Something Not Quite Right

With the Friday afternoon resignation of Louis Caldera, the White House is hoping that the matter of 'Planegate" will come to a close. Given the compliant state of the White House press corps, its likely that this issue has breathed its last. Although Mr. Caldera is not entirely blameless in this matter, it seems unlikely that he's the only one guilty of bad judgment.

Nonetheless, the critical question as to who initiated this endeavor remains unanswered. Mr. Caldera's office, according to the White House website, "...ensures that White House requirements are met..." In other words, he was paid to execute, not to think.

It seems that someone, with serious juice, requested the flyover. Curiously, according to the official White House report on the matter -- there is no discussion as to who got the ball rolling other than to note that coordination began in March.

If the Air Force is anything like the Army -- which I know a thing or two -- I suspect that several participating elements would have to sign off on the deal. It wasn't the Air Force's role to question the mission -- their function was to execute the mission. Colonel Scott Turner was the go-to guy who oversaw the planning and coordination. He answered to Mr. Caldera's assistant, George Mulligan.

Mulligan, in turn, notified Caldera about the planning of the mission and added that "...WH shouldn't catch any questions about it." (Mulligan, it seems, has a political tin ear.) Caldera claims not to have read it until after the event occurred. Moreover, Caldera claims to have had two email accounts and he reads one more frequently than the other and he had back spasms that compelled him to leave early which prevented him from reading the email.

Even if one accepted this argument at its face, it seems strange that the director and the deputy director failed to formally discuss this matter given the nature of the mission as they all knew it to be atypical. (There was a thirty second discussion that characterized as an "aside.") Moreover, it seems odd that the one who initiated the matter did not check in for a status update.

Mulligan then recommended that Caldera notify Robert Gibbs, the press secretary, or Jim Messina, the deputy chief of staff. Mulligan didn't see this as his responsibility and had assumed that the Air Force would handle the public relations.

Caldera didn't have a coherent explanation as to why he failed to notify Gibbs or Messina. In my experience, that suggests two possible reasons. First, he actually brain cramped and failed to pass the word on. Or, secondly, he was covering for someone and took the hit. It should be noted that Caldera did not formally authorize the mission -- his crime was that he failed to pass the word on the mission.

After the event, Caldera opted to take the hit for the team and it seems that his scalp was required to end the debacle.

The report accomplished its purpose -- assigning the blame to Caldera. Yet it still remains uncertain as to who started this matter in the first place.