Presidential time-usage in pictures

September 3, 2009 1:28 PM

Who spent more of their Presidency on vacation, Dubya or Bush, Sr.? Who travelled more, Clinton or Reagan? It seems to me, there's got to be some organization somewhere that tracks this kind of Presidential time-utilization info, and organizes it into pretty charts and graphs. Help me find the information visualization I seek!
posted by paisley to law & government (3 comments total)

CBS's Mark Knoller is the unofficial keeper of the stats.
posted by CunningLinguist at 1:49 PM on September 3

From George Mason University's History News Network:

"According to the Associated Press, this is Bush's 49th trip to the Crawford ranch since becoming president. As of August 3, 2005, the president had spent all or part of 319 days at the ranch. ... According to the Associated Press, "Reagan spent all or part of 335 days in Santa Barbara over his eight-year presidency."

HNN cites the AP several times as a reliable source on presidential vacations.
posted by MonkeyToes at 1:52 PM on September 3

Keep in mind that the traveling stat is an easy one to quantify but "vacation" is a tough one since the modern President is never truly disconnected from the job. Hundreds of millions if not billions of dollars have been invested over the years to make sure the office holder can do their work from any and everywhere.
posted by mmascolino at 2:22 PM on September 3