First Lady Michelle Obama recently came home from an expensive vacation in Spain. Today, President Barack Obama and his family are beginning a 10-day vacation on secluded Blue Heron Farm, a 28-acre waterfront property in Chilmark, on Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts, where they stayed last year.
I write this post with feelings that are only somewhat mixed: Any president of the United States is entitled to a break away from the pressure of what may be the world’s toughest job. But why this exclusive island resort in the northeast? Why now?
There is not only symbolism, but a good deal of substance behind every action that the President of the United States decides to take.
Both Mr. Obama and the First Lady have spent only a few days ‘vacationing’ in the Gulf to show their support for the region’s tourist businesses. But the latest was a mere one-day presidential photo-op in the Florida panhandle, and it was back to Washington.
No president ever gets away completely from his duties. Especially not in this super-connected electronic world. His/ (maybe someday her) responsibilities are simply too great. So any presidential vacation is really a working one peppered by hobnobbing with favored guests, and time alone to ponder his responsibilities in a quiet setting.
But why Martha’s Vineyard? Why not one or two locations along the Gulf Coast, where the hobnobbing can be with common people and where the president, quite frankly, has just blown a major opportunity to help reinvigorate the tourist, fishing, and petroleum industries of as many as five Gulf Coast states.
The New England tourist industry would not suffer one iota from his absence in the region this summer. But the same cannot be said for the businesses along the Gulf Coast which are flat on their backs.
The President has the right, but is it a wise choice? Somehow, for me, Obama’s decision is the wrong priority.
Just a thought. Stay cool. Thanks for reading. Stay engaged.
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