FLOTUS And Daughters Hit The Vail Slopes

It is good to be First Lady and First Daughters. With the long Presidents Day weekend, they packed up and went to Vail, Colorado for a little skiing.

No big deal, under regular circumstances. But, with a President in the Oval Office calling for 'shared sacrifice' and an economy still in the dumps and over 9% unemployment with no end in sight, you would think the First Family would be a little less tone deaf.

The Obama entourage arrived at the Eagle County Regional Airport on Friday night. A motorcade of about a dozen vehicles drove from Gypsum into Vail and the underground garage of the Sebastian hotel.

This is a follow up ski trip, I suppose, after the one last winter for the girls.

The first lady took daughters Sasha and Malia for a quick trip to Liberty Mountain Resort, in Carroll Valley, Pa., in February 2010. It was the first time on skis for the first daughters, according to Anne Weimer, marketing director at Ski Liberty.

Does anyone else think it's odd that these "family vacations" do not include the husband and father of the family?

Maybe President Obama thinks other families should be making belt tightening measures to get through the tough economy, but not so much for his family. He is a wealthy man now, you know. Those book sales really added up.

The trip came just days after the President tried to sell his cost-cutting budget to the American people by asking them to stay at home.
‘If you’re a family trying to cut back, you might skip going out to dinner, or you might put off a vacation,’ he said.
While Mr Obama is staying put at the White House, the rest of his family headed to Colorado – rather than visiting slopes closer to Washington in Virginia or Pennsylvania.
Their trip came despite previous criticisms over the family's extravagant vacations, including a trip last summer to Spain.
Mrs Obama also raised eyebrows when she left earlier than her husband for their annual Christmas holiday in Hawaii, incurring additional expenses estimated to be more than $97,000.

After discovering the Pennsylvania ski resort last year, Mrs. Obama said, "'You can go from 60- and 50-degree weather to being on a slope,' she said.
'Not too many places in this country you can do that and still be at the seat of power. It's kind of cool.'"

I guess Vail is cooler this year.

The Obamas are reported to be picking up personal expenses. The taxpayers will pick up the entourage security and all those gas guzzling, polluting SUVs transporting them.