The privileged Class...Maybe Obama should practice what he preaches

Jroc · Mar 1, 2011

It seems Obama is only worried about your carbon foot print. :doubt:

Obama's jetset fitness trainer helps shed pounds, adds to global warming

With a schedule as hectic as President Obama's it must be hard to stick to a training regimen without help -- but why does he insist on having his old trainer fly out from Chicago to D.C. regularly when Obama and his wife exhort the rest of us to drive less? And in a recession? According to Ashley Parker at the New York Times, Obama's fitness czar Cornell McClellan comes out to D.C. every week:

Mr. McClellan grew up practicing martial arts, eventually earning a black belt, and as a college student realized that he had a knack for working with people. He owns Naturally Fit, a personal training and wellness center in Chicago, and now spends part of his week in Washington at Mr. Obama’s request.

“It was an easy sell for me, because I thought of it as kind of a duty, to serve the president,” said Mr. McClellan, who works out with the first couple, often in the early morning, at the gym in the White House residence. Mr. and Mrs. Obama both try to exercise for at least an hour every day, and Mr. McClellan says he usually sees them two to four times a week, depending on their schedules.

David Axelrod says he lost 25 pounds under McClellan's watch, but that comes at a steep cost for those as environmentally minded as the Obamas: 50,000 lbs of carbon emissions. That's how much carbon emissions are involved in McClellan's flying back and forth every week for a year (according to TerraPass.com).

Couldn't they have just hired someone in D.C. to take over the training? The Yellow Pages provides over 56 entries under "Personal Fitness Trainers" alone, most of whom would have been able to reach the White House by bike.

Doing so would have at least been consistent with Obama's statements about the need to reduce emissions. Last July, Obama announced that he wanted federal workers to cut down on business travel and commuting by car in order to reduce emissions produced by the federal government: