The perils of Palin
Democrats are going to have a lot of fun with this.
Talk about your redistribution of wealth. I'll tell you one thing, we can't afford Sarah Palin as Vice President. I mean we literally can't afford it.
"ANCHORAGE, Alaska – Gov. Sarah Palin charged the state for her children to travel with her, including to events where they were not invited, and later amended expense reports to specify that they were on official business.
The charges included costs for hotel and commercial flights for three daughters to join Palin to watch their father in a snowmobile race, and a trip to New York, where the governor attended a five-hour conference and stayed with 17-year-old Bristol for five days and four nights in a luxury hotel.
In all, Palin has charged the state $21,012 for her three daughters' 64 one-way and 12 round-trip commercial flights since she took office in December 2006. In some other cases, she has charged the state for hotel rooms for the girls.[..]"
Let them eat cake while I shop at Neiman Marcus ...
Actually, $21,000 is chump change compared to what the hockey mom representing small-town real America is charging the RNC for her duds:
"The Republican National Committee appears to have spent more than $150,000 to clothe and accessorize vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin and her family since her surprise pick by John McCain in late August."
I'm sure that over the next few days we'll hear expressions of outrage from all the conservative pundits who were frothing at the mouth about high-priced Clinton and Edwards haircuts.
Not!
Looks like this would be more than a little humiliating for the GOP. All of those McCain/Palin campaign sound bites -- "elitist," "small-town values," "big spender," "we relate to 'real' America," etc. -- should be are echoing in their ears.
$150,000 is a lot of dough to spend on clothes and accessories for Palin and her family in just seven weeks. The figure includes more than $75,000 at Neiman Marcus in Minneapolis, and nearly $5,000 on hair and makeup. The funds were not just spent by her -- about $5,000 was also spent at Atelier, a high-class shopping destination for men.
Did the RNC dress Levi up too? Oh well...welcome to another morning in America where the rich get richer and the poor...shop at Goodwill.
Thank you Republicans, for showing us 'real Americans' the big gap between how yall live versus yer hero, "Joe the Plumber."
Now I could see the need for a few new things, they travel to lots of different climates, etc...but not $150,000 of other people's money for a whole new wardrobe.
And just when she's trying so hard to convince people that she'd be a good steward of other people's money...we learn about official travel for her kids for what's really personal business, about her asking for reimbursement for nights spent in her official residence, and so on...
The McCain campaign's spin machine has been very quiet so far...probably struggling to come up with a defense for this. I'm looking forward to hearing what they come up with.
I heard someone on TV say that the clothes might be given to charity after the election. I'd like dibs on the red leather jacket she wore the other day...though most of her clothes are a little too sci-fi for me, she looks like that pirate princess on Buck Rogers.
They should really let Palin keep the stuff as a consolation prize.
Anyway, a wardrobe snit from the media would work in Palin's favor, serving to distract from that interview she gave where she totally mangled her answer about the VP's job, saying the vice president is "in charge of the United States Senate" and "can really get in there with the senators and make a lot of good policy changes."
Hmmm...wonder what Cheney's been telling her?
