For some Americans — including the president – there’s just one last week of summer before work and school get back into full swing. 

President Barack Obama found out that as president, sometimes a vacation isn’t always a break from work. So he decided to extend his time off a bit by going to Camp David next week after returning from Martha’s Vineyard.

While on the Vineyard Obama interrupted his family holiday a couple of times. First, to announce his renomination of Ben Bernanke as chairman of the Federal Reserve and then to speak after his friend, Senator Edward Kennedy, died of cancer.

He and his family have been spotted out cycling and playing golf. They went out on the town a few nights for dinner but it probably hasn’t been the most restful vacation. An escape to Camp David — where the press are not allowed — could be just what he needs to charge up before battles on healthcare resume when Congress returns in September.

Obama’s spokesman Bill Burton promised that after Obama had time to “recharge his batteries” and spend time with his family during vacation he would “come back as rip-roaring as he was before.”

Battles over healthcare, questions over how the CIA handled prisoner abuse cases and the economic recovery will all be waiting for Obama.

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Photo credit: Reuters/Jason Reed (Obama and his family wave as they tour historic lighthouse on Martha’s Vineyard)

In another first for the new First Family, President Barack Obama and his brood left the White House on Saturday for a helicopter trip to Camp David, the presidential retreat outside Washington.

Dressed casually and looking relaxed, Obama left the executive mansion with his wife Michelle, daughters Malia and Sasha, mother-in-law Marian Robinson and an unidentified friend of the girls.

They boarded the awaiting helicopter and took off over the White House grounds. Spectators gathered outside the gates to watch.

The president and his family planned to stay at the retreat in Maryland until Sunday afternoon.

Camp David, in Catoctin Mountain Park, has been used as a relaxation spot for presidents since the era of Franklin Roosevelt and also hosts foreign leaders for visits and summits.

Obama has indicated he feels cooped up a bit in the White House, which the family has lived in for just over two weeks.

If he misses the travel of the presidential campaign, next week will feel familiar. Obama embarks on a roadshow of sorts on Monday to advocate for his economic stimulus package, with stops planned in Indiana and Florida.

And next weekend? Obama plans to go home to Chicago.

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He’s lived in the place for less than three weeks, but U.S. President Barack Obama is already feeling the constraints of the White House.
 
After announcing a busy travel schedule for the president next week, White House spokesman Robert Gibbs was asked if Obama was feeling cooped up at the executive mansion.
 
“It’s safe to say,” Gibbs said.
 
“Look, you know, some of you have covered him and some of you haven’t, but he’s a bit of a restless soul.  His idea of a crazy day is to take a long walk.”
 
Asked where Obama liked to walk, Gibbs said “in solitude and isolation.”
 
The president may get a little solitude and isolation on Saturday. He’s headed to the Camp David presidential retreat with his family.
 
After that he hits the road to push Congress to pass an economic stimulus package. He’s in Indiana on Monday, Florida on Tuesday and Illinois on Thursday.
 
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Photo credit: Reuters/Jim Young (Obama walks to Marine One at White House Thursday evening)

WASHINGTON - President George W. Bush, who has stayed out of the public eye in the final days before the election to choose his successor, knows his popularity has suffered, but the White House insists he will have no problem looking in the mirror when he returns to Texas.

Bush spent the weekend at Camp David and has no public events on Monday or Tuesday. He last spoke with his preferred successor Republican John McCain on Sept. 25, the day of a White House meeting on the financial bailout.

McCain has actively campaigned to distance himself from the unpopular 43rd U.S. president, rarely appearing with Bush since capturing the Republican presidential nomination in March.

“Everybody would like to be popular. We can all remember that back in high school, everyone really wanted to be popular, and some of us just weren’t,” White House spokeswoman Dana Perino told reporters on the eve of the election.

“But that doesn’t mean that you don’t have principles and values that you stayed true to. And that’s what this president has done, and that’s what he’s taught a lot of us, including me,” she said.

The Iraq war has been one of the key reasons for Bush’s unpopularity at home and overseas. However, Bush believes he made the right decision to order a U.S.-led invasion in March 2003, Perino said.

“And when he goes home to Texas, President Bush will be able to look in the mirror and know that he was true to his values and true to his principles, and that’s what keeps him going,” she said.

Bush and his wife, Laura, plan to live in Dallas and at the Crawford, Texas, ranch after leaving the White House. Bush plans to create the “Freedom Institute” on the campus of Southern Methodist University which will also host his presidential library.

Bush will watch the election results from the White House, where a small private dinner is planned in the residence with senior aides.

“President Bush remains hopeful that John McCain will pull it out tomorrow night and will win the election,” Perino said. McCain has been trailing Democratic rival Barack Obama in most national opinion polls.

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage. 

- Photo credit: Reuters/Larry Downing (Bush leaves the Oval Office headed for his Marine One flight to Camp David)

QUANTICO, Va., Oct 30 (Reuters) - Aside from the treasured memories, President George W. Bush will probably take back to Texas a souvenir or two from his years in the White House.

And as president he gets more than just T-shirts and mugs.

On Thursday, the Marines and sailors who take care of Marine One presented Bush with a little piece of the presidential helicopter to take home.

Any helicopter that carries the president is called Marine One and only a handful of senior aides get a lift in it. When Bush goes out of town, he takes the helicopter from the White House South Lawn to Andrews Air Force Base where his plane, Air Force One, is waiting.

He also flies the helicopter to the Camp David presidential retreat in Maryland and has flown in Marine One for aerial views of disaster areas such as in the aftermath of hurricanes. And the fleet is also used occasionally to ferry foreign leaders to Camp David as well as Vice President Dick Cheney.

On Thursday Bush visited the Marine Helicopter Squadron One Hangar to thank those who fly and service the official helicopters and received a gift — a piece of the helicopter’s tail rotor and a window.

The rectangular window was framed. “It was a window that he used to look out,” White House spokesman Scott Stanzel said.

Stanzel sought to allay some concerns among the press corps traveling with Bush that the presidential flight may become a touch too breezy with a missing window, telling reporters dryly that the squadron had a few extra ones for the helicopters.

- Photo credit: Reuters/Larry Downing (Bush arrives at the White House aboard Marine One)

WASHINGTON - President George W. Bush, who said in March he would find ample time to campaign for Republican White House contender John McCain, is going to spend the last weekend of the 2008 race at, well, Camp David.

Bush has record low job approval ratings due to the prolonged wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as the sour economy. He will leave Friday for the U.S. presidential retreat in the Catoctin Mountains of Maryland and will remain secluded until Sunday, according to his public schedule released late Tuesday evening.

“The president is pretty focused on the activities that we have here, especially getting this economy back in order,” said White House spokeswoman Dana Perino. “As we’ve said for a while, the president was going to be focusing on this.”

When the economic crisis unfolded and Hurricane Gustav hit the Gulf Coast, Bush canceled plans to attend several fundraisers around the country and sometimes sent surrogates in his place, including his wife Laura Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney.

And as rival White House contender Democrat Barack Obama sought to paint McCain as an extension of the current president, McCain went to great lengths to distance himself from Bush.

During the campaign, McCain met three times publicly with Bush: once when he clinched the Republican nomination at the White House, a brief appearance at the Phoenix airport after a closed-door fundraiser they attended together, and then last month at the White House during a meeting on the financial bailout package.

McCain also last week blasted Bush in an interview with the Washington Times newspaper, saying “We just let things get completely out of hand.”

During the 2000 election, then-President Bill Clinton was largely cast aside by the Democratic hopeful Al Gore who sought to distance himself from the sex scandal that nearly took Clinton down. Instead Clinton spent much of his time working to elect his wife to the U.S. Senate.

So as the final weekend before election day approaches and McCain trails in most polls (narrowly in some), Bush will spend it the sidelines.

“He’s going to focus on being with Mrs. Bush and others this weekend at Camp David,” Perino said.

Click here for more Reuters 2008 campaign coverage. 

- Photo credit: White House (Bush fills out his election ballot)