Reverend Rob Schenck Explains Why He Wasn't at the March for Life

  • Thread starter Thread starter ProVobis
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
I am always skeptical of vacation comparisons. I can see why they need a change of location and I think they are often working, certainly not partying. Bush liked his ranch while Trump likes his resort home. It would be hard to identify actual vacation time.

Regarding golf, it can be an opportunity to privately have discussions with opponents & colleagues (likely Trump’s approach) or a chance to think (alone time) away from the constant hustle and interruption (likely Obama’s approach)
 
Last edited:
Dan123 said:
Gotcha, yep seems more apples to apples. The other number I found was that Trump has spent almost as much on vacations in 3 years as Obama did in 8. I’ll vet that number more before posting a link but if true and derived from reasonable numbers and assumptions is a bit worrying. I know presidents have working vacations but still.
Click to expand...
Perhaps, this article would give more precise numbers regarding expenses on taxpayers. These numbers seem very different from your claim.


(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced today that it obtained records from the U.S. Department of the Air Force and the Secret Service in response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request and two FOIA lawsuits for travel expenses by the families of former President Barack Obama and President Donald Trump.

The total for Obama travel is $9,028,346.90 for this production of documents. Added to the previously released costs, the known total for travel expenses for the Obamas is now $114,691,322.17.

The total for President Trump’s travels in this production is $2,821,367.34. Added to the previously released costs, the known travel costs are now $10,381,792.35 (as of November 27, 2017).

Judicial Watch obtained new Obama travel records from the Secret Service as the result of a May 2017 FOIA lawsuit filed in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia ( Judicial Watch v. U.S. Dept. of Homeland Security (No. 1:17-cv-01007)). Judicial Watch’s lawsuit produced the following travel records showing a total of $9,028,346.90 for Obama travel:
 
Last edited:
Theo520 said:
Regarding golf, it can be an opportunity to privately have discussions with opponents & colleagues (likely Trump’s approach) or a chance to think (alone time) away from the constant hustle and interruption (likely Obama’s approach)
Click to expand...
Yep I agree. I don’t know the breakdown of how often each played alone vs with others either and wont’ speculate but I agree every president, every person really, is entitled to a change of scenery now and then. I do think going to a resort you own is not befitting a position that requires one to be above even the appearance of impropriety. That’s the expectation we have of executive branch employees and it should be demonstrated top down to set the expectations as high as possible.

From the standard of conduct:
The first provision, entitled “Disqualifying financial interests,” prohibits an employee from participating in an official government capacity in a matter in which he has a financial interest or in which his spouse, minor child, employer, or any one of several other specified persons has a financial interest. For example, an agency purchasing agent could not place an agency order for computer software with a company owned by his wife. The provision includes alternatives to nonparticipation, which may involve selling or giving up the conflicting interest or obtaining a statutory waiver that will permit the employee to continue to perform specific official duties.
Click to expand...
https://www.oge.gov/web/oge.nsf/Employee Standards of Conduct
 
Randolph said:
Perhaps, this article would give more precise numbers regarding expenses on taxpayers. These numbers seem very different from your claim.
Click to expand...
Well, they are from November 2017. Given it’s 2020 one might wonder if Trump has done any traveling since then.

HuffPost said it “took a conservative approach to determining costs” of Trump’s travel. It calculated Air Force One operating costs at $15,994 per-hour—the price of fuel and maintenance—although Pentagon documents received by Judicial Watch showed that each flight-hour cost $180,118 in fiscal year 2016 and $206,337 in fiscal year 2015.
Click to expand...
 
Last edited:
Dan123 said:
Well, they are from November 2017. Given it’s 2020 one might wonder if Trump has done any traveling since then.
Click to expand...
A simple 8-year projection for Trump would put his total travel/vacation expenses at around 82 million—comparing to actual Obama’s number at 114 million.
 
Except Judicial Watch is suing over Secret Service cost records, records included in Obama’s total.


And there’s efforts to hide how much is being spent. Obama did it too and JW had to sue, so I’m not counting this for/against either of them, but we do have a more complete picture on Obama obviously since it’s over and we can tally numbers that aren’t changing.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/poli...69ea28-30da-11ea-91fd-82d4e04a3fac_story.html
 
Dan123 said:
And there’s efforts to hide how much is being spent. Obama did it too and JW had to sue, so I’m not counting this for/against either of them, but we do have a more complete picture on Obama obviously since it’s over and we can tally numbers that aren’t changing.
Click to expand...
Be it as it may, analyses of total expenses from different sources can be biased and incorrect. The best numbers at this moment that we can go with are from actual documents. The numbers reported from Judicial Watch are from actual documents including from the Secret Service and US Air Force. JW had to go to court to get them.

Although the number seems to indicate that Trump has spent much less than Obama on travels, this issue is not as important as how the country is doing. You must concede that the economy is doing very well. More people than ever are working and are paying their bills. The newly signed USMCA and the Phase 1 China Deal will bring even more jobs and prosperity to the American families and workers.

I just realized that we have strayed very far from the OP. You are welcome to respond to my post, and I will end here.
 
Last edited:
Randolph said:
Be it as it may, analyses of total expenses from different sources can be biased and incorrect. The best numbers at this moment that we can go with are from actual documents. The numbers reported from Judicial Watch are from actual documents including from the Secret Service and US Air Force. JW had to go to court to get them.
Click to expand...
JW does indeed seem to be doing a decent job being impartial. All I was pointing out is it doesn’t seem like JW has the numbers for the secret service yet, but they do have them for Obama. Here’s an updated report from January 19th 2018, conveniently just a day shy of 1 year:


Taking his 1 year total from there and doing the 8 year extrapolation comes to $108,271,498.24. Given the margin of error these are likely to have it would seem unless there’s more update numbers the two presidents are actually quite close.
Randolph said:
You must concede that the economy is doing very well. More people than ever are working and are paying their bills.
Click to expand...
I do, I worry about some of the long term ramifications of some policies but yes numbers are overall good. Of course I haven’t forgotten when Obama’s numbers were good either. Unemployment peaked at about 10% during the recession and by the end of Obama’s second term it was around 4.3%. That trend has continued under Trump down to under 4%. I’m trying to be evenhanded and not unduly critical of Trump, but I often feel like I’m asked to concede Trump is great for the economy by people who describe the economy under Obama as being the worst ever, despite many of the same growth records such as stock market growth, unemployment reduction, and so on that Trump has.
 
Dan123 said:
I’m trying to be evenhanded
Click to expand...
I appreciate your sentiment and sincerity. We all have our own political and personal convictions/biases. For any debate to be fruitful and meaningful, fairness and objectivity must be allowed to take their course. Thank you for your time and (name removed by moderator)uts.
 
Last edited:
It’s not hard to hard to make comparisons. When Bush ended embryonic stem cell research he gave a prime time television address that was so eloquent and precise that I told my wife at the time he must be a closet Catholic. It was only later I learned that Fr Richard Neuhaus was his advisor on the speech.

Ronald Regan authored a book while he was president, Abortion and the Soul of America. He was largely responsible for turning the pro-life movement from a movement if Catholics and a few Protestants to an actual political movement in the US that the GOP has not abandoned for 4 decades.

So, yes, Trump should be credited for appearing and speaking at the March for Life. But let’s not pretend it makes him, by far, the most pro-life president ever. It was great for a morale boost to the people there, but it was not watched on prime time TV by the whole country. Bush’s was because he played the issue if stem cell research perfectly to build up anticipation as yo what he would do.

Finally, I admit to being cynical about most things Trump does, and I cannot help but note he chose to appear at the March for Life when he desperately needs to shore up his base among evangelicals during impeachment ok proceedings. A base which had shown some signs of cracking.

That being said, I still say: good for Trump, I am glad he appeared and spoke. Just don’t tell me he is the most pro-life president ever.
 
Last edited:
yankeesouth said:
Recently there was a liberal congressman who claims he is Pro Life and he was complaining that he does not get support from Pro Life groups. My question to him would be, if he is Pro Life why is he not supporting Pro Life President Trump. Why not become Republican?
Click to expand...
I do not think that pro-life Democrats should allow themselves to be run out of their own party. Stay, and vote for the Republican if the Democrat candidate is not pro-life, but stay. If they are politicians or elected officials, they should stay and support the party leadership and its candidates as little as they can get by with, and work to advance the pro-life position to the extent possible.
 
Dan123 said:
I do think going to a resort you own is not befitting a position that requires one to be above even the appearance of impropriety. That’s the expectation we have of executive branch employees and it should be demonstrated top down to set the expectations as high as possible.
Click to expand...
My understanding is that POTUS pays his own course fees, not the Govt. And this applies to all the past and present Presidents. Thus, Trump is not enriching himself by golfing at his resorts, he’s preventing other golfers the opportunity to pay fees that would in theory enrich himself…
 
Possibly. But he does have dinners with club members there and the fee for joining raised sharply when he got elected. People are paying for access to the president, even potential access.

On top of that there’s a lot of other costs associated with the president staying somewhere. This is from 2017, he’s visited his properties numerous times since. Secret Service spent more than $250K at Trump properties - POLITICO

The government picks up the tab for all the staff that travel with him as well. Again those fees roughly doubled when he got elected. That doubling is passed onto the taxpayer.
 
Last edited:
Meh. I get frustrated when people try to hold my pro-life beliefs hostage to the MAGA cause. On the other hand, Rev. Schenk can be a big boy and make his own sign. The Trump supporters certainly didn’t deter the appearances from pro-life atheists , pro-life feminists, or pro-life Democrats. Avoiding going somewhere because someone you don’t like will be there sounds more like middle school antics than heartfelt activism.
 
It’s pretty clear that Rev. Schenck didn’t skip the March because of Donald Trump. He skipped it because he’s no longer pro-life. He can blame it on whatever he wants, but this is coming from a guy who articles state has also been swinging left on LGBT and other issues.

Every March you can see people with signs that read “I’m a Democrat and I’m Pro-Life” or “Atheists for Life” or any number of signs that don’t endorse religion or Republicans but they still are against aborting babies. I think they’re pretty brave to run the risk of being called out by their fellow Dems or atheists or whatever, but nobody at the March gives them any trouble.
 
Dan123 said:
On top of that there’s a lot of other costs associated with the president staying somewhere. This is from 2017, he’s visited his properties numerous times since. Secret Service spent more than $250K at Trump properties - POLITICO

The government picks up the tab for all the staff that travel with him as well. Again those fees roughly doubled when he got elected. That doubling is passed onto the taxpayer.
Click to expand...
Surely you don’t imagine security are contract hires? Their salaries are fixed costs, paid whether potus travels or not. The travel planes are also US assests and fixed costs.

It’s highly inappropriate whenever the media allocates fixed costs to any trip by any potus. Mostly the incremental costs are just extra fuel, hotel, and per diem food.
 
Last edited:
I understand his point. He has a full understanding of what pro-life is, as opposed to the pro-birth crowd. Nonetheless, abortion is a moral high ground that should never be surrendered to fair weather politicians or those that curry their favor.
 
Yeah but isn’t Trump bringing his baggage to the Pro Life Community which can draw off people like minority communities, young people, women and people with progressive sensibilities sympathetic with the Pro Life Cause but otherwise put off by the GOP/Conservatism and of course, the President?
It might be a boost for the short term (Trump’s Base is passionate and while they may already be Pro Life, them getting involved (if they weren’t already) could be a boost to the movement) but a poison pill for the long term (mainstream thought)?
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top