Palin email claims she "dismissed" her personal chef...another lie.

[Bluebear]

...Also, asked the reporter, “Does the state consider the per diem paid to the governor to be taxable income?”

The subject line of Nizich’s email: “Just some info we have used to counter comments on the per diem in case in comes up in your interview.”

The points he urged Palin to make: Palin had declined “First Family per diem reimbursements to date of $4,461.” Also, the state of Alaska had paid for an Anchorage apartment for former Gov. Frank Murkowski. Also, Murkowski’s travel in 2006 totaled $525,392. Palin had saved the state $97,000 by dismissing the chef at the governor’s mansion, and also saved the state an additional $96,000 in housing expenses. She had reduced her security detail, from seven to two, saving $125,000 in 2007.

“Governor Palin does not travel with an entourage.” Nizich wrote, and “Governor Palin prefers to drive herself – no chauffeur.”

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-pn-palin-perdiem-20110610,0,3123960.story

Aside from having listed a state plane on eBay, the most popular anecdotal example of Sarah Palin’s credentials as a reformer has been her firing the governor’s chef. This has been quickly seized on by clueless Lower 48 Palin partisans as a colorful example of belt-tighting via downhome folksiness: Palin didn't just kick out the "uppity" gourmet chef, she claimed she planned on cooking herself, with her kids chipping in to make sandwiches.

As you might expect, this turns out to be another Palin fabrication. The 6/29/07 Anchorage Daily News article about the firing actually reveals the shocking truth behind the deception.

First, firing the governor's chef saved no money at all, because the chef was transferred, not fired. In the article, an e-mail from the fired chef, Stefani Marnon, to friends and colleagues is quoted as saying "Friday will be my last day at the house, but I will still be employed with the state."

The chef Sarah fired in fact still prepares elitist gourmet meals in Juneau for government employees, just not in the Governor’s Mansion.

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2008/09/07/590184/-Commander-in-Chef:Palin-never-fired-chef,-only-worked-part-time-herself

[FSogol]

1. Tonight on the menu: Souffle and Freedumb Fries

:shrug:

[xchrom]

2. recommend