Contrast this private enterprise effort with President Obama's ongoing bus pilgrimage. While the Weinermobiles are funded privately and give away frankfurters, the president's motorcade is paid for by you and me and gives away empty promises (this is not entirely true, wealthy donors and political allies can earn photos with the Debtor in Chief).
An objection some in the GOP have voiced is that Obama is using tax dollars to go campaigning. He surely is, but so has nearly every president in the past hundred and fifty year (go Google your own examples- they are out there). The better question might be, what business does any president have taking any trip around the US on the public nickel?
Of course there are perfectly good reasons a president might need to travel. Perhaps he might want to check out the piles of gold we (hopefully) still have in Fort Knox, or maybe he needs to go shake the fence between Tijuana and the US and make certain everything is secure. To me those are justifiable reasons to get out of the District and look around.
But I reject the idea that the president has carte blanche to go anyplace, anytime. And there is a perfectly good way to prevent this. Cut his budget.
Why are we paying for Obama to go on a bus tour with no discernible reason? Or for the Vice President's wife to go zipping over to East Africa to talk about famine assistance? If members of Congress are opposed to the idea, then cut the budget of the White House. There are certain expenses which are inherent in the office, security being the most obvious, which should be provided for no matter what the president is doing. But we should start to demand that personal activities (including campaign activities) come out of his wallet, not ours. There are, of course, regulations which require the president's campaign or party to compensate the government for certain expenses. But my suggestion is to restrict the White House's to such paltry funding that only essential trips can be taken.
It would be wonderful if the presidency had not metastasized into the monstrosity we have today. In that case, one might reasonably argue that the president must travel regularly to check on the state of the union. At a time when we have millions of USG employees reporting to the president though, that hardly seems necessary. I can imagine Madison or some early president taking a carriage up to Baltimore to observe a new warship, for example- but I think these days the president could likely just read an email with images of the new ship.
After all, does the president really learn anything from these trips? Dee Dee Myers was on Hardball tonight arguing that his trip allows Obama to "talk to normal people." Baloney. These orchestrated tours are so insulated, calculated, and fabricated that he probably does not even know when it is raining. The whole thing is a show and everyone in Congress knows it.
Only Congress can fund the presidency. Indeed only the House, the arm of the people, can initiate spending bills. Theoretically Congress could cut the amount of funding sent to the White House and curtail the number of trips the executive enjoys.
Of course, that is precisely why this indulgence will not end. Because Congress is doing the same thing. While Congress sometimes tries to cut the president's budget a bit, in the end they do not push too hard. That is because they also enjoy shooting around the country (and the world) "examining" the status of things that have very little or nothing to do with their actual duties.
Only the people, through the House and the Congress as a whole, can effectuate real change on this issue. Voters should demand accountability from politicians at all levels: Why did you need that trip to that district? How come it was necessary to visit the Bahamas? Who paid for your hotel and breakfast?
That sort of nitpicking might be dismissed as silly, but it is essential to keeping elected officials not just on a budget, but in their place. It needs to be appreciated that there are costs to traveling, and for other administrative actions, and the importance of USG work is not so great that it trumps all other concerns. In fact, it is secondary to the needs of the private sector. If that means canceling some First Family travel, like his wife's precious "Let's Move Campaign," then so be it. Maybe she can catch a ride on the Weinermobile. For most American kids that would be more of a treat than her current "eat vegetables and take the stairs campaign."