The self-proclaimed “most transparent administration in history” announced on Monday that it would release no information regarding the cost of President Obama’s “date” in New York. Just won’t do it.
The administration’s policy seems to be summed up in these nine words: “Love to talk more. Just no time. Gotta go.”
The New York Post guestimated that the trip cost $24,000. The London Daily Mail put the figure at $75,000. But the Washington Times did additional research and came up with a far higher number: $400,000.
Their figure includes three helicopters that shuttled the First Couple to and from Andrews Air Force Base and all the air and ground personnel associated with that move. It includes the corporate jets that flew the Obamas and the ones that flew decoy duty. It includes a previously unmentioned C-17 cargo jet that flew all the cars for the President’s motorcade to New York and back. It included hundreds of additional Washington, DC and NYC policemen. It included the vast crew of Secret Service people who had to check the New York locations out in advance and also be there during the date.
We’re not sure what happened to the Obamas at the end of the date, but we’re pretty sure the taxpayers got screwed.
Source: Washington Times
This post was last modified on January 26, 2021
View Comments (21)
@ shabaz- "In america democracy is not a choice, it is rammed down your thoat."
I don't see how it is 'rammed down your throat' when 234 years ago our ancestors and the founding fathers fought FOR the creation of a democratic republic. Since January 20, 2009, Obama & Co have been trying to ram socialism down our throats! Any American citizen is FREE to leave (even renounce their citizenship) to seek another country that they so desire. I don't read about Americans flocking to socialist/commie countries, but maybe I'm missing something!
What "glaring fact"? You think that for a "young country, it is a very backward looking, adverse to change, traditional and bigoted country"?
Yeah, that's why every year, millions upon millions clamor and claw their way (legally & illegally) and risk life and limb to become citizens and have a chance at a good life and prosper, the likes of which no other nation on the face of the earth has ever given the world's peoples. We are not perfect but we have tried throughout our history to right those wrongs and to do better for the next generation. No other country has come so far, so fast with so little to begin with.
I am forever grateful that my g-grandparents left Eastern Europe for a better life in America and for all the hardships they endured so they could start a family in a free country devoid of wars and dictators.
The first and partial last line of the Gettysburg Address sums it up:
"Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal......that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom -- and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth."
Cheers and well spoken.
I think Obama looks different when you are in America. From the outside looking in, I have been following your elections and presidential politics avidly since Gerald Ford and worked my way backwards, through Kennedy, Eisenhower, the Roosevelts, Wilson, Hayes, Lincoln, Grant, Jackson, the Adams's, Jefferson and Washington.
Obama comes across as a great visionary leader, in the same sense that Ronald Reagan was a great leader, as Washington, Roosevelt and Lincoln were. Someone who cares for his country and the world and really wants to change it and better prepare it for the future. Most of all he comes across as someone who wants to do the right thing and screw the consequences.
Do I think he is religious ? He probably is. But like Jefferson, Lincoln and the other great men before him, he does not let religion mix with government as the founding fathers intended.
But I guess if your American your main concern is how much does it affect your pockets now and the attacks on you comfort zone.
To be honest if you travel a lot and live in many countries, one glaring fact about the US comes out. For a young country it is a very backward looking, averse to change, traditional and bigoted country. In america democracy is not a choice, it is rammed down your thoat.
I can semi-agree with you on a few points.
"Obama comes across as a great visionary leader." Yes, he has a vision - a Socialist America.
"Most of all he comes across as someone who wants to do the 'right thing' and screw the consequences." Yeah, the 'right thing' according to Bill Ayers and all of his communist dupes. Screw the consequences? More like screw anyone who gets in his way. Remember "Joe the plumber"?
" Rammed down your throat". Oh, you mean like the so-called Health Reform bill that got rammed through Congress by hook or by crook, with all sorts of private side-deals to buy votes for it?
"Backward looking" - YES !! We look back on history and see how messed up other countries were with their kings and aristocrats, the official State-funded Churches ( Lutheran in North Europe, Catholic in South Europe, Anglican in England), education and special privileges for the upper-class only, minimal if any say in government for the lower class, etc. No kings or aristocrats for us. Freedom of religion without government interference for us. Freedom of speech for us. National, state and local elections to determine our leaders. Freedom to try and either succeed or fail in making our way through life.
Adverse to change? In what respect? American democracy has been called the "Great Experiment". We learned from our mistakes and made improvements along the way. If you want "adverse to change" look at Islam, which wants society and customs to revert to the 7th century.
Traditional? Depends on which traditions you mean. If you mean the tradition of the rule of law as set forth in the US Constitution, if you mean the tradition of free speech, if you mean the tradition of freedom of religion - or no religion ( try converting FROM Islam and not being killed as a infidel ), the tradition of doing an honest day's work to earn your living instead of looking for a government handout ( to each according to their need from each according to their ability?), if you mean helping your neighbor harvest his crop when he's sick, if you mean contributing time or money to private relief agencies etc., guilty as charged.
Bigoted? Has Saudi Arabia changed the law prohibiting non-Muslims from entering Mecca? Have the murders of South African white minority farmers stopped? It took some time but we finally passed the Civil Rights act and got rid of the Jim Crow laws, even though the Democrat politicians in the KKK fought against it.
While you're remembering, do you remember the Berlin Wall? Apparently East Germany was such a workers paradise under Russian Communism that the government had to put up a wall to keep out all the people fleeing Democracy in West Berlin and killing anyone that tried to sneak through. Or were they going from East to West Berlin?
So, Haj Shabaz or Shabaz X or comrade Shabaz, or whatever, if you don't like it here, too bad. Isn't it nice that the Secret Police or the Shari'a police haven't come to take you away for speaking against the "system"? The last line of the inscription at the Statue of Liberty reads " I lift my lamp beside the golden door". Well, that door swings both ways. Don't let it hit you on the tockus on the way out. I hear Castro's Cuba is beautiful this time of year, and spring is in full bloom in Communist China. Hizbolla is looking for more suicide bombers, no experience necessary, with a guaranteed 72-virgin "retirement" plan.
I didn't have time to answer this moron, earlier, but you've done the job for me.
Kudos and Fair Winds and Following Seas...
Thanks.
That’s right! I will say it, “THANK GOD FOR BARACK OBAMA”
He destroyed the Clinton political machine – Driving a stake thru the heart of Hillary’s Presidential aspirations – something no Republican was ever able to do. Remember when a Hillary Presidency scared the daylights out of you?
He killed off the Kennedy dynasty – No more Kennedys trolling Washington looking for booze and women wanting rides home. American women and Freedom are safer tonight!
He is destroying the Democratic Party before our eyes!
Dennis Moore had never lost a race – quit!
Evan Bayh had never lost a race – quit!
Byron Dorgan – had never lost a race – quit!
Harry Reid – bid for re-election doesn’t look good!
These are just a handful of the Democrats whose political careers Obama has destroyed! By the end of 2010, dozens more will be gone! In December of 2008, the Democrats were on the rise. In the last two election cycles they had picked up 14 senate seats and 52 house seats. The press was touting the death of the Conservative Movement and the Republican Party. In one year, Obama put a stop to all of this and will probably give the House, if not the Senate, back to the Republicans.
He has completely exposed liberals and progressives for what they are. Every generation has to relearn why they should never actually put liberals in charge. He is bringing home the lesson very well!
Liberals tax, borrow, and spend –
Liberals won’t bring themselves to protect America –
Liberals want to take over the economy –
Liberals think they know what is best for everyone –
Liberals aren’t happy till they are running YOUR life –
He has brought more Americans back to Conservatism
Since Regan
In one year, he rejuvenated the Conservative movement and mobilized millions of freedom loving Americans. Name one other time in your life when you've seen your friends and neighbors this interested in taking back America! In all honesty, one year ago I was more afraid than I had ever been in my life. Not of the economy, but of the direction our country was going. I thought Americans had forgotten what this country was all about. My neighbors, friends, and strangers proved to me that my lack of confidence in the greatness and wisdom of the American people was flat out wrong.
When the American People wake up, no smooth talking teleprompter reader can fool them!
Barack Obama has awakened these great Americans.
Thank God for Barack Obama!
lol so true
Terrific Article on Obama ! ! !
Article from the Wall Street Journal Form by Eddie Sessions:
"I have this theory about Barack Obama. I think he's led a kind of
make-believe life in which money was provided and doors were opened because
at some point early on somebody or some group took a look at this tall, good
looking, half-white, half-black, young man with an exotic African/Muslim
name and concluded he could be guided toward a life in politics where his
facile speaking skills could even put him in the White House.
In a very real way, he has been a young man in a very big hurry. Who else do
you know has written two memoirs before the age of 45? "Dreams of My Father"
was published in 1995 when he was only 34 years old. The "Audacity of Hope"
followed in 2006. If, indeed, he did write them himself. There are some who
think that his mentor and friend, Bill Ayers, a man who calls himself a
"communist with a small 'c'" was the real author.
His political skills consisted of rarely voting on anything that might be
deemed controversial.. He went from a legislator in the Illinois legislature
to the Senator from that state because he had the good fortune of having
Mayor Daley's formidable political machine at his disposal.
He was in the U.S.. Senate so briefly that his bid for the presidency was
either an act of astonishing self-confidence or part of some greater game
plan that had been determined before he first stepped foot in the Capital.
How, many must wonder, was he selected to be a 2004 keynote speaker at the
Democrat convention that nominated John Kerry when virtually no one had ever
even heard of him before?
He outmaneuvered Hillary Clinton in primaries. He took Iowa by storm. A
charming young man, an anomaly in the state with a very small black
population, he oozed "cool" in a place where agriculture was the antithesis
of cool. He dazzled the locals. And he had an army of volunteers drawn to a
charisma that hid any real substance.
And then he had the great good fortune of having the Republicans select one
of the most inept candidates for the presidency since Bob Dole. And then
John McCain did something crazy. He picked Sarah Palin, an unknown female
governor from the very distant state of Alaska . It was a ticket that was
reminiscent of 1984's Walter Mondale and Geraldine Ferraro and they went
down to defeat.
The mainstream political media fell in love with him. It was a schoolgirl
crush with febrile commentators like Chris Mathews swooning then and now
over the man. The venom directed against McCain and, in particular, Palin,
was extraordinary.
Now, nearly a full year into his first term, all of those gilded years
leading up to the White House have left him unprepared to be President. Left
to his own instincts, he has a talent for saying the wrong thing at the
wrong time. It swiftly became a joke that he could not deliver even the
briefest of statements without the ever-present Tele-Prompters.
Far worse, however, is his capacity to want to "wish away" some terrible
realities, not the least of which is the Islamist intention to destroy
America and enslave the West. Any student of history knows how swiftly Islam
initially spread. It knocked on the doors of Europe , having gained a
foothold in Spain ..
The great crowds that greeted him at home or on his campaign "world tour"
were no substitute for having even the slightest grasp of history and the
reality of a world filled with really bad people with really bad intentions.
Oddly and perhaps even inevitably, his political experience, a cakewalk, has
positioned him to destroy the Democrat Party's hold on power in Congress
because in the end it was never about the Party. It was always about his
communist ideology, learned at an early age from family, mentors, college
professors, and extreme leftist friends and colleagues.
Obama is a man who could deliver a snap judgment about a Boston police
officer who arrested an "obstreperous" Harvard professor-friend, but would
warn Americans against "jumping to conclusions" about a mass murderer at
Fort Hood who shouted "Allahu Akbar." The absurdity of that was lost on no
one. He has since compounded this by calling the Christmas bomber "an
isolated extremist" only to have to admit a day or two later that he was
part of an al Qaeda plot.
He is a man who could strive to close down our detention facility at
Guantanamo even though those released were known to have returned to the
battlefield against America .. He could even instruct his Attorney General to
afford the perpetrator of 9/11 a civil trial when no one else would ever
even consider such an obscenity. And he is a man who could wait three days
before having anything to say about the perpetrator of yet another terrorist
attack on Americans and then have to elaborate on his remarks the following
day because his first statement was so lame.
The pattern repeats itself. He either blames any problem on the Bush
administration or he naively seeks to wish away the truth.
Knock, knock. Anyone home? Anyone there? Barack Obama exists only as the
sock puppet of his handlers, of the people who have maneuvered and
manufactured this pathetic individual's life.
When anyone else would quickly and easily produce a birth certificate, this
man has spent over a million dollars to deny access to his. Most other
documents, the paper trail we all leave in our wake, have been sequestered
from review. He has lived a make-believe life whose true facts remain
hidden.
We laugh at the ventriloquist's dummy, but what do you do when the dummy is
President of the United States of America ?"
Add the $$ 30 million + spent flying Peelosi back and forth to california!!
Add the 2nd plane to Copenhagen because she couldnt wait one day and fly on the 747 with nobama burning a gallon of fuel a SECOND!! Not to mention the Giant contingent of lawmakers and their wives that flew over there-slept in $300 a night hotels and wined and dined on taxpayers $$ to shore up THE
LARGEST WASTE OF $$ that ever existed -Gorey Als Global Warming snafu
Add the 747 + the fighter fly over NYC
Add the 747 coming to pick him up to take him from MD. to Williamsburg VA, a 2 hour drive cost the taxpayers 23000 gallons of jet fuel- an ignorant waste of $$
The 747 is hangared in Omaha Nebraska and has to come over (2 of them) to take him anywhere.
I agree that the Founders were Christian. http://www.adherents.com/gov/Founding_Fathers_Religion.html
But you must note the stark insistance on real freedom of religion.
But things degrade over time:
The Pledge of Allegiance was created in 1892 and did not have the words “under God” added until 1954 almost 200 years after the birth of the U.S.
"In God We Trust" was added in 1864. On a two cent coin. In 1957 it was added to paper money. It replaced "E Pluribus Unum" (From Many, One) adopted by the Union in 1782. This bold concept of many states joined in a union was a real reminder of the fragile union that binds them. But God gradually won the day and real concepts lost to superstition.
Men act as if they chose their religion. They take it as important and a personal paradigm.
The reality is that our religion or lack thereof is an accident of birth or social events. Who would study all religions to make an intelligent choice of "The Best, Most True Religion?" None would be chosen if the study were extensive. Religion - all manmade and less than valuable.
Nowhere do we see the spontaneous generation of Christians, Muslims, Jews or Buddists. Why not?
The 'choice' is an accident of birth with all those choices equally serious to those enthralled by wildly divergent precepts.
When we first look up into the night sky and see 50,000,000 million year old light it should awaken us to the meaninglessness of our johnny come lately religion. When we find that 99.9% of all species are extinct it should make us aware that we too will be gone shortly and we should be very serious about our caretaker role on the planet.
Mother Nature will not miss the most destructive species that ever lived.
Some notes from the founding Fathers:
"Whenever we read the obscene stories, the voluptuous debaucheries, the cruel and torturous executions, the unrelenting vindictiveness, with which more than half the Bible is filled, it would be more consistent that we called it the word of a demon, than the word of God. It is a history of wickedness, that has served to corrupt and brutalize mankind." - Thomas Paine (The Age of Reason, 1794-1795.)
I do not believe in the creed professed by the Jewish church, by the Roman church, by the Greek church, by the Turkish church, by the Protestant church, nor by any church that I know of... Each of those churches accuse the other of unbelief; and for my own part, I disbelieve them all."- Thomas Paine (The Age of Reason, 1794-1795.)
"Question with boldness even the existence of a god." - Thomas Jefferson (letter to Peter Carr, 10 August 1787)
"Is uniformity attainable? Millions of innocent men, women, and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined, imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch towards uniformity. What has been the effect of coercion? To make one half the world fools and the other half hypocrites. To support roguery and error
all over the earth." - Thomas Jefferson (Notes on Virginia, 1782; from George Seldes, ed., The Great Quotations, Secaucus, New Jersey: Citadel Press, 1983, p. 363.)
"During almost fifteen centuries has the legal establishment of Christianity been on trial. What have been its fruits? More or less in all places, pride and indolence in the Clergy, ignorance and servility in the laity; in both, superstition, bigotry and persecution." - James Madison (Memorial and Remonstrance against Religious Assessments, 1785.)
“In no instance have . . . the churches been guardians of the liberties of the people.”
“Religious bondage shackles and debilitates the mind and unfits it for every noble enterprise.” James Madison, April 1, 1774
"Where do we find a precept in the Bible for Creeds, Confessions, Doctrines and Oaths, and whole carloads of other trumpery that we find religion encumbered with in these days?" - John Adams
"As the Government of the United States of America is not in any sense founded on the Christian religion; as it has in itself no character of enmity against the laws, religion, or tranquility, of Musselmen; and as the said States never have entered into any war or act of hostility against any Mehomitan nation, it is declared by the parties that no pretext arising from religious opinions shall ever produce an interruption of the harmony existing between the two countries." - (Treaty of Tripoli, 1797 - signed by President John Adams.)
"When a Religion is good, I conceive it will support itself; and when it does not support itself, and God does not take care to support it so that its Professors are obliged to call for help of the Civil Power, it is a sign, I apprehend, of its being a bad one." - Benjamin Franklin (from a letter to Richard Price, October 9, 1780;)
Harry,
You repeat the fabrication of the revisionist left. The founders were careful
that we did not have a state supported national church. Every citizen was free to belong to the denomination of his/her choice. The fear was a state church that suppressed all others as happened in England. It amazes me that the arguments made by the left ignore the realities of the time. Virtually every one of the founders, save 2 , were devout christians. The two "deists"
actually attended numerous demoninational churches. So ignore their personal writings and statements and continue to cling to the revisionist view that is divorced from reality.
Oh man, I think I got a visual...yuck! I wonder if she Bows to him before they...you know.
I also noticed that zero has no problem playing golf - Bush quit playing golf while we had troops on the battlefield.
How about the fact that in a country that is overwhelmingly Christian (85+%)
we are no longer a Christian nation (with a secular government, of course).Now, according to zero, a little over 2 million muslims now makes us a huge muslim country?
Hey lefties, you've all been had and the rest of us will have to pay along with you for your folly.
Actually, the founding fathers were careful not to allow this to be a Christian Nation. You are no doubt confusing the generic term God that can have many meanings with what you imagine to be it's only meaning.
And if you check on Bush's golf game you will find he was less than honest about this too.
I know: Don't confuse you with the facts, your mind is made up.
And Bush's 77 trips to his ranch were all free i guess?
Huge difference. Bush's trips were to his HOME in Crawford, Texas. It was a fully-functional substitute for the White House. We're not aware of President Bush taking Laura on any date night extravaganzas on the taxpayers' dime. If he did, we would have been equally tough on him.
Nothing about the Bush administration was fully functional, least of all George Bush.
Or are we still pretending?
Beat me to it, Editor.
And he certainly did not do it while we suffered in the depths of a recession such as this, while the rest of us are tightening our belts.