The Cost to Taxpayers of Palin's Flip-Flopping Flunky Getting Paid for Sitting at Home

One of the best blogs I've read for keeping up with the latest facts about Sarah Palin is an Alaskan one called Mudflats.

Mudflats takes a look at Frank Bailey, the staffer for Sarah Palin who got taped calling a state official and pressuring him to fire Palin's state trooper brother-in-law.  The Alaskan blogger points out that Palin did the appropriate thing at the time by putting Bailey on paid administrative leave so that he would be free to comply with the investigation of charges that Palin tried to force her brother-in-law's termination.

But after the VP nomination, both Palin and Bailey lawyered up, flip flopped, and refused to participate in the investigation.  So, Bailey basically got paid for sitting home from work rather than serving his paid administrative leave in an ethical way.  Mudflats got out its calculator to figure how much Bailey's Palin-sponsored absenteeism is costing Alaskan taxpayers:

Bailey, with all that free time on his hands, still didn’t show up for his deposition.  That means…where’s my calculator…  at a salary of $78,528…(click click click) that’s a total of (click) $5593.64.  For sitting home, and refusing to testify.  Nice work if you can get it.

Sarah Palin is running as if she is qualified to manage taxpayers' money, and yet, paying one of her staffers to sit at home rather than assist the state's investigation seems like a dubious waste of state revenues.