The Obama family is more expensive than all the royals of Europe.

We used to be a republic.

Surely part of the cost is due to the massive security needed because you people keep shooting at your presidents?

Strap the dog on the roof like Romney did.

+A Billion for dip player

For more information on how Obama is the first President to rack up massive travel bills, see "Ronald Reagan's Ranch in Santa Barbara, California" and "George W. Bush's Home in Crawford, Texas."

Seriously, if you think this is a new thing, open your eyes.

It's not new. Doesn't mean it's good.

And in the days of Sequester, it is bad form for the President to be so wasteful.

But they were travel bills for people. Not dogs. I don't have any problem with spending loads and loads of money to protect our presidents and I don't begrudge them their vacations (which are really just them doing the job they always do but just not in the White House). It's the money spent on sending a dog to Martha's Vineyard or Michelle and the Obama daughters and friends on a lavish trip to Spain I have a problem with.

Nor is Congress giving themselves a raise during an economic downturn, but that's the only thing that's unanimously passed in years. The fact of the matter is that Washington DC is greedy, no matter which side of the political spectrum you fall on. Keep electing greedy people and you'll keep having greedy people in office.

If we didn't pay our members of Congress well then only rich people could afford to be members of Congress.

The average wealth of the members of the House in 2011 was nearing $5,000,000 and the average wealth of the members of the Senate in 2011 was around $11,000,000 - way down from 2010.

http://www.opensecrets.org/pfds/averages.php

Cut every government budget 5%. Let them learn to live within their means, like the rest of us.

Then cut 5% more next year. Keep that up for a decade, at least.

The government cutting their own budget? Yeah right. They'd rather tax us more so that they can all afford their own private ranch and to fly their dog on fancy hybrid heli-planes.

Sounds nice in theory, dipplayer. Finding members of government that will make it happen is a challenge. (And that includes Libertarians.)

An average is meaningless. Nancy Pelosi alone might screw it up, since she is far and away the wealthiest member of the House.

As for cuts, that sounds good. But do you really want the DOD budget shrunk by 50% in ten years? Or NASA? Or national parks? Or highways? Or the post office, which is, even in our information age, a crazy important link very rural areas of the country have with the rest of civilization? It's one thing to want to get rid of waste, another to just gut the state so that it isn't even able to pretend that it works anymore.

On another note...that whole Obamacare thing...that Congress was supposed to fully participate in when they thrust it upon us? Yeah....Gov'mnt workers will have their coverage paid for at 75%....I wonder if they decide to graciously cover out insurance costs by 75% with all those free health ca.....oh, never mind...

And, not to sound too bourgeois, but 5 million dollars isn't really so much of a net worth if you've planned well for retirement and had a professional career. Even easier if you just had one or no kids.

You wouldn't shrink 50% from current levels. The math doesn't work that way.

So cutting the rate of growth by 5% each year? That may be fine.

Invictus, $5 million for destroying the economy is a pretty damned good salary. These same fucktards becoming multi-millionaires by siphoning off campaign contribution and selling books through the party apparatus are the same douche-wads that villify the "1%" for, you know, running companies that actually create the jobs the government can't....

Remember Krellin, some people will just never accept the value of a free market.

Misusing campaign funds is a pretty serious accusation. Do you have evidence that this is widespread?

And it looks like you don't know the difference between salary and net worth...

Invictus, this is purely my opinion, but if the House of Representatives were there to represent the common people, the average net worth would be much lower.

For a different number, the median net worth in the House is ~$666,000 (http://www.marketplace.org/topics/economy/globalist-quiz/how-many-millionaires-are-congress) while the same statistic reads $120,000 for American families.

By that number, they are, by median, not average, since you're looking for a resistant figure, approximately five times richer than the rest of us.

I'm still interested in my question. Why was it even necessary to transport the dog separately?

Old news there's been this rumors since 2010. Probably was flying in with some other advisors and the what not.

The what not? This is getting bigger than a dog. How much is spent transporting the President's what not to various destinations? Does the what not require special handling? What would be the effect on the morale of ordinary Americans if they knew the President had lost his what not?

I'm talking real cuts. Not slowing the rate of growth.

Is it a problem, really? Who's to say they weren't once at a $120,000 net worth in their lives? After all, members of Congress are older than the general population.

I don't want this to get too far into the weeds. I just think our elected representatives ought to be fairly compensated, and that means a fairly high level of compensation. After all, they have to have an apartment in another city and most of them work crazy hours both in Washington and in their districts, both to keep the contributions coming and to stay in touch with constituents. I've worked for a Congressman. I know how hard it is on these people and how a lot are not the plutocrats we imagine them to be (at least until they retire and become lobbyists, haha).

We're not talking about cuts. We're talking about the what not.