Dear Mr. President:

I have a number of bones I'd like to pick with you -- health care, No Child Left Behind, US environmental policies, the war in Iraq -- but let's focus on a simple issue. One, that with a little common sense and thinking of others could be avoided:

Traffic jams on I-75 during rush hour caused by presidential motorcades.

I understand that it must be very important for you to use government resources (Air Force One) to fly down to Atlanta for a fund raiser at a private Buckhead residence. I understand that for your safety, roads must be closed down. I dealt with enough presidential motorcades in DC to understand the difficult logistics that precede the movements of a president.

But do you have to come and go during rush hour in a major city?

It might not seem like much of a big deal to you, but I'm sure a number of people were inconvenienced waiting to on-ramp to the closed-down highway as you came and went from Dobbins Air Force Base. One of which was the hubby who actually left the office a bit early in order to get home to our whiny peanut (who spent the afternoon acting out in any way he could think of in order to communicate his apparent belated displeasure that we left him for a few days) but who still didn't make it home until nearly 6.

Sure, not an earth-shattering issue, of course. But I imagine you could have raised even more funds by locking peanut in the room with your glamorous, check-writing guests and not letting them leave the squealing, magnetic letter tossing, tantrum-throwing "entertainment" until the coffers reached a certain amount. I'm positive you could have raised a lot more money a lot more quickly without causing any traffic jams on 75.

Just a thought.

Another concerned citizen,
High Heeled Mama