they can clear out the places for the Obamas. The parks will be packed with people who have come from very long distances on long-planned family vacations at a national park. Which presents a security challenge. But also the possibility that the President’s very charismatic family will be engaged in the all-American summer vacation, not only like other families, but with other families (and a whole bunch of Europeans, as well). And maybe pitching health care along the way.
I gotta say this, though. Sasha and Malia–who will be enjoying a very abbreviated form of the same vacation lots of Americans take as 11 or 8 year olds–don’t know what they’re missing. When I was that age, I spent three weeks in the back seat fighting over invisible lines with two older brothers. I’m guessing the Obama girls are going to miss that fun as they head out for their requisite family national park trip on Air Force One.
Now would be a bad time for them to vacation in Hawaii– Hurricane Felicia is dancing with the Islands, and although it is losing force, it is still potent. Big Island is getting its full force today, and it is expected to pass south of Honolulu tomorrow, bringing drenching rain and high winds.
I do hope they get some serious R&R, however. Thanks for pointing out their frantic work schedules. I wish them well.
Bob in HI
And I thought you guys were typhoon candidates, not hurricaine.
Stay safe, Bob.
Typhoons are West of the International Date Line. We’re East of that, so they’re still hurricanes. Or so I’ve heard.
Aloha,
Bob in HI
First thought, EEEKKK, guns are now allowed in the parks. Second thought, the girls can fight aboard Air Force One. Abbreviated fighting, though.
Really good point about the work ethic disparity between the parties, though. KKKarl might be the exception.
Yeah, I was thinking about that–this does seem to be a big security challenge, particularly in Yellowstone.
Maybe they’ll view the canyon from a helicopter, though that doesn’t seem like them.
And I assume the girls have separate bucket seats. So they’ll be deprived, at least, of the line down the middle of the seats. “She crossed the line, Mom!!”
I know. Four siblings here. Could be just a little of the pinky over the line for a fight.
Masking tape on the carpet?
Wow, megatons of nostalgia. I often wonder if my parents traded the Chevy Nomad for our Pontiac Safari wagon because the upholstery had a four-inch DMZ down the middle.
Wishing our outstanding public servants well this summer, they’ve worked very hard in the Augean stables left by the Bushies and deserve a break. Who will be the first FOXie to complain, do you suppose? I bet KKKarl.
And I hope that Rahm meets a man with an intriguing job offer while on holiday.
Agreed! “Fucking Stupid” really needs to make a big career move. For the good of the country and all, I mean.
I’d suggest a career move to the Hague, but I don’t think it’s the kind he’d like to make.
I remember as a kid, fifty years ago at Yellowstone, the Rangers asked if my dad and friend had any salmon eggs, that were used to feed the small trout. They said yes but wouldn’t use it. The Rangers said throw it out, and my dad pretended to. The Rangers later saw no eggs and found our camp site and demand the eggs, which my dad had already thrown in the river.
Today, a visitor with a 50 caliber sniper scope rifle couldn’t be questioned. America, the land of the ….
Do not complain about the amount of vacation Bush and the congressional republicans take. If they had worked as hard as Obama has, imagine the shape the country would be in.
Boxturtle (Double economic damage and a war with Iran, at least)
Very good point BoxTurtle
I’ve checked back in several times over the course of the day, and W still hasn’t moved in that live web cam shot at the top of the post.
Hope all you hippies checked out the Woodstock videos and photos. You’ll be young again!
Thanks, EW; it does seem that every day I hear or read about some horrific Bush policy being reversed or cancelled (road-building in national forests, anyone?), and think, Gawd, it’s going to take a decade to get to it all, and people claiming he’s (PBO) doing nothing are just wrong.
A week or so ago I calculated how many days off Bush had taken by this point in his 1st term, compared with how many O has. don’t remember where I put that, but we know the basic ratio, right?
Re: all-American vacay – I love that they’re choosing Yellowstone and
Grand Canyon. Really, what could be more all-American?
And, yep, my family went to Grand Canyon the summer I was 13. Sadly, I had food poisoning or something and spent much of the day there in a nasty latrine. Vague memories of looking out at the Canyon. Bet they have flush toilets there, now, huh?
LooHoo – I looked at those Woodstock vids – mostly, I felt old – all those “old folks” telling their stories! Best was the old home movie of cars full of kids heading for the festival. And how few in those cars actually looked much like hippies. Loved the one by the woman with her teen-age son; pix of her now and then. Gee, all those girls looked just like me (then). Still, it was fun.
I remember hearing something about it from deep in the midwest (Indiana U. Bloomingon campus), but knowing immediately that my parents would never let me go, so I didn’t try. *g*
Come on back to the Grand Canyon, it is still awesome and waiting for you.
Ooh, LooHoo – listening to American Routes on NPR station – songs from sixties and seventies Newport Festivals – right now talking to Joan Baez about arriving in Harvard Square, landing in the epicenter of the new folk movement. Ahh, mem’reez…..la la la la….
Oh, thanks! Off with the iTunes library, on with Nick and AmRoutes!
Bob in Hi, Felicia’s now a TS with sustained winds of 50mph. Looks like we on Oahu have more rain than wind to worry about.
Aw, thanks, bmaz. Can you still see it? (joke) I don’t recall much infrastructure; now I understand visitors’ facilities are quite developed.
If I ever get both time and travelin’ money at the same time, I’d love to really see it.
Heh, no, my eyesight sucks so I can’t see it from Phoenix. But my wife and daughter were up there a couple of weeks ago and the pictures still look the same. If you go, and are into a hiking trip, I heartily suggest a side canyon off the Grand Canyon, known as Havasupai Canyon. It is beyond stunning and spectacular.
Has Bush gone to that great brush field in the sky? No one ever mentions him and he appears to have dropped out of sight completely. I don’t read the Dallas papers so maybe he and Laura are in the social whirl and I just don’t know it. Has anyone heard what he’s doing…..oh, wait, he working on his book?
and his library, but funding has been slow.
You kiddin’ me? 1) He doesn’t work and 2) the only book we know he appreciates is “The Pet Goat.” Actually, that’s probably good news–perhaps his book will be short, mercifully short. And with pictures. Whee!
and it will be printed upside down.
Funny Bush started his Presidency with an economy that was tanking yet he took all that time off. Imagine if he had gotten to work would 9/11 had hit our economy so bad if Bush had taken an interest in the California power crisis manufactured by Enron?
You can’t cripple California’s economy enough to force a recall vote on a governor without weakening the nation.
Enron was a house of cards they like the food industry, drug industry etc need new products to keep growing in a growing economy.
Once growth stops the banks tighten up credit and the funds for growth disappear along with house of cards business plans.
On the plus side Bush did prove Milton Friedman wrong.
Bush might be a rather special case, since it’s fairly clear he was as lazy as he was incompetent & incurious, but on the whole, I do not think modern-day Republicans have any real interest in governing. My own suspicion is that they’re contemptuous of our government — they certainly act as if they are — and this is probably due to the whole “the govt is the problem” Reagan thing. He is their hero, after all, for some odd reason.
Republicans absolutely love the fight of it all though — impeding Dems from doing anything substantive or crushing them into the carpet when Repubs are on top. They also, of course, enjoy the whole power thing.
Shrug. Just my take …
No sorry needed why anyone votes for government officials who think government can’t work is beyond me I want my pilot on an airplane to believe that Man can fly!
I want my Doctor to believe that its worth the effort to try and fix me when I’m sick.
Quiters Like Sarah and Vacation Specialist like Bush need not apply.
Just how many days did Bush take for vacation total in 8 years while we fought 2 wars? How many does Bush stack up against FDR, Johnson, Truman, Nixon and other Presidents fighting wars?
Very is Obama saying he feels safe in the red states despite his *cough* lower poll numbers? The GOP is trying their best to say the President is unpopular and scare people away from Town Halls.
When Bush had these numbers Broder was calling for a Bush Bounce very soon!
I am not sure what the point is. So what if the Obama Administration has been working like mad? It has been producing one bad policy after another. We are escalating in Afghanistan, not withdrawing from Iraq, Guantanamo doesn’t look like it is closing, Bagram is expanding. Obama has not renounced Bush’s domestic wiretapping programs. He continues to employ the state secrets argument. New USAs are not being appointed and he is not pushing for hearings for them and federal judges, or Dawn Johnsen for that matter. He is trying to hide the torture photographs. He continues not to investigate and prosecute criminal and constitutional violations that were rampant in the Bush years. His economic plan was to pump $7 trillion into a broken system of crony capitalism. Depression in 2011 remains extremely likely. He has taken shots at Social Security and is currently sponsoring a healthcare program based apparently on who can sell out the most to the insurance companies, BigPharma and the medical industry. To be honest, I could live without such business. It is entirely too destructive.
Hey, bmaz, if you see this – I’ve heard of Havasupai. In no shape for any kind of hiking now == recently realized this, and it’s one reason I am trying to exercise and lose a little weight so that when the opportunity comes I can take advantage of it. I used to be quite a walker, even a bit of a climber. Don’t want to find I have the time and the money but the body just won’t cooperate!
Living in Boston without a car (in my 20’s), the ex and I used to tease visitors, used to driving, who’d poop out early when we took them around on foot to the historical spots. The Freedom Trail might wear me out today, I fear, let alone a real canyon hike.
And, so of course, at long last, once again not early, off to bed.
Tomorrow is another day on which my fortunes may change, right?
Has anyone else noticed that Obama has also dispelled the climate of fear this country operated under since 2001? Before going on vacation, Bush would declare a terror alert so we were thinking about the right things while he was away. Obama is not playing that game, but gets little credit.
I’d suggest he’s due for a L-O-N-G, preferably out-of-the-country vacation.
Linkmeister:
They’re saying we on Maui are supposed to get hit with lots of rain, but it’s sunny, sunny, sunny out right now.
Worst thing about these storms = power outages. No internet.
Maybe we should think of Rahm as their older brother? Okay, maybe not.