With Wall Street and most every other kind of money no longer falling his way at 2008 levels, to make up for the shortfall, President Obama is breaking records with the sheer number of fundraisers he’s attending and by increasingly relying on Hollywood and the big ticket fundraisers the likes of George Clooney, Sarah Jessica Parker, and Vogue editor/Syria propagandist Anna Wintour can deliver.
This is pretty treacherous and hypocritical ground for the embattled President to tread upon, especially when one of his reelection themes is to paint his opponent, Mitt Romney, as someone too wealthy and out-of-touch to understand the problems of the common man.
However, it’s one thing for the President to fundraise with his foo foo friends, but quite another for him to cynically force the taxpayers to foot part of the bill for a double-shot of A-list fundraisers by using Ground Zero – the World Trade Center, of all places – as an excuse to turn the trip into an “official one.”
President Barack Obama brought Manhattan to a standstill last night as he held two star-studded fundraising events at exclusive addresses in the city – raising a total of $4.5 million.
However, the President’s re-election campaign will not have to pay the full cost of his jaunt to the Big Apple, because he combined the trip with an official event which will be charged to the taxpayer.
Before the fundraisers, one at actress Sarah Jessica Parker’s house and one at the five-star Plaza Hotel, Mr. Obama scheduled a visit to the World Trade Center site.
Following his visits across New York he headed home to the White House in Washington DC aboard the presidential helicopter, Marine One.
Mr. Obama has now held more fundraising events than the last six presidents combined, leading to his opponents coining the derisive nickname ‘Campaigner in Chief’.
He frequently combines the events with his official duties, which allows his re-election campaign to defray the President’s travel costs by charging part of them to the public purse.
For a trip like yesterday’s, involving both official duties and campaign events, a formula is applied so that the campaign pays part of the costs – but it still works out cheaper than making a trip purely for campaigning.
Obviously, the President isn’t doing anything illegal here, but something he and his team don’t seem to get is that decisions like this matter, and that it’s not 2008 anymore – his media pals no longer own the narrative. Stories and bad decisions such as these are going to get some traction.
How out-of-touch can Obama be to think that, regardless of the legality of it, Americans are going to condone a quick trip to the World Trade Center – the site of a wound still raw and fresh – taken as a sort of travel coupon so the President can dine and raise gobs of money with The Beautiful People.
Follow John Nolte on Twitter @NolteNC
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