Report: Sarah Palin "bus tour" a hoax, more like "private jet tour"

Sarah Palin's "bus tour" to promote her new book simply isn't. Joe McGinniss reports she's in fact flying around America on a private jet, specifically a luxurious "Gulfstream II 12-passenger jet rented from Universal Jet Aviation of Boca Raton, Florida, at a cost of more than $4,000 per hour."

Boing Boing editor/partner and tech culture journalist Xeni Jardin hosts and produces Boing Boing's in-flight TV channel on Virgin America airlines (#10 on the dial), and writes about living with breast cancer. Diagnosed in 2011. @xeni on Twitter. email: xeni@boingboing.net.

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crashgrab

” “Except nobody is talking about bankers here.”

Um, exactly? Maybe we should be. Maybe we should be calling them out, by name, in multi-paragraph posts with pictures.”

Why don’t you go start a blog about that then? No one is stopping you. And who said you can’t talk about both issues?

“I think most of her fans are smart enough to understand that her populist appeal doesn’t have anything to do with the way she travels. It’s interesting to me that her critics don’t. Which makes them less effective at countering that appeal.”

Really? Why would someone bother to pretend to travel by bus when you’re really flying by plane? No, she’s trying to hoodwink those who will fall for it.
Chuck

But they buy a custom painted bus for every stop.

That’s economically stimulating, right?
Anonymous

“Who cares? Al Gore does the same thing – and he preaches about “not leaving a carbon footprint.” Stop hating, and just live your life.”

Um, we care because this crazy, compulsive liar is thinking about running for Prez in 2012 and we do NOT want her in office. Ok?
- Karl Jones
  
  … this crazy, compulsive liar is thinking about running for Prez in 2012 …
  
  I’m not convinced that she is compulsive — sometimes I wonder if it’s not all carefully scripted in advance.
  
  Item: during the debates, she said “nookyoolar” how many times … five? Six? It was so palpably, painfully obvious, I couldn’t help but think that it was deliberate scripting by her handlers — a homey-folksy touch designed to make her more appealing to … well, whoever it appeals to: “I’m one of you people, not some pronunciation Nazi!”
Suburbancowboy

I would call her bus “The Run-on Sentence Express”.
eZee

Wouldn’t be too surprised if this woman burns babies as fuel so hiring a 4k per hour plane and a custom bus on every stop is kind of an anti-climax.
Teresa Nielsen Hayden

Doug Moore, Al Gore doesn’t do the same thing. He doesn’t pretend he’s riding a bus when he’s actually flying. And even if he did, it wouldn’t make it right for Sarah Palin to do it.

The woman’s a phony. You can support her if you want.
Ernunnos

How many Gulfstream IIs are bankers flying on our dime?

Sarah Palin is a private citizen, and her travel arrangements are a matter between her and her publisher. Don’t want to help pay for it? Don’t buy her book.

We don’t get that kind of choice when it comes to the bankers, but somehow, that doesn’t seem to be worthy of comment.
- John Napsterista
  
  The point is not that Palin is flying on a private jet (the article’s author opines “there is, of course, nothing the least bit inappropriate about flying from place to place on a book tour”) or even who/what is paying for it (apparently, a tax-exempt evangelical Christian religious organization). The point is that Palin is being deceptive by creating the impression that she is traveling from city to city on a bus, like a mythical populist champion, and not flying around on a jet, like the fat cat bankers that populists are so steamed at right now. This post was simply about pointing out this hoax, by a worthless politician.
phenomenon

lol americans?

I wish you people would stop talking about this stupid woman already. She’s your bog standard hick with a sub-standard vocabulary (for a hick) with ass-backwards ideas that is milking the attention for every last cent, before she returns to hicksville to blow it all on a deluxe trailer.

For the love of god can we close the book on her already. There is nothing to see here.

nd whl ‘m n th tpc f thngs nvr VR wnt t s gn cn th Bng Bng vrlds pls pls pls pls gt rd f tht gddmn Bng Bng vd pctr f th gy mrryng/fddlng hs DS? ts pnfl t scrll pst. Thnks n dvnc.
gnargnar

I wonder if she hunts from it.
Anonymous

Except nobody is talking about bankers here. Sarah Palin is making a point of being like any other American. It seems like she’s doing this to gain the support of the ppl but why wouldn’t you just ride the bus? how can she meet the regular ppl way up in the sky? Why would she even schedule stops along a bus route if your in a plane and can get anywhere you want with a quickness? Seems like you could sell more books if didn’t have to lie about being on a bus.
- Ernunnos
  
  Except nobody is talking about bankers here.
  
  Um, exactly? Maybe we should be. Maybe we should be calling them out, by name, in multi-paragraph posts with pictures. Maybe if we’d done that a few years ago, we might not have so many of the problems that are driving people to consider Sarah Palin as a potential solution.
  
  Sarah Palin is making a point of being like any other American.
  
  You mean, like any other American who’s been governor of a state, a best-selling author, and candidate for Vice President of the U.S.A.? “Any other American” doesn’t even make a bus tour. I think most of her fans are smart enough to understand that her populist appeal doesn’t have anything to do with the way she travels. It’s interesting to me that her critics don’t. Which makes them less effective at countering that appeal.
  
  Although it makes them very effective at appealing to others who already share their opinion of Palin. Which might be the point. SWPL signaling. “Date me, I’m right-thinking!”
zandar

ha gnargnar, beat me to it.

Ernunnos, I’ve seen and played a part in plenty of bitching about that. What nets do you hang out on?
Dave Faris

The less attention we give this idiot, the better off we’ll all be.
Anonymous

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johnphantom

I humbly disagree Dave. Everyone needs to see what she is, so less people will vote for her.

Unfortunately, I think those that would vote for her are already stuck in the rut.
Simtra

Something seems a bit off here. Her stop in Jacksonville started at 9:00 am EST on the 24th and a stop in Gainsville then Orlando all on the same day. But the flight arrived at 10:09 PM EST on the 23th and left an hour later. All that means is that at night she is flying on a plane at night and during the day she is moving via bus. I know I would. Sleeping on a moving bus sucks.
Anonymous

If I remember the old saw it goes: any publicity is good publicity. Way to go Joe! Enjoy the summer in Wasilla.
Suburbancowboy

But she really is like most Americans. he doesn’t know sh*t about anything outside of the little hick town she is from. She also lacks the ability to speak English in well thought out sentences.
ian_b

her stance on late term abortion has also come into question, as she was once quoted as saying “drill baby, drill”
mdh

I’m somewhat relieved it isn’t leased from Donna Blue.

just saying.
demidan

One of us, one of us!
Steve

Seems like another attempt to fabricate a story that really isn’t there, soiling ones pants the whole way in giddy delight.

Hey, I bet she walks around in expensive $4000/hour shoes too – yet another example of her NOT USING A BUS!!!1!one
- paradoxcycle
  
  Steve, you still don’t get it do you? No one cares that she’s using a private jet. It’s the obvious hypocrisy of flying on a private jet and creating the impression she’s riding across the country in a tour bus painted with the american flag because she’s just one of us after all.
Doug Moore

Who cares? Al Gore does the same thing – and he preaches about “not leaving a carbon footprint.” Stop hating, and just live your life.
- Xeni Jardin
  
  @Doug, citation needed. The post is not about Al Gore, and your comment is irrelevant unless you can show me where there’s evidence that he fraudulently promoted himself as being on a “bus tour” in which he traveled by private jet.
- Santa’s Knee
  
  But Dougie – I live my life by HATING…!
  
  Wah!!!
angusm

The issue isn’t whether she travels by bus or by plane.

The issue is whether she travels by plane while letting her fans think that she travels by bus.

If that’s what she’s doing, it’s certainly not illegal, but it would indicate a certain level of hypocrisy. Particularly because her spear carriers are apparently having to actually endure the whole life-on-the-road experience while she travels better-than-first class.

I could certainly believe it. It would seem to be consistent with the way that she or her handlers have tried to manipulate her image in order to portray her as things that she isn’t.
Daemon

It’s not that she’s taking a bus. It’s that the airplane is named Bus.
Talia

But its OK to lie a little, isn’t it, because she’s just so awesome! Anyway its not like she’s lying about anything important, is it.

[sarcasm alert]
thefnord

The comments on the linked article scare the hell out of me. People in the same sentence calling their president a terrorist and calling others disagreeing with them ignorant.

Baffling.