Obama is about to go on vacation, so you know what that means! Endless wankery from Republicans about Obama going on vacation, cost analysis of Secret service details, and the works. The RNC is ahead of the game with vacation postcards you can send Obama:
Meanwhile, the facts tell a different story:
There has been criticism of the president’s vacation at this time. But how does the number of vacation days the president has spent compare to his predecessors? CBS Radio’s Mark Knoller has kept track of presidential vacations for years and supplied the data.
So far, President Obama has taken 61 vacation days after 31 months in office. At this point in their presidencies, George W. Bush had spent 180 days at his ranch where his staff often joined him for meetings. And Ronald Reagan had taken 112 vacation days at his ranch.
Among recent presidents, Bill Clinton took the least time off — 28 days.
To be fair, a presidential vacation away from the White House is not the same as a vacation for the average person. The president is still in contact with his advisers and on call for any emergency.
Looks like Rain Main at CBS came through for a change.
I hate Republicans. Also, too.
agrippa
Normal table pounding.
This sort of thing is to be expected.
dmsilev
To be fair, Bush taking long vacations was a good thing; it reduced somewhat the amount of damage he did. And also probably slightly reduced the potential for Texas wildfires.
Villago Delenda Est
The facts, as we’ve seen demonstrated over and over again for the past 30 odd years, have a decidedly liberal bias.
zmulls
Love the not-racist-at-all backwards baseball cap.
I remember all the pictures of George W. Bush with a t-shirt and backwards baseball cap. Good times.
aisce
did they photoshop a doo-rag on the president’s head? and, of course, the white t-shirt. classy. they forgot to give him some chains.
this was the national republican campaign committee? jesus fucking christ.
PeakVT
@dmsilev: I don’t know. Bush being out of town could have left Cheney free to meddle even more.
4tehlulz
No “THUG 4 LIFE”? GOP is slipping.
Carnacki
@dmsilev: Aug 6, 2001. Bush was on vacation when he got the PDB about bin Laden and he thanked the briefer with “you’ve covered your ass.”
Just countering the point that Bush did less harm when he was on vacation.
Corner Stone
@4tehlulz:
The card doesn’t show his hands but he’s holding a blunt in one and a bagged forty in the other.
dmsilev
@PeakVT: Fair point.
nevsky42
@zmulls:
@aisce:
Yeah, the actual content of the e-mail didn’t register at first because I was still picking up my jaw from this racist bullshit…
This isn’t a dog whistle, it’s a fucking air raid siren…
MattF
… and it’s probably safe to assume that he’ll be accompanied on his vacation by his wife who, as you may know, is colored.
Villago Delenda Est
@MattF:
And has bare arms. And eats cheeseburgers. Probably made with brie or some other French cheese. With dijon mustard. And that funny lettuce-substitute stuff.
General Stuck
Hell, Reagan slept in to 9 every morning, got rousted out of his rack, downed a few jelly beans, said a few pretty words and took off for Southern Cal, to get in some horseback riding. But Reagan was Wingnut Gawd. Obama is the black devil riding shiny black buses, probly selling crack to school kids when not plotting terrorist attacks on Texas.
Bubblegum Tate
The actual wingnut talking point I encounter over and over again on this:
“Bush wasn’t taking vacations, he was going to his ranch to WORK! He had to get away from Washington so he could get things done, and he brought his work with him, kept his advisers close, and held meetings, just not at the White House. Obama’s just going on expensive vacations on the taxpayers’ dime!”
Bulworth
@MattF: And is trying to force all Americans to eat peas and other green things and take away our McD’s.
Violet
@nevsky42:
I know. I had the same reaction. They’ll claim it’s a baseball cap, but it looks like a doo-rag. Baseball caps don’t have the hem at the bottom, nor do they have the creases across the top of the head — they’re too thick for that. It’s obviously a doo-rag with a bill tacked on at the last moment so they can claim it’s “not racist.”
These people might as well put on the white sheets.
Davis X. Machina
I don’t know why you’re all wound up. The words ‘shiftless’, ‘lazy’ and ‘no-account’ were not used anywhere.
Sam Houston
Congress has been on a vacation from responsibility since 9/11. Man this is turning into a shitty millennium!
Sam Houston: I preferred measuring deer tracks to tape – that I liked the wild liberty of the Red men better then the tyranny of my brothers.
Villago Delenda Est
@Bubblegum Tate:
Yeah, right, all those well orchestrated photo ops of the deserting coward’s “work” at clearing brush, and riding a bicycle, were all liberal plots to make us think he wasn’t sweating out the details of some battalion op order in Fallujah.
Vishnu Schist
Love the cornrows under the hat too. His vacation is actually a week of grinding on a corner in Baltimore, hope Marlo doesn’t show up
Judas Escargot
They forgot the gold tooth and the Mike Tyson tribal face tatts.
They’re slipping.
Bulworth
@aisce: What a classy bunch.
scarshapedstar
C’mon, guys, no gold chain? No crack pipe?
Mark
@Vishnu Schist: Barry’s a good earner
aimai
@MattF:
They’ve been bitching about Michelle and her “vacations” for a while. She’s taken so few that they had to include the lovely “weekend” that she spent with the President reassuring the Gulf area that their water wasn’t permanently destroyed. That must have been a fun, romantic, getaway!
aimai
SenyorDave
Since I’m not running for president and it can’t hurt me (although apparently the WSJ and other bastions of conservative thought don’t have a problem with Perry calling Bernanke treasonous), I can say it:
IMO The RNC and the tea party congressman act like treasonous, racist scum. This latest stunt is par for the course.
Corner Stone
If I were Obama I’d be fairly pleased with the card. IMO, it makes him look early 30’s again.
artem1s
@PeakVT:
I prayed Cheney would take more vacations; at least he limited his personal second amendment solutions to GOP donors.
scav
‘f course, showing mostly naked (with strategically placed gold watch and fob) obese white men in top hats lolling on a beach being served champagne and canapes of hundred dollar bills by supermodels with a similar greeting would be class warfare. tut tut tut.
4tehlulz
@Corner Stone: Never underestimate the rejuvenating powers of vector graphics.
Linda Featheringill
I agree with all the observations you guys have made. It’s not a baseball cap.
HOWEVER, I think Obama looks cute in that getup. And I’m probably not the only person in the country to think so.
Villago Delenda Est
Given the expression on Obama’s face in the postcard, it seems that this GOP strategery is not working as well as they’d planned.
dmsilev
@aimai: It’s not just vacations either. David Frum, who passes for sane by conservative standards, got all huffy recently about how Michelle Obama dared to be photographed barefoot inside the residence portion of the White House (the family was watching the finals of the Women’s World Cup; hardly a formal state dinner). They just don’t believe the Obamas are legitimate occupants of the White House.
jwb
@Corner Stone: Yes, the image works more by juvenilization rather than making him look scarry or threatening. It seems to be playing into the current media meme of Obama as passive sap.
aimai
I went over there–this is only one of about thirty cards. I thought I’d download it and send my own message of encouragement to the President but the cards come ready loaded with some little bitchy point, some right wing story line like “teleprompter” or “appearing on ESPN” or “40 fundraisers.” So they were at least clever enough to make sure that the platform they are using can’t be hijacked by supporters of the President. They’ve improved a bit since Michael Steele had that walking/talking widget of himself that could be attached to porn sites.
aimai
Villago Delenda Est
@dmsilev:
Of course not. They’re usurpers. Any Democrat in the White House is.
It’s funny how the Dems didn’t automatically assume after 20 years of FDR and Truman in the WH that the WH was their party property, but the Rethugs, after 12 years of Reagan and Poppy Bush, immediately declared Bill Clinton to be an usurper, and the legacy has been passed on to Barack Obama.
Maude
They should have hired Rush to do the card.
Why is Rush still on the air?
I wonder how many people in the country will get the picture of Obama. Some may think he looks cute.
niknik
@aimai:
You could always cover their pre-formulated trash with cardboard paper (I’m thinking glue stix) and write your own sweet nothings…
/arts&crafts addict
shortstop
@aimai:
Another missed opportunity. I gotta pay closer attention.
niknik
@niknik:
Oh. Digital, not real postcards. So my plan is, essentially, stupid.
*fooey*
bkny
love the backward cap …. nah, race has nevereverever been a factor in the gop attacks on obama. how dare you even suggest it…
kd bart
No 16 year old white girls in the background to imply that Obama will be ogling them all week long. What happen to the GOP?
harlana
Don’t you just love the dog-whistle-y backwards ball-cap in that pic?
handy
This is just standard meat to feed the base. Nothing to see here. Although I gotta say O looks mighty relaxed in that photo.
harlana
@aisce: Y’know, upon further inspection, it does look like a doo-rag, sheesh. The ghost of Atwater will always be with us.
nastybrutishntall
Do they have one where he TOUCHES A WHITE WOMAN HOW DARES HE!! because that’s my favorite dog whistle. This one’s played out.
Elizabelle
A doo rag, hmmm?
Although, no corn dog.
Yet.
PS: am very sure we are meant to see a “doo rag.” That is not in any way a backward-turned baseball hat.
Elizabelle
Looking at that and thinking:
I am voting for
The One.
In the Doo Rag.
Elizabelle
Does the DNC do stuff like this? If so, linkable examples, please.
Bubblegum Tate
@Villago Delenda Est:
Pretty much, yeah. They get very, very defensive about it because they’re quite proud of the spin they’ve concocted and they don’t want to hear your damn dirty LIEbrul facts.
cckids
Contessa Brewer just interviewed a guy from US News & World Report, the focus was “OMG why is Obama vacationing NOW when the stock market is tanking?” As if he got up today, packed up the limo & took off. My favorite point was when he said that it wasn’t so much the fact that Obama is on vacation that is bad, but that he went to the Hamptons–it’s so “rich people”. Brewer asked: “so, he should just go to the KOA?” Made me laugh.
Just Some Fuckhead
@cckids:
He should vacation at our national parks. They’re much safer since he allowed firearms.
TenguPhule
Meanwhile, the Republican House has taken how much vacation since starting and done exactly what work when on the clock?
Fucking Projection, how does it work?
What the hell are we paying the CIA for if these douchebags are not dying en masse in mysterious accidents?
Villago Delenda Est
@TenguPhule:
Do you when the Rethugs in the House whined like fucking three year olds when Nancy Smash informed them that they’d have to work FOUR DAYS A WEEK?
TenguPhule
Any decent editing program will let you alter that image once you have a saved copy of the pic.
Lysana
Doo-rag, T-shirt, and bad Photoshopping to make him look younger. Yep, it’s a double dog whistle. No wonder some of you who will argue their very existence with certain people are actually hearing it this time. (Yeah, it’s bullshit when you can get it as long as a white person tells you it’s there.)
Carnacki
@aimai: I confess with the exception of the photo above I think the others make Obama look good. The RNC is unintentionally making Obama seem as one of those “regular guys” they always claim he is not with the photo of him bowling, holding a boogie board, running about in a T-shirt. How very NOT elitist of him. All around GOP #fail.
gex
What I don’t understand is why consistently shouting n***** to their base accomplishes anything. They are already upset about one of THOSE being president. They know he’s black. I guess they just have nothing else to say.
Elizabelle
@Carnacki:
Agree with you there.
Also wonder how these will play in the African American community.
I think the doo rag and disrespect shown throughout would steel my resolution to vote.
noodler
Looking at the variety of postcards to choose from on the site: http://www.obamagetaway.com/ they look like actual photos, but I don’t recall this pic in dfmf or audacity anywhere. He looks younger in this pic. Probably an actual pic vice photoshopped, but in extremely poor taste.
ThresherK
@zmulls: The sad thing is that after the bone-in-nose, watermelon, and other Teabagger image mockups, this is a step up for the right wing.
Samara Morgan
i hate libertarians….all of ’em. liberaltarians, bleeding heart libertarians, neo-liberals, classical liberals, civil libertarians, etc, etc.
for the lexicon–
eemom
nothing to do with Obama’s vacation, but I kind of hate Martha’s Vineyard.
Spent a lovely summer there as a carefree college student — but when I went back years later as a grownup, I was kind of disgusted by how “two Americas” it is — mobbed by peasant tourist hordes in Edgartown, Vineyard Haven and Oak Bluffs and the public beaches, and on the other side — safely out of reach of the great unwashed — tons of hidden, gated, lavish estates of the superduper rich.
Massachusetts folks — is this a fair assessment?
fasteddie9318
These are great! I just sent a couple to my friend, [email protected], telling him what he should do with them!
Evan
Ranches typically have either animals or prostitutes. Reagan and Bush had compounds, like the Kennedys.
merrinc
Getting a late start on my daily reading but between this and reading the report of the town hall with the Speaker of the NC House (who I am very, very, VERY sorry to have ever voted for), I have resolved that it will be a cold day in hell before I ever vote Republican again. I’ve been a registered independent since Dukakis and while the majority of my votes (and money) have gone to Democratic candidates, I’ve never been a straight party ticket voter. Well, except in 2004 but I was outraged over receiving umpteen robocalls on my cell phone from the NC Republican party. Bastards put me over my limit for minutes that month.
But from here on out? Straight Democratic ticket.
noodler
Isn’t the Obama sunrise copyrighted? How can it be used it as the stamp on the card?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Obama_logomark.svg
noodler
Isn’t the Obama sunrise copyrighted? How can it be used it as the stamp on the card?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Obama_logomark.svg
ruemara
Why does he have a doo rag on, also? I try not to hate, but it’s been far too much, too often.
aimai
@eemom:
I’m a lifelong MA resident, born and raised, and I’ve actally never been to Martha’s Vinyard. I did go to Nantucket for a wedding once. I think that like all these summery places there’s an insider side and an outsider side and if you have friends who are going to be there and you are staying for more than a day your experience is just going to be nicer, regardless of the money involved.
For a modern African American family I’d think the storied history of the very old upper class African American community over there would be a huge draw, as well as the sense of a kind of backwater/summer experience without too much glitz.
Where should the first family go? Is there some kind of approved list that the President and Mrs. Obama should have submitted to a committee of right-thinking-vacation experts. Half Republican and half Centrist Dem? A super Congress, if you will?
aimai
Davis X. Machina
@aimai:
Branson. In an RV. But not an expensive one.
aimai
@Davis X. Machina:
And it better be Made in America, yo. (Sorry, I’m watching my way through Breaking Bad. That’s a Jesse imitation.)
aimai
eemom
@aimai:
as I said, my opinion of the place has nothing to do with the Obamas going there, and I have no opinion about the Obamas going there, and I think it’s nobody’s business where anybody else goes on vacation. It was honestly just a by-the-by sort of thing because I have wondered over the years what local, regular folks think about the place.
I did not know that about the AA history. And yes, now that you mention it, there are certainly good solid working class people that live there all year.
Actually, one of the reasons I was disappointed at my last visit there was that it does have sort of a sentimental value for me. ‘Twas there that I lost my virginity, in a nice A frame house in the woods. : )
ETA: and boy was I glad to get rid of it.
fasteddie9318
In passing these cards along to my best friend, [email protected], I made sure to express my deep appreciation for the ways in which their imagery brings out the deeper message behind the
Negro’sPresident’s activities. The white background, the darkening of theNegro’sPresident’s features, it all spins a glorious tapestry of information.ThatLeftTurnInABQ
@aimai:
They should go to Fell’s Point in Baltimore, hang out, drink some brews and eat some chow, and then afterwards they could drive around with a big green “Eat Bertha’s Mussels” bumpersticker on the back of the WH limo.
fasteddie9318
@aimai:
This first family? Back to the blackety black blackness from which they blacked, I think.
eemom
@fasteddie9318:
tee hee
rikryah
tell the truth…how dare you
gogol's wife
Not that I care, but I’m confused: I’ve seen references to their going to Martha’s Vineyard, and other references that say they’re going to the Hamptons. Which is it? Because they are not synonymous, despite what these references seem to imply. I thought it was Martha’s Vineyard.
eemom
@gogol’s wife:
no, it’s the Vinyud.
Gah. The Hamptons. That is where all the banksters go. UGH.
gogol's wife
@eemom:
Well, I thought that sounded highly unlikely.
Villago Delenda Est
@gogol’s wife:
It’s near an elitist body of water somewhere on the Eastern Seaboard.
NOT Myrtle Beach, which, as we know from the extensive knowledge base of Cokie Roberts, is not elitist. Or exotic. In the slightest.
The Other Bob
You guys are right, that is NOT a cap, it is a nylon do rag. You can even see the corn rows through the rag.
I don’t throw around the r-word much, but that is straight up racist.
See do rag here.
Tony J
Well now, come on. I’ve had it explained to me that this is just a Backatchta political move to punish the Democrats for making such a big deal about El Residente’s long vacations at Rancho White House West.
And really, if you totally ignore the amount of time El Residente spent reconnecting with nature (about 1/3 of his presidency, give or take), and pay no attention to the eight years of wingnut outrage at the very – idea – that a President couldn’t do his job properly from a vacation site, and you sort of squint your eyes a little to haze out the differences between a fake cowboy cutting brush on a secure compound and a real family man spending some time with his family in one of the nation’s most emblematic holiday destinations, then yeah, obviously it’s just the same thing, and Democrats are hypocrites for complaining.
But that’s really hard to do. I just don’t have the well-toned muscle in my cognative-dissonance ganglia to pull it off.
You Don't Say
Even Andy Roddick doesn’t wear his hat backwards anymore.
Derf
Well at least they didn’t use that photoshopped picture of a cigarette in Obama’s mouth.
twiffer
so…61 days is about 12 business weeks off…in just over 2 and a half years…averages out to about 4 weeks vacation a year. which is fairly standard in the business world. that’s my base vacation time, and i’ve only got 12 years of work under belt.
also, um, congress is taking the entire month of august off. but, i suppose it’s different cause they aren’t all going to the vinyard?
where is there a handy brick wall to bang my head against?
twiffer
@aimai: yeah, going to the vinyard is pretty much like going to the cape, or, say, kennebunkport. obviously not the sort of place a president should be vacationing.