Conservatives Slam Obama for Vacation

A mid-July weekend means summer vacation for every hard-working American, right? The answer, apparently, is no—if you're President Obama. At least that's what critics who are speaking out against his family’s weekend trip to Mount Desert Island, Maine, think. Most of the criticism comes from the fact that the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is still an urgent issue. The Republican National Convention has set up a website bashing Obama’s recent “leisure activities”, for one. And then there’s the fact that the First Family is vacationing in the northeast instead of the Gulf region—an area Obama has repeatedly stressed for vacation-goers to travel during the summer months. "Presidents are certainly entitled to vacation, just like everybody else,” said Brad Blakeman, a former George W. Bush's senior staffer, “but there is a fine line as to when presidents should do it, what they should and where they should do it.” The president’s time off, though controversial, will nonetheless provide him with a respite from what will surely be chaotic months ahead. “Where he chooses to take his days off should really be up to him,” Jamal Simmons, a Democratic strategist, told CNN. “We don’t want to get into a situation where the president is making familial vacation decisions based upon polling or political maneuvers.”