Obama's SUV-Laden Motorcade Demonstrates His Climate Change Hypocrisy
By Peter Roff, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
My nephew met the president.
It happened Saturday during an impromptu family outing to The Dairy Godmother, a well-known frozen custard store near my home in Alexandria, Va. Coming out the door, my lemon lavender sorbet cone in hand, I noticed a man with an odd-shaped pin in his lapel talking into his wrist. Having lived in the Washington, D.C., area for 25 years, I know that means the president (or a VIP of similar stature) is on his way.
So we decided to wait—and, sure enough, in just a couple of minutes, a motorcade of considerable sized pulled up, out of which jumped the president and his two daughters on a pre-Father's Day trip for a special treat. And according to the people who were inside the store, he could not have been nicer—even going so far as to give Nicholas, my eight-year-old nephew, an autograph.
The whole visit, which took somewhere between 15 minutes and a half an hour, was accomplished with a minimum of fuss. The Secret Service could not have been nicer, going out of their way to make sure the store stayed open so that folks coming to get their own tasty treats were not inconvenienced—well, not too inconvenienced anyway.
So give the president points for style and consideration—but up to a point. I wasn't in the store during the president's visit; I was outside, watching. And counting—counting from where I stood the Chevy SUVs and the vans that made up the motorcade.
I counted 11, none of which had any signs identifying them as hybrids or flex-fuel vehicles, plus an ambulance, idling, engines running while the president ate his vanilla custard with hot fudge and nuts on top. There may have been one or two more, spewing what the president and his supporters would call "greenhouse gasses" into the atmosphere. I'll leave it to someone else to figure out the carbon footprint it put down while sitting at the curb but I think it is fair to note that these are the same kind of SUVs that members of his party like to portray as gas-guzzling environment killers that have no business being sold.
I understand the president needs to travel in safety—and that the Secret Service and critical White House functions that need to travel with him at all times need large vehicles to accommodate their needs. What I don't understand is why the policymakers who are trying to redesign the General Motors and Chrysler product lines into something more environmentally correct and who are trying to force a national energy tax on the American people don't understand that sometime the American family needs large vehicles too? It's true you can't move the president around in a SmartCar—but you can't move a family of five around in one either.
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Tags: Barack Obama | environment | global warming
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Reader Comments
big guys and little guys
it will never change nor will the elementary bullying( simple)yet forever unfair(life)
Liberals need trucks too but won't admit it
So the president has an SUV motorcade. I actually call them trucks. Chevy Suburbans are like a half ton pick up truck. SUV's are something else. And yes many other American families need them too...and need not have to explain "why". I think liberals and environmentalists living in their fantasy world forget that everything in their homes including food purchased at the grocery store or local hippy mart is there because of a truck. You need something repaired in your home or delivered to you? It involves a truck. I am in the horse business, I have 2 trucks one is a Yukon 3/4 ton (GMC equivalent to a Suburban). I get sick of liberals asking my tiny wife why "...a little thing like you needs to drive such a big vehicle" So much for their liberal minded thinking.
JUST THE WAY IT IS
I WORK IN THE DC AREA PART TIME AS A VALET, AND OFTEN SEE SECRET SERVICE WORKING. EVERY VIP GETS AT LEAST 2 LARGE SUVS (BILL CLINTON AT THE DLC DINNER LAST WEEK, HAD 2 SUBURBANS & A FULL SIZE BUICK) THE SEC OF HUD AT ANOTHER EVENT HAD A FULL SIZE GMC ENVOY & A TAHOE THAT WERE BOTH RUNNING THE WHOLE TIME HE WAS INSIDE. THE ONLY THING THAT COULD BE DONE WOULD BE MAYBE HAVE THE AGENTS WHEN PARKED AT LEAST STAY IN THE SAME VEHICLE, BUT ANYTHING ELSE IS JUST NOT PRACTIAL. NOTE AT THE DLC EVENT MOST SENATORS & CONGRESS PEOPLE JUST HAD STAFFERS DROP THEM OFF IN FRONT IN THEIR PERSONAL VEHICLES (MOSTLY NORMAL SIZE CARS & SMALL SUV'S, BUTH THEY JUST WENT AROUND THE CORNER TO IDLE WHILE WAITING FOR THERE BOSS TO COME OUT)
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