The US is still crawling through a recession and its citizens are unhappy that their president is squandering huge resources on a vacation
There's a groundswell of anger in the US over the high cost of Barack Obama's trip to India this weekend. The sentiment stems from reports that the president and his entourage of about 3,000 officials, business people and security personnel will spend an estimated $200 million a day when he visits India for four days, beginning Saturday.
Topping the list of critics is newly-elected Republican representative from Minnesota Michele Bachmann, who has called the cost of the upcoming presidential trip "over-the-top". In an interview to a television channel on Wednesday, following her victory in a hotly-contested re-election bid to the US Congress, she said, "We have never seen this sort of an entourage going with the president before. And I think this is an example of the massive overspending that we've seen-not just in the last two years, really in the last four."
There has been no independent confirmation of the expenditure figures, but the White House was quick to respond, saying that the figures cited have no basis in reality. "Due to security concerns, we are unable to outline details associated with security procedures and costs, but it's safe to say these numbers are wildly inflated," White House spokesperson Amy Brundage said in a statement.
Still, it's difficult to believe that the elaborate arrangements for the four-day visit will come cheap. Take the bomb-proof surface tunnel that is to be installed by US military engineers on the approach to Mani Bhavan, the Gandhi museum that the president will visit soon after he comes to Mumbai on Saturday. US security officials came up with the plan after inspecting the route to the museum and they felt that the area was too congested to monitor. The kilometer-long tunnel that will be large enough to let Obama's cavalcade drive through, will be put up in an hour.
Several officials from the White House and US security agencies have been in India for the past couple of weeks with helicopters, a ship and high-end security systems, preparing for the visit. While security is a major concern, Americans aren't convinced about the costs involved.
"Some people say that Obama does not get it. I say he gets it just fine. He just does not care. He has his pie and he will eat it with all the toppings he can get on it and to heck with anyone else," writes one reader to a website, in response to the report on the cost of the trip. "This man has had more vacations in his two years in office than I have had in my entire life. He does not care that US citizens are living in tents as long as he is not."
Bill Hammersley, another writer on the website disagreed with the criticism. "Every time I see this article the number of people grows and grows. It started out as 150 people and now it's 20 times that size. This is the kind of over exaggeration that makes us look so silly and ignorant."
At $200 million a day for the four-day stay, the total expenditure might not be anywhere near $1 billion, perhaps a lot less. But this is apparently a little too much for Americans working through a recession to digest. A large section of them are struggling without employment and factories are continuing to close down. Thousands have lost their houses since the financial crisis set off the economic slide in 2008.
Obama was elected exactly two years ago for the hope he gave the American people. With no significant improvement in the economic situation, the sense of hope has been replaced by frustration and fear which resulted in a dramatic vote against the president and his Democratic Party in mid-term elections this week. As Bill, one of several agitated Americans, wrote after returning from casting his vote: "I'm totally speechless when it comes to Obama and his clowns and the whole political mess. I can't express my anger and resentment anymore." — Moneylife Digital Team
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