Sarah Palin contract demands 'Lear 60 jet' and 'bendable straws'

For a woman who until last July was a fairly unknown governor of one of the most obscure states in America, existing on an official income of $125,000 (£80,734) a year, Sarah Palin has acquired some pretty impressive trappings of celebrity and influence. She now commands fees of up to $100,000 for just one speech, and her engagements are controlled by her minders in minute detail.

Those details include demands that she have two bottles of still water and bendable straws placed near the lectern from which she delivers her speeches; that she be flown from her home in Alaska to wherever the event takes place on first-class commercial tickets or in a private jet of at least the size of a Lear 60; and that she be driven from the airport to the venue in professionally licensed SUVs or, failing that, in black town cars.

Her hotel room must be booked under an alias, for security reasons, and must include a one-bedroom suite and two single rooms. There must be a laptop computer and printer fully charged with paper in the room. And the hotel must be rated as deluxe.

We now know such arcane details of the life of Sarah Palin in her new incarnation as megastar courtesy of two intrepid college students at Stanislaus, a branch of California State University in Turlock, California.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/apr/14/sarah-palin-contract-speaking-jet-california

She's probably poke her eye out with a regular straw.

Requesting bendy straws just means you're persnickety. Pre-screening questions means you're stupid and know it.

Which is more important for the media to report?