August 17, 2009
What Obama’s Vacation Tells Us
Holiday optics matter
for politicians. These are people who
painstakingly spend hours trying to figure
out the best setup for a speech or press
conference room. They know any move they
make will reveal something about themselves.
So what does President Obama’s vacation –
and those of other leaders – tell us?
Obama is reportedly set
to head to Martha’s Vineyard, Massachusetts
(aka Kennedyland, USA) to force a media
connection between him and JFK every time
they mention his vacation spot. This is what
those of us in the political business call
the “halo effect”. JFK is synonymous with
Martha’s Vineyard, and it’s likely not a
coincidence that he was the last Democratic
president anyone liked who’s not still
around to present any danger of upstaging
Obama.
With a job approval
rating of 47 percent and plummeting, the
visit will make Obama the only person to be
locked in a nosedive in a final approach
toward Martha’s Vineyard since JFK Jr.’s
plane went down. If his handlers are smart,
they’ll keep him in shorts and out of blue
jeans. He already had to justify his lack of
coolness while throwing like a girl in
granny-jeans at a baseball game. And during
the campaign last year, he was caught on a
hot day in Chicago riding a bike in what
looked like the same ones. That’s fine, but
voters wanted you to be cool, Barack. In
fact, that was the only reason some of them
voted for you. So maybe try not to let your
geek flag fly too much – like the chick who
blimps out within a few months of the
wedding ring being slid onto her finger.
What kind of vacations
did recent Republican presidents take?
George W. Bush and Ronald Reagan spent time
on their ranches, clearing brush and
building things. Ronald Reagan cut down
trees and built giant log fences by himself
on his ranch in Santa Barbara. When I
visited Rancho del Cielo a few years ago, I
saw bits of paper on which he had diagrammed
out some of the fences he built. He even
made the massive table on which the largest
tax cut in American history was signed. Was
this spin? Perhaps some might say that it
was, but if Reagan truly didn’t enjoy
building things himself he could have paid
someone else to do it and just kicked back
by the pool in some cowboy gear for his
media close-up. He was an actor by trade,
and could have just played the role when the
time came. Likewise, I don’t think George W.
Bush cleared brush or went pond fishing for
the sake of a photo-op before running back
inside to paint and file his cuticles.
Russia’s Prime Minister
Vladimir Putin spent his vacation in the
Southern Siberian wilderness riding a horse
with his shirt off. This is a case where you
really believe this vacation is in total
character. No one joins the KGB and works
their way up its ranks for show. I think
this is truly the kind of person who rises
to the level of “big man on campus” in
Russia, and we’re seeing him interact with
nature and bring it to its knees, much like
every Russian woman after viewing his
vacation photos. If your country is going to
be a socialist or communist one, you’d
better give the people the impression that
Big Red Daddy has it together.
Obama’s granny jeans
don’t exactly scream, “Trust me with your
money and safety!” Obama was once caught on
vacation floating around in waves. There was
no floating for Putin! Not only was he
snapped swimming, but he was sporting
rippling arms while performing swimming’s
most difficult stroke – the butterfly. Putin
doing the butterfly on vacation makes girls
dream of the breaststroke. One shot shows
Putin holding a fishing rod as though it’s
an extension of something else. And it’s
hard not to note that the rod is huge and
extends all the way across the other side of
the river and onto the bank.
French President
Nicolas Sarkozy caught flack for flaking out
on a rich pal’s yacht after his 2007
presidential victory. He has since become
known as President Bling-Bling, and is
currently spending three weeks at the Cap
Negre home of his ex-supermodel musician
wife, Carla Bruni. They have been snapped
looking ridiculously fit while toweling off
from a dip. But what a difference a
near-death experience makes. The vacation
comes on the heels of a fainting episode
that resulted in a short hospital stay. The
guy is obviously killing himself trying to
fix France, so at the moment he’s rightfully
getting a free pass from his other 64
million countrymen on their multi-week paid
vacation. “Mars or Marseille?”, I ask my
French friends every summer, knowing the
length of vacation would be about the same.
Finally, British Prime
Minister Gordon Brown is doing “volunteer
work” in his community for his summer break.
That’s a safe bet for someone whose gravy
train is on the verge of derailing. He could
have just stayed put in office and done his
“charity work”, because he doesn’t really
have any money left to pay his own salary
either. People with a poor job outlook in a
bad economy usually do best saving up and
staying close to home.