Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, wants to fly without refueling the plane. That's her reasoning for the taxpayers' funded jet Pelosi wants to use.
Gotta love and enjoy this headline
Air travel flap circles over Pelosi
The House speaker says she simply wants to fly home without refueling. Critics call it an abuse of power.
By Faye Fiore and Julian E. Barnes, Times Staff Writers
February 8, 2007
Notice the careful wording "in an attempt to paint"
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House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's aides say she just wants to get home to California now and then and would like to do it in a plane that can make it all the way without stopping to refuel.
Critics say the San Francisco Democrat is abusing the perks of power by attempting to commandeer a fancy jumbo-size military jet with a "distinguished visitor compartment with sleep accommodations."
The flap over how the House speaker gets around has been circling over Washington since last week, but on Wednesday, it landed.
"Flying Lincoln bedroom," Minority Whip Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) said in a story stripped across the top of the conservative-leaning Washington Times.
"Pelosi One," Rep. Patrick T. McHenry (R-N.C.) said in the same article.
"Ridiculous," Pelosi spokesman Brendan Daly countered after his boss was peppered with questions at the tail-end of an event with Iraq war veterans.
At issue is what kind of aircraft the House speaker — second in line to the presidency — should use to get around the country. For years, speakers flew commercial like everybody else in Congress. But after the Sept. 11 attacks, it was deemed that anyone two heartbeats away from the presidency warranted a military jet.
Until now, the only speaker affected was Republican J. Dennis Hastert, who commuted to his Illinois district in small executive-style military jets.
But those aircraft require ideal weather conditions to make the cross-country trip without stopping to refuel.
The military passenger plane that can make the flight in any weather and also provide the communications necessary to stay in contact with the White House is the bigger and costlier C-40 — described by the Air Force as an "office in the sky" with beds, two galleys and business-class seating.
It's this plane that critics have flogged for a week in an attempt to paint Pelosi as a San Francisco elitist who wants to fly around in splendor with family and friends...
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/nation/la-na-pelosi8feb08,1,5334029.story?coll=la-headlines-nation&track=crosspromo
See what they link about the West Wing
http://www.factbites.com/topics/Pilot-(The-West-Wing)
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