My Dear American Citizens,

For only the second time in my adult life, I am not ashamed of my country. I want to thank you hard working American people for paying $242,000 plus additional expenses for my Spanish vacation.

My daughter Sasha, several long-time family friends, my personal staff and various guests had a wonderful time. Honestly, you just haven’t lived until you have stayed at a 5-Star, $2,500.00 per night suite in a luxury hotel. Some of you say we are extravagant. That’s just not true. We booked only 70 rooms for our friends, staff and family. Also, we used public transportation, Air Force 2. Besides, we had little privacy with 70 Secret Service personnel who tagged along to be sure we were safe and cared for at all times.

I sincerely must ask the help of you American citizens. Please drive smaller, more fuel efficient cars and drive less too. We need to lessen our combined carbon footprint.

That old Air Force 2 used 47,500 gallons of jet fuel for our trip and carbon emissions were a mere 1,031 tons of CO2. It costs only $11,500 per hour to operate Air Force 2 and each additional plane for the other members of our party group. These are only rough estimates, but they are close. It’s quite a carbon footprint, as my good friend Al Gore would say. But who’s counting anyway.

I want you to know that I realize that times are hard and millions of you are struggling to put food on the table and many of your are exhausted trying to make ends meet. I do so appreciate your sacrifice and do hope you find work soon. I also was really exhausted after Barack took our family on a luxury vacation in Maine a few weeks ago. I just had to get away for a few days.

I had planned to have written you more from Martha’s Vineyard where we spent our sixth vacation this year with more of our family and friends, but Barack and I were just too busy eating shrimp. I just didn’t realize it is so much fun being proud!

Cordially,
M. Obama



Thursday, 2 September 2010
http://www.theospark.net/2010/09/letter-from-proud-american.html#links