Anger mounts over Michelle Obama's £150k Spanish holiday bill... footed by U.S. taxpayer

The UK's Daily Mail notes that Americans are not thrilled to have the couple that lectures us about "shared sacrifice" fail spectacularly to stifle their impulse to lead lives like African dictators or Arab Princes.

Here is where Michelle "my belle" Obama is sacrificing today, the Hotel Villa Padierna in Marbella, Spain.

Here's the hotel as you drive up:

Enter the lobby with your security detail and admire the view:

The living room of your suite:

Check out the bedroom:

There's your private pool in case you want to take a dip:

Then there's your terrace for dining; while your security detail keeps the riffraff away:

You have to admit, ruling America has its perks.

These are the people we've been waiting for?

Hope N' Change is for the little people. Barack and Michelle have "arrived."

Living like kings and emperors is not what a country like the United States is all about, even for our leaders.  Richard Nixon (remember him) was accused of having accepted money for a fur coat for his wife.  Those were simpler times when ostentatious lifestyles were not in vogue, at least in the White House or Congress.  How times have changed.  No one expects the Obamas to wear sackcloth and ashes even as the American people fear for their jobs, their homes and their savings.  But we are seeing just a little too much of the Obamas living the good life, vacationing, golfing, vacationing, golfing, vacationing, golfing, having a date night, and vacationing again at the watering holes of the rich and famous.  But that's what the Ruling Class does.

UPDATE: When I visted Marbella nobody shut off a section of the beach for me.

Spanish police cleared off a stretch of beach for U.S. first lady Michelle Obama and daughter Sasha to relax by the Mediterranean Friday after a busy day of sightseeing.

UPDATE 2: Michelle Obama today faced a fresh wave of attacks over her lavish break in Spain with 40 friends, which could easily cost U.S. taxpayers a staggering £50,000 a day.
The First Lady has been lambasted for her extravagance at a time when the economy is still struggling. One blogger went so far as to brand her a modern-day Marie Antoinette.
And her critics will be further annoyed when they learn that the president's wife had a Spanish beach closed off today so that she, her daughter and their entourage could go for a swim.

Now where's that cake we should eat?

UPDATE 3:  Roger Simon wonders if Obama really doesn't want to be President. 

If I were still a member of the Democratic Party, I would be most concerned. What is going on in the White House seems to be so disconnected from the reality of our country — with some indicating real unemployment at a staggering 22% — as to be teetering on the brink of a pyschological disorder. And in this case that disorder would be a folie a deux of some sort because Barack and Michelle appear to be colluding in it in some way, whatever the state of their relationship. And that disconnect — between them and the American people — is growing.

Simon thinks that the answer may be psychological and that Obama is pathologically narcissistic.  Does this sound like the Obama we are getting to know?

...there is a weak correlation between the narcissist’s behaviour and his professed or proclaimed emotions. The reason is that his emotions are merely professed or proclaimed – but not felt. The narcissist fakes feelings and their outer expression in order to impress others, to gain their sympathy or to motivate them to act in a manner benefiting the narcissist and promoting his interests.

In this — as in many other simulated behaviour patterns — the narcissist seeks to manipulate his human environment. Inside, he is barren, devoid of any inkling of true feeling, and disdainful of emotions and emotional people. He looks down upon those who succumb to the weakness of sentiment and holds them in contempt. He berates and debases them.

This is the heartless mechanism of “simulated affect”. It lies at the core of the narcissist’s inability to empathise with his fellow human beings.

Via Instapundit.