Washington – August in Washington means time for vacation.
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Congress has left on a five-week break. The Supreme Court reopens in October. Now it’s President Barack Obama’s turn.
On Saturday, Obama begins a nine-day vacation on Martha’s Vineyard, Mass., where he spent summer vacation in each of the first three years of his presidency. He skipped his annual Vineyard vacation during last year’s re-election campaign.
Here’s a numerical look at vacation time taken by Obama and his predecessor, George W. Bush, according to CBS News White House reporter Mark Knoller, who tracks presidential travel. The numbers do not include visits to the Camp David presidential retreat in Maryland.
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—14: Number of vacation trips taken by Obama since he took office in January 2009.
—92: Number of days, all or in part, Obama has spent on vacation.
—57: Number of vacation trips taken by Bush at this same point in his presidency.
—50: Number of visits Bush made to his ranch in Crawford, Texas.
—323: Number of days, all or in part, Bush spent at the ranch.
—7: Number of trips Bush made to his family’s compound in Kennebunkport, Maine.
—26: Number of days, all or in part, Bush spent in Maine.
what I would like to know is how much did the American public have to spend on Obama’s vacations and on bushes vacations that’s a very big point that they very conveniently leave out. most of bushes vacations were to his own homes. also how many vacations did Laura Bush take and how many vacations did Michelle Obama take and how much those cost American public.
So Bush took 57 vacation trips totaling 349 days of vacation, while Obama has taken 14 trips totaling 92 days of vacation…. interesting. That’s what I thought.
Bush worked from home!
The comparisons are really insignificant and tell you really nothing. For one thing at least in the case of Pres. Bush a lot of his vacations were actually working vacations so in essence he was running the country from outside the bubble. Whereas when Obama and his family….and his mother-in-law are on vacation, they are on vacation and the country can go to hell.
Two lousy presidents. Someone should go back to work and try to find a single accomplishment over the past 13 years.
This article is meant to mislead the American public into thinking that President Bush spent more money on vacation than Obama.
Bush spent almost all his vacation time at his home which the taxpayer didn’t have to
pay for lodging.
I want to see the dollar figures not the media spin.
Wait! I think we need to also look at what they counted as vacation!!! Obama just went to Los Angeles, shut down whole sections of the city, backed up traffic like crazy…. Just so he could have dinner with a major donor to his campaign and he could go on some late night tv show that’s more comedy than news… And that ain’t work, so it should be counted in his vacation time which it isn’t…
How about the amount of golf games Obama played while in office vs. the amount og golf Bush played?
All this debate about the Presidents’ travels is highly amusing. Bush loved to talk about spending money to “stimulate the economy”. Does all the money spent for the various Presidents’ travels, vacation or business, go into the economy, provide jobs for all sorts of people including those who serve the hotels, provide the services, etc., etc.? Sure it does. Let the Presidents spend money on travel, folks – it’s good for the economy! This cheap talk about how much they spend for vacations is just so much blather by people who have nothing else constructive to offer. It’s “gotcha” talk, when they have nothing of substance to offer.