Steve Peacock's U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor

Disturbing Truth Behind Obama's Travel Madness (WND)

My latest from WND. -- S.P.

Supporters of Barack Obama tout his dedication to the responsibilities of the presidency by noting that he had taken 96 days of vacation at the point in his term that President George W. Bush had taken a reported 335.

But they admit that 51 of Bush’s trips were to his Texas ranch, while records show that Obama’s destinations have ranged from exotic European and African locales to pricey digs to Hawaii, where he’s sometimes traveled separately from his family, effectively doubling transportation costs for taxpayers.

The records released are partial, meaning no firm travel-expense total can be assembled. But individual cases are revealing.

Continued at WND.com...

ALSO SEE: CNN Rips Off U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor Story on Biden's Plush Parisian Jaunt

 more at http://www.wnd.com/2013/11/the-disturbing-truth-behind-obamas-travel-junkets/#SMBd76Lp60bvCSCW.99

CNN Rips Off U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor Story on Biden's Plush Parisian Jaunt

Over a month ago U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor broke the story on U.S. Vice President Joe Biden's pricey trip to Paris, during which time taxpayers shelled out $585,000 and $322,000, respectively, for hotel rooms, limos, and other vehicles. VPOTUS Biden and his staff spent those taxpayer funds during his one-day Parisian journey to meet French President Francois Hollande.

CNN this past week reported on the trip -- using the same documents that the Monitor had discovered via painstaking database research -- and tooted its own horn on international TV as if that were its own discovery.

CNN's Situation Room with Wolf Blitzer talked about this "amazing, amazing discovery" (of theirs) and how shocked they were to have found these rare documents. Blitzer asked CNN White House Correspondent Brianna Keilar about her unparalleled reporting skills in uncovering this rarity, and they both speculated that the government perhaps did not mean to upload the documents to the federal database.

From the broadcast:

“We’re getting an extremely, extremely rare glimpse at how much it costs when Vice President Joe Biden goes traveling,” Blitzer proclaimed. “Brianna we’ve covered a lot of presidential and vice presidential trips, but this is pretty amazing.”

“It kind of makes you wonder if this information was put out accidentally,” Keilar later says. “I did a search myself of the past 365 days where obviously the president and vice president have gone on other foreign trips and I could find no contracts in addition for any of those visits.”

Couldn't find any contracts, eh?

I went back into FedBizOpps to see if the White House or State Department has sanitized the site of any traces of such documents (similar to what was done to the controversial USAID/Kenya Strategic Communications Plan 2012-2013 I had reported on).

I figured that maybe she may have missed, for example, the documents I previously found specific to President Obama's and Biden's million-dollar stay in Colombia (the scandalous one when Secret Service agents were caught hanging out with hookers). In that instance I was smarter about my research, and had uploaded those contracting documents to the Monitor website rather than linking from my page to the government site (which I had done, not so coincidentally, to prevent other media from stealing my story!)

A quick search today of FedBizOpps reveals that Keilar was less than forthcoming about her supposed "research." The Colombia documents are indeed still publicly available. Here they are:

1) Acquisition of vehicle rental in support of Presidential and VIP travel.

2) Acquisition of hotel accommodation in support of presidential and VIP travel.

3) JOFOC [Justification for Other Than Full and Open Competition] for Hotel Accommodations in Support of Presidential and VIP Travel.

I would link to additional, existing procurement data, but I have other more productive things to do instead -- such as performing some good old-fashioned reporting without ripping off some professional blogger-journalist and claiming it's my own work. -- Steve Peacock

How Much Did it Cost to Send VPOTUS Biden to Paris for a Day?

 

The U.S. Department of State spent $585,000 on hotel rooms and racked up $322,000 on intra-country transportation costs for Vice President Joe Biden's recent trip to Paris, according to contracting documents that U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor located through routine database research.

Despite the availability of contracting awards granted to Hotel Intercontinental Paris Le Grand and Biribin Limousines, respectively, no other procurement documents currently are available. Consequently, it remains unknown just how much State spent on Biden's European mission, which also included stops in Berlin and London.

According to the White House Blog:

In Paris, French President Francois Hollande hosted a lunch for the Vice President to discuss the French and African mission in Mali and their broader counterterrorism cooperation in the region. The two also exchanged views on Syria, Iran’s nuclear program, the Eurozone, and the U.S.-E.U. economic partnership.

A verbatim transcript of his remarks revealed Biden struggling to explain "on behalf of President Obama how much he looks forward -- how much he looks forward to working with you and France, because there’s not a single issue that affects us on the international -- in the international arena that does not -- where our interests do not intersect.  And we look forward to a very, very close relationship between our administrations."

Biden in Munich delivered remarks at the 49th Munich Security Conference, where he: 

held a series of bilateral meeting with world leaders.  His speech stressed the continued importance the U.S. places on the transatlantic relationship…

In his meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, Vice President Biden emphasized the importance of the two countries working together in the interest of international peace and security, including in Syria.  The Vice President noted that while the United States and Russia will continue to have serious differences - including, among other things, on human rights and Russia's recent ban on U.S. adoptions - U.S. and Russian leadership is necessary to achieve practical solutions to the challenges facing the world today.

He also met separately with UN and Arab League Joint Special Representative for Syria Lakhdar Brahimi, and Moaz al-Khatib, the president of the Syrian Opposition Council, to discuss bringing about a transition that leads to a peaceful, inclusive and democratic Syria, where the rights of all Syrians are protected.

Then in London, according to the WH Blog:

the Vice President held meetings with Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg and Prime Minister David Cameron and participated in a meeting of the United Kingdom’s National Security Council.  The meetings focused on array of economic and foreign policy issues, particularly Afghanistan and Pakistan since the Prime Minister had just hosted a UK/Pakistan/Afghanistan summit a few days before the Vice President arrived in London.

Source documents:

Contract award #SFR63013D0004.

Contract award #SFR63013D0003

Dozen Diplomats to Get New $25 Million Palatial Parisian Crib

The U.S. Embassy in Paris is building a new residential facility to house a dozen diplomatic staff members -- and the project will cost taxpayers up to $25 million to design and build.

The U.S. Department of State will construct the facility on U.S. government-owned property near the existing embassy, according to a presolicitation notice that U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor located via routine database research. The proposed compound includes plans for a 90-vehicle underground parking garage.The new structure will supplement, not replace, The Chancery, as the embassy is known, which:

Today, the Chancery faces the Avenue Gabriel and the gardens of the Champs-Elysées. To one side is the famous Hôtel de Crillon. From the Ambassador's office, one can admire what is probably the most beautiful example of 18th Century French architecture, the Place de la Concorde, with statues representing France's great cities, fountains evoking Saint Peter's Square in Rome and twenty gilded columns holding lamps.

Because of "local historic preservation controls," the selected contractor(s) must hire a "local design consultant" to achieve compliance.

Source document: Solicitation #S-AQMMA-12-R-0237.