Bush vacation daze....

The front page of today's N.Y. Times print-edition shows President Bush, wife, Laura, and family dog, Barney, disembarking Air Force One in D.C. after yet another a trip to Texas. Now, the caption doesn't say Bush was on vacation, but it was Easter, after all, so I'm going to make a leap here and assume the royal couple were kicking back at The Ranch.

What I'd like to know is, how many vacation days does this guy get? Americans, if we're lucky enough to have a permanent job, average 13 vacation days a year. That's 13...! We trail by nearly half the legendary workaholic Japanese, who enjoy 25 days of annual vacation. Not to mention the Europeans! They get a month off every year, give or take a week.

Now I don't know, maybe I should be glad G.W. would rather hit the jogging trail than burn the midnight oil over some confusing, complicated and boring peace treaty between Palestinians and Israelis. His reign has wrecked enough global havoc with him on light-duty; Lord knows if the planet could survive a full-time Bush presidency!

But the issue here is also parity. If our head civil servant gets a 3 or 4-day every-other-weekend, well, we should, too! Or at least a month off every summer.