Let's be honest, Democrats.
If First Lady Michelle Obama was a Republican, we'd rightfully be pitching a public tantrum about the galling arrogance of Michelle Obama using Air Force 2, which cost $11,351 hourly to operate, to ferry her, 9-year-old Sasha Obama, a handful of White House staff, and security personnel for a "private" vacation this past weekend in a glitzy five-star Spanish coastal resort.
Per Lynn Sweet at Politics Daily, expenses born by U.S. taxpayer for Mrs. Obama's grand holiday include "about $95,000 in hotel costs for an estimated 70 security personnel -- Secret Service and military -- who get a $273-a-day government per diem, plus costs for the dozen or so cars in her motorcade. I'm told that three shifts of agents are needed for a trip of this magnitude."
Understandably, if Mrs. Obama was a Republican, we would've ranted and raved about all her other pricey trips on our taxpayer dime, as well. Three of numerous examples rush to mind:
Paris in June 2009, when Michelle and her young daughters toured the Eiffel tour, shopped the toniest streets in downtown Paris, noshed epicurean French cuisine, and admired modern art. Michelle and entourage then flew on to London to prolong their European vacation fun while the President returned to D.C.
Also in June 2009, Michelle's romantic date to Manhattan... "a campaign pledge that Barack Obama didn't dare break - a promise to take his wife out for dinner and a show once the election was over," per the UK Mail.com.
To impress his globe-trotting wife, Mr. Obama escorted her to dinner, a Broadway show, and after-show martinis, all reasonable expenses paid by the President, of course.
But taxpayers picked up the tab for much more, including most costs of "... three planes, one to carry the couple and two to ferry aides and reporters all the way from Washington... The bill was pushed even higher with the use of two helicopters, one to take the Obamas to catch their plane in Washington and another to zip the party into Manhattan from JFK airport. Police also shut down New York streets for the motorcade to pass through so they could get to their date on time."
Here in my hometown of Los Angeles in June 2010, when, after a uber-brief visit with Camp Pendleton Marines, Mrs. Obama, daughters and entourage took "the town by storm, popping up at Hollywood restaurants" and attending game six of the NBA play-offs between the LA Lakers and Boston Celtics.
Reported the Huffington Post the day after Mrs. Obama arrived in the City of Angels, "The next day the First Lady was spotted with her huge security entourage (CHP motorcycle cops, a CHP patrol car, and four SUVs) at Chef Mario Batali and Chef Nancy Silverton's Osteria Mozza... "
At minimum, if Michelle Obama was a Republican, we would've called out her dreadfully insensitive fashion faux pas which range from:
sporting $540 designer sneakers to volunteer at a D.C. food bank, to...
wearing an impossible-to-miss white designer dress with over-sized black ink splotches, for her visit to tour a Gulf Coast beach heavily damaged by history's largest oil spill. (Quipped one blog commenter, "Perfect wardrobe choice. If some oil splashes up on the dress, it will blend right in."), to...
allegedly toting an Italian-made "shiny black alligator manila bag - with a retail sticker price of $5,950" while "strolling the wooded landscape outside of Moscow." (Per the New York Daily News, "Told that Obama's office denied the bag was the high-end VBH clutch, Kelly Vitko, a rep for the company replied, "It's definitely ours.")
As a devoted cook and amateur foodie, I distinctly remember when, in September 2009, Mrs. Obama, who admits to not cooking, made a remarkably costly show of pretending to shop for healthy ingredients for her family meal table. Reported columnist Dana Milbank of the Washington Post:
"The Secret Service and the D.C. police brought in three dozen vehicles and shut down H Street, Vermont Avenue, two lanes of I Street and an entrance to the McPherson Square Metro station. They swept the area, in front of the Department of Veterans Affairs, with bomb-sniffing dogs and installed magnetometers in the middle of the street, put up barricades to keep pedestrians out, and took positions with binoculars atop trucks. Though the produce stand was only a block or so from the White House, the first lady hopped into her armored limousine and pulled into the market amid the wail of sirens.
"Then, and only then, could Obama purchase her leafy greens. "Now it's time to buy some food," she told several hundred people who came to watch. "Let's shop!"... the result was quite the opposite of a quaint farmers market. Considering all the logistics, each tomato she purchased had a carbon footprint of several tons."
Yes, if Michelle Obama was a Republican, Democrats would undoubtedly point out the self-absorbed insensitivity and unfettered hypocrisy of our First Lady consistently living so luxuriously and wasting millions in public largesse while in 2010, middle-class and working-class Americans suffer miserably.
But Michelle Obama is a Democrat, not Republican, and accordingly, most (not all!) liberals turn their heads and conveniently ignore the irresponsible excesses of our First Lady, despite this time of desperate need for Americans.
I wonder... does Democratic passive acceptance of these greedy wrongs make liberals complicit in Mrs. Obama's waste of millions in public funds? If Democrats don't challenge her frittering away of our hard-earned funds, how can they lay claim to moral credibility when calling out conservatives for the same bad behavior?
One thing I know: I will never again find Michelle Obama believable when she ladles food at a soup kitchen, or volunteers a couple hours at a food bank. She is one woman who looks terrific for the press while talking the walk, but who feels too privileged, too special, to walk the walk of meaningful sacrifice in her own life for others.
