Failed to get D-Bus connection

Why do some configuration commands fail like this when used in the
kickstart post script?

# Configure the host names

  hostnamectl set-hostname test.hunter.org --static
Failed to get D-Bus connection: Failed to connect to
socket /var/run/dbus/system_bus_socket: No such file or directory
  hostnamectl set-hostname "VM Test"     --pretty
Failed to get D-Bus connection: Failed to connect to
socket /var/run/dbus/system_bus_socket: No such file or directory
  hostnamectl
Failed to get D-Bus connection: Failed to connect to
socket /var/run/dbus/system_bus_socket: No such file or directory