Speaker Pelosi Wants A Big Plane! Why?

Since 9/11, the Speaker of the House, second in succession to the President, has been allowed a government plane to use for travel.

Speaker Pelosi was offered the same jet that former speaker Rep. Dennis Hastert used. But Rep. Hastert used the but for official business only - not for moving himself and his family back and forth to his congressional (home) district. Speaker Pelosi was not satisfied with this plane and asked the Department of Defense (DOD) for a larger plane namely a Boeing 757 that she could use to move her family back and forth to California nonstop. Apparently, the Gulfstream will not fly from Washington, D.C. to San Francisco nonstop and only three planes which the DOD have will.

After this story was exposed in the press and much stammering by the madam speaker, she has opted to fly on commercial jetliners after all. Why the hullabaloo over the size of the plane? Was it really about flying nonstop?

Those who are awake and astute will remember the fates of other congressional members and perhaps presidential candidates where they died in small plane crashes. Those who would create problems for the presidents and/or dare I say shadow government(?) seem to die whenever they board small planes at key and most unfortunate times.

Note the coincidental(?) deaths of: (1) Governor Mel Carnahan who at the time was only a couple of weeks away from the 2000 election in which he was in a very tight race with former senator and now former attorney general John Ashcroft. (2) Senator Wellstone just days before the 2000 election and after he voted to oppose the resolution to allow President George W. Bush to go to "war" with Iraq, pushing Wellstone handily ahead of opponent Norm Coleman in the polls. (3) John F. Kennedy, Jr. , who went down in the Atlantic Ocean in clear skies (but misreported as foggy). His future plans at the time were to run for either senator against Hillary Clinton in New York where it is a pretty safe to say he would've won or for president where he would have gone up against George W. Bush in 2000 and no doubt would have won.

Knowing the consequences suffered by controversial public figures who are troublesome to presidents and other powerful politicians, maybe Pelosi's real reason for asking for a large DOD plane instead of accepting the smaller one offered her and now having opted to fly on commercial airliners is the safety of her family and herself?