{"id":5814,"date":"2010-10-07T17:16:35","date_gmt":"2010-10-07T21:16:35","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/henrypayne.com\/?p=5814"},"modified":"2010-10-08T17:18:51","modified_gmt":"2010-10-08T21:18:51","slug":"green-pretender-obama-gives-up-his-hybrid-suv-the-national-review-10-07-10","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/2010\/10\/green-pretender-obama-gives-up-his-hybrid-suv-the-national-review-10-07-10","title":{"rendered":"Green Pretender Obama Gives Up His Hybrid SUV ( The National Review 10.07.10)"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>President\u00a0Obama has ditched his hybrid Ford Escape SUV.<\/p>\n<p>Obama bought the car in a panic in the summer of 2007 immediately after a Detroit Economic Club speech in which he dressed down Detroit automakers for destroying the planet by building big V-8s and not hybrids. The then-presidential candidate\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalreview.com\/planet-gore\/18451\/what-does-obama-drive-part-2\/henry-payne\">admitted after the speech<\/a> that he himself drove one of those V-8s \u2014 a gas-guzzling, Hemi-powered\u00a0Chrysler 300.<\/p>\n<p>Red-faced, Obama quickly\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.nypost.com\/p\/news\/national\/item_2gQ9Hhsu2DOqlkB5V0wnzM;jsessionid=E57F74564D0E459E1166A6C24BA4CB05%3Equickly%20swapped\">swapped<\/a> the cool Chrysler for the prudish Escape at an Illinois dealer.<\/p>\n<p>Ironically, his former\u00a0Chrysler 300\u00a0is for sale again. The\u00a0<em>Detroit News<\/em>\u2019s Dave Shepardson\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/www.detroitnews.com\/article\/20101007\/AUTO01\/10070339\/Obama%E2%80%99s-former-Ford-Escape-now-belongs-to-someone-else\">reports that<\/a> its current owner tried to cash in on the car\u2019s celebrity pedigree by asking $1 million in 2009 on eBay. It didn\u2019t sell, though it is still available at www.Obamas300c.com.<\/p>\n<p>No doubt the car\u2019s celebrity value has plummeted along with its famous owner\u2019s poll numbers. Indeed, the very cynical politics and ideological hypocrisy that surround Obama\u2019s sale of the 300C exemplify why the public has lost trust in this\u00a0president.<\/p>\n<p>Obama rarely drove the hybrid Escape after 2007, using it mainly as a political prop. \u201cMy most recent car was a Ford. I had one of those Ford Escapes, and that was a spiffy car,\u201d Obama told Ford workers at a plant this August. The SUV sold quietly after the\u00a0president\u2019s lease ran out. \u201cAs a result,\u201d reports the\u00a0<em>News<\/em>\u2019 Shepardson, \u201cit\u2019s very likely that somebody is driving around in thepresident\u2019s former ride without even knowing it. \u2018It could be anywhere,\u2019 (the dealer) says.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Today, our green\u00a0president\u00a0tools around in a giant gas-guzzling, armor-plated Caddy limo \u2014 dubbed \u201cThe Beast\u201d by\u00a0the Secret Service\u00a0\u2014 that gets an estimated 10 mpg. Like many Americans, he\u2019s found green takes a back seat to practical.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>President\u00a0Obama has ditched his hybrid Ford Escape SUV. Obama bought the car in a panic in the summer of 2007 immediately after a Detroit Economic Club speech in which he dressed down Detroit automakers for destroying the planet by building big V-8s and not hybrids. The then-presidential candidate\u00a0admitted after the speech that he himself drove [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,87],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5814"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5814"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5814\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5816,"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5814\/revisions\/5816"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5814"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5814"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/henrypayne.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5814"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}