Ok everybody, all together. Awwwwwwww

[Rude Horner]

Presidential Gas Bill Gets Steeper

http://www.cnn.com/2005/POLITICS/08/24/bush.gas.guzzlers.ap/index.html

<snip>
WASHINGTON (AP) -- Getting President Bush from here to there consumes an enormous amount of fuel, whether he's aboard Air Force One, riding in a helicopter or on the ground in a heavily armored limousine. The bill gets steeper every day as the White House is rocked by the same energy prices as regular drivers.

Taxpayers still foot the bill
<snip>

[Bluebear]

1. Imagine what AF1 costs, flying him hither & thither to push his "policies"

Shudder

[melissinha]

5. its like $38 K each way or roundtrip

not sure, you can bet that all that fuel could be used by us regular folks... but then again this is MR. I'd rather spend money on PR than put it towards something like say armor, equipment or VA costs.. naaaah.

[VPStoltz]

6. This one advantage of the incumbent I have always opposed.

It is ridiculous that the sitting president should be able to use AF1 for campaigning on the taxpayers dime. * made something like 17 trips to was is N. Dakota in the 2002 midterms just to defeat one Dem. I don't care who the president is, the party of the sitting president should pay for AF1 when it used for campaign trips.

[Redstone]

2. The White House is "rocked" by energy prices? Yeah, right.

You think they really give a rat's ass? I doubt it.

It's not like anyone connected with the White House has to pay anything out of a fixed paycheck.

Redstone

[Child_Of_Isis]

3. The White house?

How about the tax payers, or make that "regular drivers", that foot the bill?

[Applan]

4. I find this difficult to believe...

".....fuel costs for the largest plane in the Air Force One fleet have gone up dramatically -- from $3,974 an hour in fiscal 2004 to $6,029 per hour now, according to the Air Force."

I remember reading that AF1 costs about $58,000 per hour to operate and that was a few years ago. Granted, fuel is probably a small part of that but I bet it's more than they quoted.