Bob McCarty Writes

A cloud is hanging over the Oval Office as Americans wonder whether or not Smoker-in-Chief Barack Obama is giving up cigarettes during today’s Great American Smokeout.

Truth be told, one would hardly know the event that takes place annually on the third Thursday of November is taking place today.

As of this posting at noon Central today, few in the mainstream media had even mentioned the annual event online and none — NOT ONE! — had broached the subject of whether or not Smoker-in-Chief Barack Obama, the nation’s top elected official and an on-again-off-again smoker, would refrain from toking on his “cancer sticks” for at least 24 hours as his way of encouraging others to quit.

In case you doubt me, run a Google Advanced Search of the word, “Obama”, and the exact phrase, “Great American Smokeout”, and see what you find.  That search produced only nine results.  Only one mentioned the president’s name, but none mentioned it in reference to the day set aside for a break from smoking.  In addition, a Google Advanced News Search of the exact phrase, “Great American Smokeout”, yielded barely 600 results.

Could it be that members of the Fourth Estate are more interested in maintaining a smoke-free image for the president than they are in reporting the truth about his personal habits?  Seems that way.

The last time President Obama’s smoking habit made news was just over two weeks ago in the sixth paragraph of a Nov. 3 article in the UK’s Daily Mail:

The unnamed ‘insider’ quoted by the report insisted that Mr Obama was working ‘non-stop’ – and that he was not chain-smoking.