Water cooler chat

So, the topic around the water cooler this morning was Sarah Palin. We talked about the AP investigation that reported that she charged the state of Alaska in order to bring her children along when she travelled . . . even when the children were not part of the official duties. We discussed the report that she altered the travel vouchers to make it appear that the children were performing "state business" in order to receive travel reimbursement.

Then someone brought up the fact that she charged the state of Alaska per diem to stay in her own home because she rarely stayed in the Governor's residence. (And, we all agreed that it seems a bit like stealing when you are claiming reimbursement when there were no out of pocket expenses involved.)

Then, ESK brought up the story that hit the news outlets most recently about the GOP campaign purchasing clothes for Palin and her family to the tune of $150,000.

We wondered if this were the cost of business when women are the leaders . . . but the AP story points out that the Democratic Party had no similar expenses in the same time frame . . . and the Obama family also appeared at their convention.

But, the reason I'm blogging about this is because Campbell Brown had an editorial tonight about how women are judged more harshly for their appearance than men and thus the hype over the expenditures is nothing more than a distraction from the real issues.

It was her editorial that solidified my thoughts on this issue. It isn't exactly the clothing . . . rather, given the pattern, it seems that Sarah Palin uses her political position to free load from tax payers and donors. And, I think this country has had enough of freeloaders, no?