Valentino. Gee, that's the designer for Cindy *Elitist* McCain's expensive dress.

One wonders how much it cost for her to know have stylists and makeup artists following her around. People griped about John Edward's haircut, is it a double standard not to know about how much Palin's is costing?

But she's springing for designer labels. One source familiar with Palin's primping posse told us, "They do not want the American public to know that Palin is using stylists or that she is paying for expensive clothes this early on in the campaign."

Here's the NYPost with some before and after shots.

P.S. I have to contrast that with dresses I have worn when my company had an event or a dinner. There's no way any of us ran out and bought (much less could afford) a $2500 dress. That, of course, doesn't include shoes, hosiery, makeup, hair style, jewelry. So cough it up, those in the know. How much do the Rich wear on the stump and what does it cost?

UPDATE: Radar has the numbers for Palin

Her jacket was a $2,500 "shantung silk" number from Italian designer Valentino! By contrast, the designer dress Michelle Obama took flack for wearing cost $900. That's not the least of it: while the Times notes that "Michelle Obama apparently pulls off the feat of getting dressed on her own," Palin seemingly employs a "secretive circle of stylists who dress her for events."...

Hair and makeup is actually more expensive. The Los Angeles Times described Palin's look as "a study in contrasts, carefree and 'done' at the same time.... [it] says, 'I have more important things to do than worry about my hair, so I just twirled it into this clip so I could get to the real business of governing and shooting caribou and having babies and taking them to hockey practice.'" Don't confuse "carefree" with "cheap," though: Bream and Lobello estimate that the hair and makeup experts who prepped Palin for her big moment probably charged anywhere between $2,000 to $4,000 for a day's work. (An important add-on: since it was such a momentous occasion, Bream and Lobello say it's likely that the hair and makeup people were brought in a few days before to "test some different things out." They charge a full day rate for that, "unless they're being nice, in which case they'll charge half.")

If you're doing the math at home, that means that Sarah Palin spent anywhere from $4,550 (one stylist, two assistants, and a friendly "half rate" for the hair and makeup test day) to $9550 (one stylist, two assistants, two full days for high-end hair and makeup). Let's split the difference and say she spent $7,050.

That's before the $2, 500 Valentino, mind you.