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No, President Obama will not attend the Winter Classic

No, President Obama will not attend the Winter Classic

As his family does at the end of every year, President Barack Obama is currently in the great state of Hawaii, vacationing during the holiday as best as the leader of the free world can kick back.

Here’s the thing: The 2015 Winter Classic? The hockey game between the Washington Capitals, D.C.’s local team, and the Chicago Blackhawks, Obama’s local team from back home, played at Nationals Park, the baseball stadium a short motorcade away from the White House?

Yeah, not in Honolulu.

So as Russian Machine Never Breaks reminds us, despite public pleas to have him attend the game, President Obama will not be watching hockey at Nationals Park on Jan. 1.

Because he’s not getting back to D.C. with his family until Jan. 4.

But hey, he did catch that Oregon State/Akron game in Hawaii this week.

Oh well. Ted Leonsis tried, via the Chicago Tribune:

“It’s just such great theater,” Leonsis said of the New Year’s Day game. “The bar keeps getting raised, and we’ll have a couple of unique things to D.C. I’m sure we’ll do something important with the military. Hopefully we can get President Obama to come. It’s Chicago, it’s Washington, it’s national television. I’m hoping that we can get President Obama to come to the game.”

Normally, this sort of thing wouldn’t be that notable, as a sitting president has never watched a Winter Classic, let along, like, an NHL game in general. But this was Washington vs. Chicago in Washington. This was, like, a game designed to get Barack Obama to an NHL game.  Which, incidentally, he hasn’t done during the entirety of his presidency, despite being within walking distance of the arena.

Oh well. Maybe Biden’s not busy.