This wild maverick can’t be tamed:
Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin has billed taxpayers for 312 nights spent in her own home during her first 19 months in office, charging a “per diem” allowance intended to cover meals and incidental expenses while traveling on state business.
The governor also has charged the state for travel expenses to take her children on official out-of-town missions. And her husband, Todd, has billed the state for expenses and a daily allowance for trips he makes on official business for his wife.
Palin, who earns $125,000 a year, claimed and received $16,951 as her allowance, which officials say was permitted because her official “duty station” is Juneau, according to an analysis of her travel documents by The Washington Post.
The governor’s daughters and husband charged the state $43,490 to travel, and many of the trips were between their house in Wasilla and Juneau, the capital city 600 miles away, the documents show.
Sounds like a mainstream Bush-era Republican to me!
B. Moore | 14-Sep-08 at 11:41 am | Permalink
it’s difficult to get excited about mere ‘thousands’ of dollars over a 20-month period when BILLIONS are wasted everyday by others in the gummint. round numbers, $60k by the figures you quote…
$60K? is that what all this yellin’s about???
only $60K? that works out to about $100 a day…
not that i’m saying you’re making this up, but are not such expenditures allowable according to existing law? and what politician does’t indulge in the perks of office from time to time?
how much has you favorite congressman(s) indulged during the years he’s been in office. or any of your guv’ners…
if THIS is the best you got, i say sit back and relax. make yourself a tomato sammitch; enjoy life
Hey. gimme something big and nasty, dirty and juicy. but make sure it’s the TRUTH…
Adam Frix | 19-Sep-08 at 9:35 am | Permalink
It’s not about the amount. It’s about the mindset.
When we stop pursuing it because “well, it’s only a few bucks,” then it grows and grows.
Anyway, this sounds like the old Microsoft light bulb joke, the punch line of which involves redefining dark as the standard. This *is* mainstream business as usual–to them. And Palin et al. will look at you quizically, like a dog with its head turned, when you question it. How can you possibly question mainstream behavior?
B. Moore | 19-Sep-08 at 3:59 pm | Permalink
HELLO Mr. Frix
A friendly ‘Good Day’ to you..
where do YOU set your priorities?
$12 billon a month and lives wasted/destroyed, plus national/world economic damage/disruption? you LIKE $5 a gallon gasoline/truck fuel? you LIKE the ripple effect of same in your expenditures? and related etc?
or throwing away a few dollars a day on ‘possibly’ legitimate, by current law, optional expenditures by a popularly elected official that is authorized to make same decisions by voters?
(keep in mind that if Alaska voters no like spending the $60K extra dollars, they can always vote their vote AGAINST, next time. and, i do not live in Alaska. people get the gummint they vote for, either way they vote.)
me, i start at the top of the list. i’ll clean up the pissant details later…
i’ll drain the swamp first, the major portion of the alligators will naturally go away. leftover small alligators can be shot later.
i SET/CHOOSE my priorities according to what i decide affects me…
i think $12 billion thrown away, monthly, plus wasted human bodies and lives, plus $5 a gallon gasoline and the other economic effects of same, rates just a bit higher than $100 a day in perhaps legit authorized expenses in ALASKA for a few months.
if you got a problem with that opinion, i’m willing to hear legit arguements…
BUT, i will agree that non-authorized THEFT of funds need to be kept on the list of things that need cleaned up, eventually