LETTER: Obama should curb his travel

President Obama talks a lot about higher taxes on the wealthy and tightening our belts. How about some cuts in his spending of our tax dollars such as the money he spends flying around the country on Air Force One on his never ending re-election campaign.

The Air Force estimates this costs $181,757 per flight hour, not including the additional travel costs of Marine One, Secret Service, logistics and local expenses. He is spending more than $100 million taxpayer dollars annually travelling on presidential aircraft and probably another $100 million on his entourage including his wife's numerous vacations.

While the president needs to get out of Washington, D.C., and see the people, being out of town every other day of the year seems somewhat excessive to me.

Perhaps he should spend a little more time at home rethinking government investments in companies like Solyndra, Beacon Power and Enerl where we have already lost $633 million dollars. An even better topic would be working on positive solutions to solve the nagging 8.5 percent reported unemployment rate which does not include those who have just quit looking for work.

The best project would involve what to do about the ever increasing national debt including the $5 trillion additional dollars he has racked up since taking office. It is now so immense that merely paying the interest, even at today's low rates, threatens to crowd out essential government operational expenditures elsewhere. Here is a hint. This cannot be done by just making those who are wealthy pay more taxes. We must address every single area of government existing and future expense.

His aides indicate the real good talker wants to travel even more. I think most of his tax paying subjects would like to see him stay home taking real action.

Allan C. Sorensen

Aiken