I was watching the news on TV on Friday morning (the Today Show to be exact). I always come away with stuff to talk about after watching any TV, and yesterday was no exception. The clip that peeked my curiousity was about the President traveling around the country on Air Force One doing last minute campaign stops for close Republican senate races. This news bothered me a little bit (and this is not a rant against Bush, this goes for any president). Here are a couple of reasons:
- I understand the President has some political party ties before he is actually elected as President. But once you are President, my understanding is that you represent ALL the people, not just those from your political party. It seems to me that if your going to be using your clout as President to endorse political candidates, then you should probably be doing it during your time off.
- That being said, do President’s get time off? It does seem like one of those “always on” types of jobs.
- For example, does the president have his own personal car or plane? If he does, I’d much rather he use his own plane, then Air Force One, which I helped pay for and all the fuel our tax dollars are going to go to, if he’s going to fly around the country promoting politicians. Personally, it sort of seems like stealing paper clips from the office or writing off a meal out as a “business meeting.” Using Air Force One as a backdrop for someone else’s campaign sort of seems like cheating.
- Finally, and this is direct to our current president. The polls seem to indicate a lot of people don’t think President Bush is doing a very good job in office right now. That being said, you would think he might consider spending a little more time there, rather then flying around the country preparing campaign speeches to help ensure his Republican chums win their states.
Am I the only one who think’s it’s a little wrong, unfair, disappointing, waste of money, unethical and terribly misrepresentative for Bush to be wasting his time on this?
Good points. I agree on the ‘represent everyone’ thing.
I have posted a short video that actually covers this issue with some interesting facts. Please visit my blog for the link. It is the more recent entry. When I did some research on this and discovered the loopholes and the costs, I felt obligated to disseminate this information. CJ
you are not the only one who thinks it is wrong, unfair, disappointing, time-wasting, unethical, and misrepresentative of Bush (or perhaps any other president) to spend his or her (maybe one day) time in this manner.
That’s because for Bush it’s all politics. It’s all about keeping the Republicans in power. Look at Cheney. Look at Tony Snow. Should the White House spokesman bash Democrats? Or should he be more even-handed? It’s all politics with them.
I agree with you. I think that no matter what, even if it becomes “all politics” for these people, they are STILL representing everyone. It is terribly irresponsible for the president to be doing this.
I’m certainly no Bush fan, but this is typical of pretty much every President in a mid-term election.
The Republican National Committee has to pay for Bush’s air-fare, but this is where we get ripped off. They have to pay whatever a commercial airline ticket would cost for the same trip. Everybody knows that Air Force 1 costs a lot more money to operate than a normal commercial airliner.
Personally, if I was a Republican running for office, I’m not sure I’d want a President whose favorability rating is in the ’30s’ ‘helping’ me.
Often, campaign stops are scheduled to coincide with “official business”. In the case of official business, the taxpayer foots the bill for the President’s trip. It doesn’t take much to make the trip official. Bush can speak to workers at a factory for 15 minutes, and then be off to a $10,000-a-plate invitation-only fundraiser for the rest of the evening.