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A 27-Hour Gulf Avoidance Jaunt Doesn’t Pass The Sniff Test * Updated

By Linda Anselmi on August 17, 2010 at 2:30 PM in Economy, Environment

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Family vacations have become something of a challenge these days.  Choices have to be made.

These are new economic times and difficult working times. A new job means vacation days that haven’t been earned yet. A second job can present work conflicts with the already scheduled vacation at the first job. And with job cuts around every corner, those much-needed and cherished vacation days may seem like a temptation best resisted, if it will help you to hang on to that job security.

Finances are tight.  Much dreamed of and long-planned for cruises and tours have moved to a back burner with the heat turned off. Flying for fun has become an unaffordable luxury for many. Going local is a growing trend. It cuts both travel time and travel expenses. Exotic locales have become local discoveries. A weekend get away to a local motel with pool and nearby family attractions maybe the best many can do this summer.

No surprise the First Family had more than a few challenges to face on their whistle-stop promotional jaunt to the Gulf region this weekend. First they had to scrape together a whopping 27 hours for their visit to the Gulf. No easy task when their calendars were already brimming with campaigning, fundraising and vacation plans including a 10-day return visit to Martha’s Vineyard.

For most Americans, the First Family’s Gulf vacation was about not only showing skeptical Americans that the Gulf is truly safe.  But also showing Gulf residents, fishermen, drill workers, and business owners that the American people support them.  Letting the Gulf community know that we too are worried about their health, homes, families, jobs and finances.

The Gulf is a tricky place to visit these days.  The Gulf community isn’t just worried, they are angry.  There was a possibility the First Family might actually come face-to-face with those angry and worried people.  If not handled properly, it could have resulted in something neither fun nor a vacation and far from giving support.  But leadership is made in moments like these.

If location was the critical choice for the First Family’s visit to the Gulf.  Avoidance became the central theme.  Go to Florida.  Avoid the hardest hit region.  Avoid the angry people.  Avoid the 2 million barrels of oil that have not magically disappeared — despite BP’s promises, governments assurances, and media parroting.

After all, could President Obama proclaim during his visit that the Gulf Coast beaches clean, safe and open for business if the oil started showing up in all the obvious places — like “clean” beaches and “safe” waters.

And could the Whitehouse post pictures of the President and his daughter swimming in “safe” waters, if “gulf” waters are not suitable for wadding, playing, or swimming?

From Suzanne Goldenberg at The Gaurdian:

… John Kessler, of Texas A&M University, who led a National Science Foundation on-site study of the spill. “The fact is that 50% to 75% of the material that came out of the well is still in the water. It’s just in a dissolved or dispersed form.”

Go to Florida.  Avoid “gulf” waters.  Swim in bay waters.  And exclude photographers and journalist from documenting the swim.

From Guy Adams at The Independent:

The official picture was intended to provide evidence that the region’s beaches are back to normal. Yet it soon emerged that the private beach on which it was taken, off Alligator Point in St Andrew Bay, north-west Florida, isn’t technically in the gulf.

Could the President encourage Gulf visitors and proclaim the area “open for business”, if dispersants are still being sprayed to sink the oil that hasn’t disappeared?

Go to Florida.  Avoid dispersant areas.  Avoid discussing the accuracy of “sniff” testing seafood for oil and the hazards of having no test for the dispersants in food.  Ignore that  oil and toxic dispersants found on recently opened Mississippi shrimping and oyster grounds.

It is not surprising that the public has shown considerable interest in the First Family’s summer fun this year.  After all, the President and his family are a very visible symbol of American families and the American way of life.  Commenting on summer vacations is a time honor American tradition.  It is how we greet each other as the dog days of summer roll around and we head back to classrooms, homes, and the dwindling few convene around water coolers.

But will the American people like what the First Family’s Gulf Vacation says about Americans?  Do we care that the First Family went for the least amount of time they could call a get-away? Or that they traveled to the least affected area that they could reasonable call the gulf?  And that the water they swam in wasn’t really the Gulf, but a bay?  Will Americans feel like the President gave the Gulf community their and our full support?

And more importantly, has the First Family succeeded in convincing Americans and the world that the Gulf’s waters, beaches and seafood are now safe?

It would seem I’m not the only one who thinks the First Family’s Gulf Avoidance Vacation didn’t pass the sniff test!

***

UPDATE:

It seems the Obama Family can’t catch a break on the vacation front.  They go from the oil and dispersant filled waters of the Gulf last weekend to fecal coliform contaminated waters of Martha’s Vineyard this weekend.

From Will bacteria count beach Barack Obama? by Gayle Fee and Laura Raposa at the Boston Hearld:

Welcome to Martha’s Vineyard, Mr. President – but don’t go in the water!

President Obama, who took a plunge in the Gulf last week to show Americans it was safe to swim the oil spill-plagued area, arrived on this supposedly pristine island yesterday in the midst of a rash of bacteria-induced beach closings.

Portions of Tisbury Great Pond, the salt-water lagoon fronting the first family’s vacation estate Blue Heron Farm, were closed earlier this week due to high levels of enterococci, an indicator that the water is contaminated with fecal coliform bacteria. Ew.

High levels of enterococci can cause skin irritation, vomiting or diarrhea in swimmers. Which could ruin anyone’s vacation!

I guess the President’s Martha’s Vineyard vacation won’t pass the sniff test either.

***

  • kenoshamarge

    Certainly doesn’t pass the sniff test. It certianly does show how stupid the Oblahblah Administration thinks the public is. They gone from appearing “tone-deaf” to appearing “stone-deaf”. And that just plain stinks.

  • Lt. Beowulf

    Can all this be real? Did we really see the First Family attempt to fool the American public? NO. It was impostors. They wouldn’t think people in this country were that stupd, would they? They know better. Surely the President of the United States wouldn’t try to con people. There has been some mistake. I’m sure it will explained during his re-election campaign. It was done to save tax payers money. Yeah, that’s it. That’s the ticket. We just misinterpreted his intentions.

  • Breeze

    -  
     
     
    Safe seafood? Shrimpers  
    worry as season opens      
       
    Associated Press,  
    by Cain Burdeau  
    & Kevin McGill     
     
    Original Article  
     
    8/16/2010  
     
    New Orleans – Shrimpers returned to Louisiana waters Monday for the first commercial season since the Gulf of Mexico oil disaster, uncertain what crude may still be in the water and what price they’ll get for the catch if consumers worry about possible lingering effects from the massive BP spill. (Snip) Perhaps the biggest fear is that some fisherman might try to sell oil-contaminated shrimp and scare consumers away again after prices crashed once already this summer. “If you see oily shrimp, you got to throw them back over. Go somewhere else. It’s all you can do. And you hope….

  • Breeze

    -  
     
     
    Much Oil Remains in Gulf,  
    Researchers Estimate      
     
    Wall Street Journal,  
    by Robert Lee Hotz     
     
    Original Article  
     
    8/17/2010  
     
    Researchers at the University of Georgia said Monday that more than three-quarters of the oil spilled in the Gulf of Mexico following the Deepwater Horizon drilling-rig explosion could still be in the Gulf threatening fisheries and marine life, disputing government statements that much of the oil had been safely dispersed. The federal National Incident Command, which has been coordinating clean-up efforts, reported earlier this month that the damaged well had spewed about 4.9 million barrels of oil into the Gulf before it was capped. (Snip) Both the UGA assessment and the federal calculations it contradicts are estimates based on incomplete….  
     

  • Happy

    I certainly did not agree with President Bush and was angry over most his policy but I never had any doubt that he loved his country this is the first time in my life I doubt a President love of country this is really big to me . It hit me last night when I was caught up the Mosque debate and all the other questionable wisdom from the President it just so much bigger than policy I really believe he hates America (could that be)

  • My Site (click to edit)

    I don’t believe for a moment the water and fish are safe.  Its  like after Katrina when hundreds of bodies passes through the pumps in Lake Ponchartrain and the Bush Administration still said the seafood was okay.  Not.

  • arabella trefoil

    Nobody is going to fooled by this. If Barry wanted to show that the water was safe, and if Michelle wanted to promote weight loss for kids, the photo ops (er, optics) would have shown the Obama family eating sea food. Not ice cream.

  • Breeze

    -
    Scientists: Toxic oil settling on Gulf floor


    CNN,
    by Ed Lavandera   

    Original Article

    8/17/2010

    John Paul says, at first, he couldn’t believe his own scientific data showing toxic microscopic marine organisms in the Gulf of Mexico. He repeated the field test. A colleague did his own test. All the results came back the same: toxic. It was the first time Paul and other University of South Florida scientists had made such a finding since they started investigating the environmental damage from the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill. The preliminary results, the scientists believe, show that oil that has settled on the floor is contaminating small sea organisms….

  • Olivia1998

    Just like “the chickens have come home to roost” Rev Wright.  I think he was listening.

  • Peggy Sue

    The Gulf story [that the Government and BP are just so desperate to have disappear] is really distressing.  Several independent scientific teams have called the Government’s numbers absolutely ludicrous.  The official story says the oil is gone, gone, gone.  If you don’t see it, it doesn’t exist.  But the latest team has been taking samples and the oil [dispersed droplets] is disrupting, possibly destoying the food chain. 

    I give the fishermen credit.  As anxious as they are to return to their livlihoods, they do not want to endanger others or themselves and their families. I watched another video, featuring a group on the Mississippi.  In a very simple experiment, they used white rags, submerged them in the water and within seconds came out with oily blotched evidence. 

    This has become another chapter in the Big Lie.  To add insult to injury, Obama does a Gulf drive-by, does not visit the hard-hit coastline [he might have been booed], gives a flat, uninspired speech, telling people to “come on down,” and then has the unmitigated gall to have a photo-op in St. Andrew Bay, where he’s sure not to get his hands dirty.

    A disgrace!

  • arabella trefoil

    Very bad news. Once those contaminants work their way up the food chain, they will become more concentrated in each species. As a result, the organisms/animals on the top of the food chain will be even more contaminated.

    Hard to explain, but you get the idea. The apex consumer/predator gets a more lethal does than those on the bottom of the food chain. And depending on whether or not the contaminant is fat soluble, the toxin is retained the in animals tissues. Until somebody else eats it.

  • arabella trefoil

    Even if you can’t see the oil, the molecules remain unless they are degraded/transformed in some way. Remember the PCB’s in the Hudson River?

  • Happy

    Michelle plan is going to work great she will be funding it with a 13% reduction in Food Stamps (the kids will lose weight because there will be no food) and people said she wasn’t a smart attorney oh wait she hasn’t been a attorney for 17 year whoops!

  • Breeze

    -    
     
    BARF ALERT:  
     
     
    Obamas show some affection  
       
    The Hill [Washington, DC],  
    by Christina Wilkie     
     
    Original Article  
     
    8/17/2010  
     
    It may look like a Hallmark card, but don’t be fooled. This is an official White House photo taken Sunday, while the First Family was touring St. Andrews Bay in Panama City Beach, Fla. The hands in the photo belong to, you guessed it, President Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama, who interlocked fingers along the railing of a Coast Guard ship on a trip out on the bay. Here’s the official White House caption from photographer Pete Souza: “The hands of President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama rest on the railing….”

  • Breeze

    -  
     
    ONE MORE O/T:  
     
     
    Michelle Obama to hit campaign  
    trail with ‘upbeat’ speech      
     
    The Hill [Washington, DC],  
    by Shane D’Aprile     
     
    Original Article  
     
    8/17/2010  
     
    The White House is ready to deploy first lady Michelle Obama on the midterm campaign trail, but expect her to leave the partisan knocks to other surrogates. The Chicago Tribune’s Peter Nicholas has some details on White House plans to use the first lady (shown here speaking in Panama City, Fla. this summer) to stump for Democratic candidates this fall. Her campaign schedule won’t be a heavy one, the White House said Monday. She makes public appearances about three days a week, and any campaigning she does for….

  • Diana L. C. Hazelnut Nut Thin Cracker

    Breeze, thank you for the warning.  I cannot bear to look at the photo.  Barfing is NOT a pleasant thing to experience.

  • Diana L. C. Hazelnut Nut Thin Cracker

    So if she’s going to give us all an “upbeat” message, we might assume she has some experience doing stand up comedy?  It will all be terribly facetious, sardonic, and sarcastic, won’t it? 

    No?  Then, I’ll pass going to hear her.

  • Diana L. C. Hazelnut Nut Thin Cracker

    Linda A,

    I have always thought, as I have mentioned before, that all the delegates to the U.N. should have to greet each other the way dogs greet each other at an off leash park.  They find out pretty quickly which ones are alpha (and would have cajones if they weren’t already cut off) and which ones are (ahem) full of it.

    So, in this case, I would have to send my dogs in to do the sniff test for me, as I am pretty sure already what the verdict would be.  ;)

  • Rabble Rouser Rev. Amy

    So THAT’S how that plan is going to work!!  Now it all makes sense.

    Michelle never did practice law, did she?  Neither did BO, come to think of it.

    Along those lines, is anyone else sick of how Obama is always referred to as a “law professor” and that’s why he gets all lofty and a bit difficult to understand when he speaks extemporaneously (as opposed to him being full of BS)?  He couldn’t even get the job he had on his own merit, for heaven’s sake, so how erudite could he possibly have been?  Sheesh.

    Thanks, Linda, for covering this.  I am just shaking my head at the crap he continues to try and pull on us.  I am glad you aren’t letting him get aawy with it here!

    One more thing – why is his oldest daughter off at camp while the family is going on all of these vacations??  Just wondering…

  • Lt. Beowulf

    So the money Obama ‘extorted’ from BP was like money Al Capone gave to politicians in Chicago to make thinngs go away? A trick Obama learned from his betters while learning the ropes? How does that work, do you think? He gets it after he leaves office through a job, or what? I know it’s in escrow but there must be some slush hidden somewhere that he can eventually tap into. He tipped over too far backwards on this one. It stinks more than the water in the Gulf. Of course everyone wants to make it go away. They’ll eat food tested in a private lab if it comes down to it. Money will buy anything. Just like it has the President of the USA. Aren’t we all amazed?

  • Lt. Beowulf

    Obama and his family aren’t on vacation, they’re hiding until their last stink fades from public memory as the media launches off into another misleading attempt to prove that the rest of us are suckers. They even have the gall to say he’s paying his own way. Just like he paid for his mansion in Chicago. The only problem we have is the help he gets in covering up his lies and double dealing comes from our own tax dollars. I just want to know what his bank account statements look like. Or do you think he keeps it in his sock drawer along with the stink from his feet Michelle was complaining about before their excrement quit stinking? Bad. We’ve had some crooks but this one is just plain bad.

  • Breeze

    -

    RRRAmy,

    It seems that there were behaviour problems with the children at school.

    But only the elder has been sent to camp…..

  • candymarl red bone cracker

    Did you hear the latest? WalMart is giving away fishing licenses so people will fish the Gulf.

    I’m done.

  • Lenny

    oso he tried to fool the unsuspecting public and ended up on #8 of America’s worst nbeaches – a beach which tested for high levels of human fecal matter?  Oh that’s so funny.  I’d really rather wash off the oil  than marinating in bacteria any day!

  • Patience

    Great article Linda.  And I appreciate all of the links.  The Gulf Oil Spill story seems to be slowly fading away, in spite of the ongoing and serious problems there. 

    In fact, the drop-off of coverage caused me to have a lapse in judgement: I bought some frozen shrimp from a meat store the other day.  It was packaged on 6/11/10.  What was I thinking???  Does shrimp come from anywhere other than the Gulf???   

  • Talk2ThePaw

    Me thinks it is much more than behaviour problems. Or they are major league behavior problems such as setting the school on fire.  A large majority of children at one time or another have mild behavior problems, but do not have to be sent away.  There is much more to the story of the eldest daughter.  But do not fear for her privacy, her parents know how to launch major coverups.

  • kenoshamarge

    Why shouldn’t she be “upbeat”. She’s been on vacation to Spain, and to Martha’s Vineyard. Twice. If I could afford to do that I’d be a lot more upbeat than I am. It being the case that I cannot afford to do those things getting an “upbeat” message from someone that can is just going to honk me off.

    Of course the base, the Obamacrats will swallow any bilge, toxic, oil-soaked or not if it comes from the mate of the “one”. Once you decide you suspend the thinking process it’s difficult to get it up and running again. And so many don’t try because it might take an effort.

    I think this bumper sticker says a lot about many voters:

  • kenoshamarge

    Do they throw in a bottle of Dawn with that license?

  • arabella trefoil

    kenoshamarge – Michelle is going to be so batshit crazy the next time they let her out in public that her handlers are going to have to shoot her with animal tranquilizers. I mean, she’s building up some anger and she’s an angry person already.

    She is going to go ballistic in public. I can’t imaging her sticking to an “upbeat message” unless Barry is holding her hand, or her mouth is full of food.

    She and Barry expect nothing but love and adulation 24/7. Even Michelle must know that her trip to Spain caused problems. And now the country is disrespecting her husband. And it’s not as fun being First Lady and Spokesmodel as Michelle thought it would be.

    I think Michelle sees herself as a power broker. She does not want to be talking fluff any more.

  • Mr. Natural

    >>> Does shrimp come from anywhere other than the Gulf???   

    Yes.

  • Mr. Natural

    Bogus.

    Or, as I prefer to call it, Horseshit on Melba Toast.

    WalMart is a dealer of fishing licenses in all states where allowed by law, as they are a sporting goods retailer.

    You can get a free FLORIDA “Shoreline Fishing License” at WalMart, or Dick’s, or Kmart.

    See below.

    Called WalMarts in Louisiana and Mississippi (one each) this AM, asking what I had to do to get a “Free Fishing License.”

    They didn’t know shit about it.

    Called a WalMart in a resort town in Florida, got the story.

    Gee, at 5 cents per minute for my Long Distance, it cost me less than a buck to learn the facts…

    Hey! Didja hear that Mc Donald’s uses worms in its hamburgers and the Proctor and Gamble logo is a Satanist symbol, too. And that the Record Companies had Michael Jackson murdered?

    From the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission:The shoreline fishing license for Florida residents to catch saltwater fish from shore or a structure affixed to shore cost $9 last year, but this year it’s free, beginning July 1.The Florida Legislature repealed the shoreline license fee during the past session. However, legislators retained the license requirement to prevent a more-costly federal registration fee from taking effect in Florida.Resident anglers who obtain the shoreline license over the phone or Internet still will have to pay a convenience fee to the vendor. The convenience fee is $2.31 for Internet sales at http://www.fl.wildlifelicense.com or $3.33 for phone sales at 888-FISH FLORIDA (888-347-4356).Only Florida residents qualify for a no-cost shoreline license, and the license does not cover fishing from a boat or fishing from a location or structure accessible only by boat. That requires a regular saltwater fishing license: $17 for residents; for nonresidents the cost is $17 for three days, $30 for seven days or $47 per year.

  • Linda Anselmi

    Too funny kenoshamarge!  

    Maybe they should issue a bottle of dawn to all travelers to the Gulf and each seafood purchase – just incase…

  • Mr. Natural

    Everything settles onto the floor of the Gulf. The Gulf is the polishing pond for the vast majority of sewage from all the lands drained by the Mississippi system.

    With respect to the oysters, who in his/her right mind would eat something uncooked which eats poop? There are a lot of nasty/interesting substances inside of an oyster, many of which you wouldn’t care to put inside you.