The administration is not dead. You can see that from the very skillful way it has massaged the news treatment of Porter Goss’s resignation. Sure, there’s a great deal of truth behind the Negroponte context, and the bureaucratic tensions and policy disputes that contributed to Goss’s 
demise. But even if this were the case to an even greater extent, does anyone believe the Bush administration would actually want to lose its CIA director so soon after appointing him, and when the president himself cannot give a good reason for it? Occam’s razor applies here. Goss’s connection to Foggo is just too close for comfort. Even if Goss is exonerated completely of any direct connections to the poker games, hookers, and corrupt deals that Randy Cunningham is now explaining to the authorities, his closeness to the people who are makes the scandal that much more visible and that much more damaging to the White House.
Why so damaging? Because the scandal involves old-fashioned corruption and bribery, it involves military-corporate deal-making, and it involves sex. If the party of evangelical fundamentalism is revealed as one in which several key members are quite comfortable being bribed by booze, gambling and prostitutes, it cannot exactly help wrench the depressed base out of growing surliness. This is how metastasizing scandals are successfully headed off. Cut your major losses early; create a persuasive cover-story to hide that fact; then hunker down and hope you can weather the tawdry details that will doubtless emerge. That’s still not good news for the White House. But it’s surely better than having your CIA director forced to resign in September in "Hookergate". Karl is refocused. And, of course, the MSM ate it up. At least, that’s my take.
(Photo: Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP)
The Dish 