CNN contributor and former Clinton advisor Paul Begala has a problem with President Hope&Change being criticized for all the vacations he’s been on. And he’s been on a lot, even during the BP oil spill.
To GOP criticism, Paul Begala retorted:
The president is the president wherever he is … I thought it was silly when people attacked Bush for going on vacation, so I’ll be consistent and say it’s silly when people attack President Obama for going on vacation. …
Of all of the concerns that Americans may have, they do not need to worry whether President Obama is a hard-working man. They may agree or disagree with his policies, but there is just no doubt that the guy is busting his rear end.
But Tim Graham at NewsBusters says: WRONG, and within seconds finds this CNN transcript from October 11, 2004:
It’s no surprise if you’ve been losing sleep over what’s been going on in the White House. The Better Sleep Council wanted to find out which candidate would make people lose more sleep over the next four years.
Their ingenious poll of registered voters shows that President Bush has a 42-40 percent edge as the one who would lead you to have more sleepless nights. Well, the good news for President Bush is they did choose him, as well, as Commander in Sleep. Forty-four percent say he seems the more well rested candidate of the two.
Probably because he spends so much time on vacation, Gary [Bauer]? I don’t know.
I wondered whether that was the only time Begala criticized Bush’s vacations, and did a Google search myself. Lo and behold, from CNN Crossfire on June 23, 2004:
… If anybody is shirking his job, it is Mr. Bush.
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
A quick count of President Bush’s vacation days shows that he has spent an astonishing 43 percent of his entire presidency on vacation, sometimes at his multimillion-dollar 1,600 acre ranch in Texas with its own private 10-acre lake stocked with 5,000 bass, sometimes at his family’s multimillion-dollar three-story mansion in Kennebunkport, Maine.
Mr. Bush even stayed on vacation after he was warned of Osama bin Laden’s plans to hijack airplanes and attack America. George W. Bush is plainly a gentleman of leisure. So let’s send him on a permanent vacation November 2.
(CHEERING AND APPLAUSE)
… On August 11, he was warned that bin Laden had a plan to attack America. He went and played golf.
But apparently Begala would have a problem with Obama critics taking note he’s played more gold in 18 months than Bush in all 8 years as president.
Back to July 16, 2010 one more time:
The president is the president wherever he is … I thought it was silly when people attacked Bush for going on vacation, so I’ll be consistent and say it’s silly when people attack President Obama for going on vacation. …
And that, my friends, is the latest example of liberal hypocrisy.
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