ohmidog!

Our answer is a qualified “yes” — but based on far different reasons than those being hammered away on by U.S. Rep. Michele Bachmann and other Republicans.

The former presidential candidate from Minnesota said she thinks having a caretaker/dogwalker assigned to Bo is one example of lavish and excessive spending at the White House.

“We are also the ones who are paying for someone to walk the president’s dog — paying for someone to walk the president’s dog,” she said over the weekend (serving as her own echo).

Bachman, who has a beagle named Boomer,  made the remarks at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference, held just outside Washington .

We, too, think the president should walk his dog — not as a money-saving measure, but because we think those peaceful moments of solace and reflection (assuming Bo is not a tugger) will make him a better president.

Walking the dog not only clears the head, it reminds one of what’s important in life. It’s good for the brain, it keeps the blood circulating, it lets you smell the roses and it calms the soul. I want a president with a calm soul, or at least as calm as the office permits.

While I think Obama and family should walk their own dog at every opportunity, I find nothing wrong with the White House having a full time dog walker on staff — even if, as some not 100 percent confirmed reports suggest, it”s a $100,000- a-year position.

(Also, I offer to fill that position should it ever become vacated — or even on a fill-in basis.)

As reported on the CNN blog, Political Ticker, Bachman, in her speech, blasted what she called “a lifestyle that is one of excess.”

She said she has nothing against the president and his family receiving the best security possible, or having their own plane, but she questioned whether they’ve gone overboard.

“Now we find out that there are five chefs on Air Force One. There are two projectionists who operate the White House movie theater … They regularly sleep at the White House in order to be regularly available in case the first family wants a really, really late show. And I don’t mean to be petty here, but can’t they just push the play button?”

The Obamas, though always very well dressed, don’t strike me as lavish, and I don’t think Bo experiences the same amenities of, say, Queen Elizabeth’s corgis.

Our nation’s First Dog deserves, at least in some ways, royal treatment — even amid all the fiscal cliffs and sequesters that, dramatic as they are, were created by lavishly living (often) politicians out of touch with the real world.

Dogs help keep the word real. I want my president to keep it real. So I want my president to walk the dog whenever possible.

If it comes down to tending to a world crisis and taking Bo outside to pee, by all means, tend to the world crisis, and let the highly paid dogwalker handle the duty, as well as the doody.

(My far bigger questions about all this are whether the Obamas personally scoop Bo’s poop from the White House lawn, and whether Bachmann picks up Boomer’s droppings at her home, valued at $1.27 million, on the 18th hole of the Stoneridge Golf Course.)

Grabbing and bagging a  handful of feces is how you keep it really, really real.

But back to our main point. Routine and mundane as the task might seem, there is much to be gained from time spent walking your own dog. (Just ask Leon Panetta.)

In trying times, when the head gets too clogged by all the stress, there is no better way to return it to a state of reason and clarity than the simple pleasure of walking the dog – whether you’re a queen, a president, an assembly line worker, or even unemployed.

(Photos: Bo and the president, official White House photo by Pete Souza; Michele and Marcus Bachmann, with Boomer, AP photo by Craig Lassig)

When Yogi Carroll of Kensington, Maryland, started having doubts about whether her dog walker was walking her dog, she set up her own amateur sting operation, using a video camera, a baby monitor and some tape.

Carroll says that, under her agreement with the dog walking company, the walker was to take Wilson, her two-year-old terrier, outside every day and make sure he did his business. She was paying $10 a day for the service.

Carroll says she set up the camera, hid a baby monitor in the room, and  attached a piece of tape to the door of Wilson’s crate to determine if the dog walker opened it.

Then she apparently hid outside, watching as the dog walker arrived and left just a couple of minutes later.

As the dog walker left, Carroll confronted her, Mike Wallace-style, with camera rolling.

On the video, you can hear Carroll asking the dog walker for her key back. “I’m Yogi. I live here. I’m here to grab the key because I’m actually going to discontinue the dog walking service from now on.”

The dog walker asks, “Why is that?”

Carroll responds, “I’m guessing if I walk in there, you wrote ‘peed only,’ you didn’t walk Wilson. That going to be true?”

The dog walker replies, “Yes.”

Carroll then walked into her home and found Wilson in his crate, the tape across the door unbudged.

Carroll says she made the recording to confirm her suspicions and warn others who may be concerned about their pets.

“So many people use dog walking services in this area,” said Carroll. “My friends are dog walkers, so not all dog walkers are bad. I know this is a hard industry to be a part of, but people need to be aware of what’s going in and out of their house.”

Carroll, showing she’s as classy as she is sly, didn’t reveal the name of the company when she talked to Fox News, but she said the owner of the company took swift action.

A new twist in the case of the Tasered dog walker: After a park ranger informed him she would use her Taser if he walked away, Gary Hesterberg informed her he had a heart condition.

She, seconds later, as he turned her back to her, fired anyway, according to a witness quoted in a Patch.com report.

Given the offense Hesterberg was being detained for was an unleashed dog, given the park ranger’s mission that day was supposedly “educating” dog owners about the new policy, we feel her use of a stun gun falls clearly into the category of over-reacting.

Her use of force was not just unnecessary, it was potentially deadly, and even though Hesterberg originally supplied her with a phony name, even if he may have been argumentative, even if he was aware that the park service had started requiring leashes in Rancho Corral de Tierra two months earlier, the bottom line is 50,000 volts of electricity for one unleashed dog doesn’t add up to anything but brutality.

Howard Levitt, spokesman for the park service, said Hesterberg repeatedly tried to flee the scene, and that the encounter between the dog walker and the park ranger ”moved into a different realm” when Hesterberg gave her a fake name.

“He didn’t have ID and gave a name that turned out to not be his actual name … In checking that out — it’s standard procedure to run somebody’s name when you’re dealing with someone who might be a danger — she asked him to remain on the scene, as we understand it, and more than once he refused to stay there,” Levitt said

If Hesterberg had been placing strange packages under the Golden Gate Bridge, that would be one thing. But he was walking his dogs. There is no  reason — other than over zealous law enforcement, which isn’t a good reason at all — that should escalate into a potentially deadly encounter.

Given a choice of worst case scenarios, I think allowing Hesterberg to go home, and catching him, if it’s really all that important, the next day would be preferable to potentially executing a man for an unleashed dog — if not for reasons of logic, then at least for the park service’s public image.

Congresswoman Jackie Speier is asking for an investigation into last weekend’s arrest of a dog walker who was Tasered by a park ranger in the Golden Gate National Recreation Area near Montara.

Speier sent a letter to GGNRA Superintendent Frank Dean expressing her concerns and requesting information about the arrest of Gary Hesterberg, of Montara, who was walking his dogs off-leash when stopped by the park ranger.

“Many of my constituents are understandably angered by what appears to be an excessive use of force by a park ranger,” Speier said “From the information I have to date, it does not appear that the use of a Taser was warranted.”

Speier worked closely with state officials on the use of tear gas, stun guns and pepper spray while she was in the California legislature, a local NBC affiliate reported.

She says she has requested information about training in Taser usage for park rangers and also about how the public was informed about dog policy changes at Rancho Corral de Tierra.

According to witnesses, the dog owner — who had one of his two dogs leashed when he was stopped — repeatedly asked why he was being detained, and eventually told the ranger to cite him or he was going to walk away.

“He started to walk away and she told him that she would Tase him if he walked another step,” one witness said. When the man turned, the ranger deployed her Taser, causing him to fall to the ground.

Advocate groups for dog owners, including Montara Dog and DogPAC of San Francisco,  have asked the National Park Service to investigate the incident and to cease ticketing dog walkers in Rancho Corral de Tierra.

GGNRA officials said the dog walker provided false information to the ranger and refused the ranger’s repeated orders to remain at the scene while his identity was confirmed.  They said they are are reviewing the incident.

The 3,800-acre property was transferred to the park service by the Peninsula Open Space Trust in December. While dogs were once allowed off leash there, the park service changed the rules, requiring all dogs be on leashes.

A National Parks ranger zapped a northern California resident with a Taser Sunday afternoon after an argument about walking his dog without a leash in a newly added section of the Golden Gate National Recreation Area.

The incident occurred around 4:45 p.m. when the man was walking two dogs — one leashed — at the Rancho Corral de Tierra open space, near the southern edge of McNee Ranch State Park.

A ranger working for the Golden Gate National Recreation Area stopped the man and an argument about his off-leash dog escalated, according to the Half Moon Bay Review.

The Rancho Corral area was an off-leash dog-walking spot until December when the National Park Service took over and required all dogs to be on a leash.

The San Francisco Chronicle identified the dog walker as Gary Hesterberg, of Montara, a coastal town south of San Francisco.

The ranger, whose name was being withheld by authorities, used her stun gun on Hesterberg because he continued walking despite orders to stop, Park Service spokesman Howard Levitt told the Chronicle.

Hesterberg was arrested by San Mateo County sheriff’s deputies and was booked for investigation of failing to obey a lawful order.

According to one witness, the dog walker dared the ranger to arrest him; he was walking away when the ranger pulled out her Taser.

The man collapsed on the ground, and the ranger began shouting at him to turn over so she could handcuff him. As a crowd gathered, the man shouted out his home address so that someone could take his dogs home.

A yoga instructor in Boulder faces an animal cruelty charge after witnesses saw her running a Chihuahua alongside her car — at speeds of up to 15 miles per hour.

In court on Monday, Joan Renee Zalk said she was pet-sitting for the dog. She told police officers the dog, named Cooper, needs to walk at least three miles a day or he goes “ballistic.”

Zalk, 29, also faces a charge of felony menacing after a witness who confronted her about the dog told police she was threatened, the Boulder Daily Camera reported.

Zalk, who is also an acupuncturist, told the newspaper there was no abuse involved.

Several witnesses called police Friday after seeing the leashed dog running alongside the car.

“That poor dog was running its guts out trying to keep up,” said Elizabeth Whaley, who followed the car, pulled up alongside it and issued a scolding.

Another woman, Debra Baros, later confronted Zalk, who, according to police, told her, “Excuse me, I have a gun in my car. Do you want me to get it?”

Zalk told police she didn’t really have a gun, but made the remark because she felt threatened by Baros.

Zalk was taken to the Boulder County Jail. She was released on bond on Monday.

Officers observed cuts, scabs and blood on the neck of Cooper, who was taken to the Humane Society of Boulder Valley. He was later released to his owner.

Zalk told police that the owner, Erin Livers, knew that she sometimes ran the dog from her car or her bike. But police say Livers, when contacted, denied that was the case.

Zalk is scheduled to appear in court again today.

Friends, family and fellow dog walkers in Salem, Oregon, raised funds to have a new bench installed at a dog park in memory of Darrel Valentine.

Valentine, 74, who used to walk his dogs, Lady, Velvet and Nicky, in the park every morning, was attacked in another park while walking his dogs, and died in September of last year.

The bench was completed and unveiled Friday at Minto-Brown Island Park’s dog park, according to the Statesman Journal in Oregon. A plaque on the bench reads: “In memory of Darrel Valentine. Beloved dog park friend.”

“He was kind of an icon down here,” dog walker Deede James said. “He was down here about two hours every morning.”

Friends and family raised more than $1,000 for the bench. They gathered for its unveiling Friday afternoon, along with Carole Miller, Valentine’s sister, who brought Valentine’s two labs to the park as well. Two of the dogs, Lady and Velvet now live with her. A third, Nicky, was adopted after his death.

Valentine was walking his dogs early Sept. 12 near Santana Park in southeast Salem when he was attacked. A suspect was riding by on a bike and demanded cash from Valentine, who said he didn’t have any. The man attacked and beat Valentine, who died days later. No arrest has been made in the case.

Valentine, who served in the U.S. Marine Corps, devoted most of his time to his dogs after retirement.

“I think it is wonderful that everyone came together to do this,” said Mark Valentine, Darrel’s son. “It’s really nice.”

A dog walker in England died after being trampled by a herd of cattle in a field in North Yorkshire.

North Yorkshire Police said the woman — not yet publicly identified – was walking two dogs on leashes Sunday near the hamlet of Gayle when the cattle apparently panicked and stampeded, according to a Press Association report

“She was surrounded by a herd of cattle and calves, and as a result of dogs being present the cattle reacted in an aggressive manner,” a police official said. Early press reports from England gave no indication of what happened to the dogs, a spaniel and a collie.

Last year, another woman, Sandra Pearce, 45, died in a cattle stampede as she crossed a field in  Suffolk, with her pet dogs.