Michelle Obama’s Recent Vacation – Too Lavish?

By Andrea Kunicky

First lady Michelle Obama and daughter Sasha just returned back from a vacation in Spain that drew some backlash in the United States. Michelle is under fire for a trip to Spain that included expensive hotel rooms and trips. There was also supposedely a bill that came out of US taxpayers dollars for the Secret Service, which was reportedly close to $250,000.

Mrs. Obama's trip is getting a less than a warm reception in the United States because we are experiencing some tough economic times. The five-day trip took Michelle and Sasha to the southern part of the country, where they visited beautiful coastal towns, did some shopping and even had lunch with King Juan Carlos and Queen Sofia of Spain. They stayed at the five-star Hotel Villa Padierna, where rooms range anywhere from $400 to nearly $7,000 per night, a high price for extravagance that many are saying is insensitive with the country is in such a terrible recession.

The White House defended the first lady's vacation, noting that the Obama’s paid their own way for the trip. White House adviser David Axelrod said the criticism was overblown, telling The New York Times, "Folks in the public eye are also human beings."

In my opinion, this trip during an economic recession was probably not the smartest move on the Obama’s part, but I feel that we have much more to worry about. Everyone is entitled to a vacation, whether we are a working class citizen or the first lady of the United States. She wanted to spend some quality time with her daughter so we can’t deny her that.

This should die down soon enough, to where we can focus on subjects that are far more important than a mini vacation for a mother and daughter.

Andrea Kunicky is an Account Executive. Contact her at andrea@maroonpr.com.

The Media's Effect in the Firing of Shirley Sherrod

By Carolyn Maroon

I’m sure just about everyone is familiar with the story about the firing of Shirley Sherrod from the United States Department of Agriculture as Director of Rural Development for Georgia. The firing was based on an edited tape of a speech that Sherrod gave in March to the NAACP, which has stirred up a lot of negative emotions and outrage. The story is largely about the danger of jumping to conclusions and media bias.

It all started with conservative blogger Andrew Breitbart, who posted an edited part of the speech without allegedly viewing the entire speech or doing any investigating or research beforehand. Breitbart has stated that his intent was to bring the speech to the public in an effort to expose the hypocrisy of the NAACP. Breitbart is just the latest example of “journalists” who are reckless, and the end result is a blow to the credibility of journalism - a bad thing for society as a whole.

More and more these days we see media outlets and reporters with agendas and strong political leanings. The media is very powerful and reporting the news in a slanted fashion can be dangerous if we blindly believe what we read or listen to without thinking for ourselves and asking questions.

You think this is an exaggeration? Let’s see… a woman was fired from her job after a media member posted an edited tape in which this woman appeared to be making racist comments. The woman’s employer didn’t do an internal investigation as to the origin or legitimacy of the story. The employer didn’t even give the employee an opportunity to tell her side of the story. Since the woman was employed by a government agency this story is national news, and today the USDA along with the Obama administration is taking a hit for not thinking for themselves and asking questions. They simply believed what the media reported.

The lesson I took away from all of this is that we need to continue to monitor the press and look at all stories with a more thoughtful eye before we jump to conclusions or trust the reports on both sides of the political aisle.

Carolyn Maroon is Maroon PR's Office Manager. Contact her at carolyn@maroonpr.com.