As President Obama enjoys golfing, tennis and his $35,000 per week vacation rental the media provides wall-to-wall coverage of the travels of the dead body of a US Senator. Meanwhile real Americans are suffering. According to Atlanta Fed chief Dennis Lockhart, "If one considers the people who would like a job but have stopped looking - so-called discouraged workers - and those who are working fewer hours than they want, the unemployment rate would move from the official 9.4 percent to 16 percent." (source)

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The official unemployment rate in Detroit has now reached 28.9 percent and in the president's hometown of Chicago its hit double digits (10.7). But what should be front and center on the national news has been virtually ignored in favor of hours of long range images of the Kennedy compound in exclusive Hyannis Port while pundits interview other pundits about Senator Kennedy's life. No disrespect intended but is there anything about Senator Kennedy's life we didn't already know (or have access to if we wanted to know it)?

With the interuption of the Obamas' vacation by two hurricanes and a funeral, White House officials said they are going to give vacationing a second try next week with a five-day Labor Day weekend stay at the presidential retreat at Camp David. (source) While I don't begrudge the president the occasional respite from his high pressure job, maybe he could avoid flaunting his luxurious getaways while so many Americans are on involuntary vacations in much less posh surroundings. And maybe the media could tear itself away from tagging along and fawning over the Obamas just long enough to report on the problems affecting the other 300 million of us.