Can We Just Tie Her to the Wings??

AIR-OGANT NANCY
DEMANDS 22G-AN-HOUR JET OF SAME TYPE VEEP GETS

By NILES LATHEM Post Correspondent

February 8, 2007 -- WASHINGTON - House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is demanding regular use of the military's "Lincoln Bedroom" in the sky - a luxurious aircraft of the same type that carries Vice President Dick Cheney and First Lady Laura Bush on official trips, officials said yesterday.

In a development that has some Republicans and defense officials fuming, Pelosi recently asked the Pentagon to give her access to the Air Force's super-opulent C-32 for flights to her San Francisco home and other official trips.

The floating pleasure palace is a reconfigured Boeing 757 stored at Andrews Air Force Base with Air Force One and the rest of the fleet of executive aircraft.

The aircraft has a game room, stateroom, showers, a communications center and seats 42 to 50 people, according to the Air Force.

It costs taxpayers $22,000 an hour to operate, according to military and congressional sources.

"It will be a flying Lincoln Bedroom," said House GOP Whip Rep. Roy Blunt (R-Mo.).

"This shows an unprecedented sense of entitlement. This is a symbol of hypocrisy, this is a symbol of excess and this is a symbol of arrogance," said a member of the House Republican Conference.

Pelosi responded that he was a victim of "misrepresentation by the Bush administration and the news media."

"It has nothing to do with family and friends and everything to do with security," she said of the plane.

Congressional sources told The Post that the ostentatious demand surfaced in negotiations her office and the House sergeant-at-arms are conducting with the Air Force and Department of Defense.

Sources said she was initially offered use of the much smaller and more modest C-21 executive jet, which operates at a cost of $900 an hour and has room for eight.

The C-21 carried Pelosi's predecessor, Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.), after 9/11 when it was decided to give the speaker of the House - who is second in line to the presidency - extra security.

Pelosi rejected the smaller C-21 because it could not reach San Francisco without refueling.

"I want an aircraft that will reach California," she said yesterday.

The Pentagon agreed to give her a bigger plane. Sources said Pelosi's team countered with the demand for the C-32 as the only suitable aircraft for her and her traveling party.

niles.lathem@nypost.com


The TrekMedic ponders:

This is the same Squeaker of the Mouse and leader of the Coalition of the Cut-n-Runners that's already damned the current administration as being the sole cause of global warming? How much exhaust does a 757-200 put out??

Ahhhh,...at this rate, the 2008 version of the Red November Initiative will be a cakewalk!


HT to Matt at Weapons of Mass Discussion for the YouTube video: