Putin Airlines: Something Special In the Air

KING IN THE CASTLE Putin's throne No one ever said Vladimir Putin didn't roll in style. Or fly for that matter. A recent New Yorker "Letter From Moscow" portrayed the Russian president as a lethal threat to enemies and press critics, but as the following photos (gleaned from a Russian language blog) attest, he has a soft side. A soft, buttery, leather side to judge from his pimped out personal jet.

The pictures first came to our attention via the data-miners at boing boing, but Radar dispatched our own Ruso-Lux expert to translate some of the comments.

"Russian taxpayers can sleep tight," one commenter says. "Their money's in good hands." Another calls Putin a "Russky Tsar."

"It's Russian Style personified—lots of gold, frills, pathos, and a tiny little bit of taste," someone says, comparing it to President Bush's subdued Air Force One decor.

One Russian joker suggests "you board this plane, open your laptop, make sure your neighbors are watching, and open this link." (What comes up is a fake bomb detonator clock.)

One reader, who must've watched a few too many episodes of MTV's Pimp My Ride, asks, "I wonder if the outside of the plane is diamond-incrusted ... Perhaps the landing gear's golden too. And windows are 90 percent tinted glass."

Another asks, "Why the hell are the seats so thick?"

The answer: "Because the people sitting in them are even thicker."

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