As it turns out, the sun rises in the East and sets in the West. The force of gravity still applies on planet Earth. And for at least this one day, a minimal standard of punishment for ethical wrongdoing applies to the Bush administration.
Just one day after I proclaimed that no official would pay a price for the despicable and shocking fake FEMA news conference on the California wildfires, the imbroglio has cost John Philbin, the agency's director of external affairs, a glamorous promotion. As the AP is now reporting, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence MichaeL McConnell has withdrawn its offer to Philbin to run its office of public affairs:

"We do not normally comment on personnel matters," DNI spokesman Ross Feinstein said Monday. "However, we can confirm that Mr. Philbin is not, nor is he scheduled to be, the director of public affairs for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence."
Feinstein said earlier that Philbin's job change had been put on hold while McConnell reviewed his record.

Philbin's lost opportunity to become the PR flack for DNI McConnell should be just the down payment on the price he should pay for his key role in the FEMA disinformation campaign. Philbin, after all, had the cajones on Friday to pooh-pooh the dustup with this classic of Bush administration double-speak:

"It was absolutely a bad decision. I regret it happened. Certainly...I should have stopped it. I hope readers understand we're working very hard to establish credibility and integrity, and I would hope this does not undermine it."

As for McConnell, the Director of National Intelligence will have to turn elsewhere for assistance in crafting rationalizations for torturing detainees and perverting FISA to expand the domestic surveillance of Americans. With Philbin apparently out of the picture, the DNI will need to find a new PR stooge to perfect new deceptions and false claims, such as the bogus assertions that new FISA rules were central to breaking up the German terror plot or expanded surveillance powers are needed to prevent kidnappings of U.S. troops in Iraq.
And as for divine retribution against the Bush team for its myriad abuses of ethics guidelines and the law, well, for this one day God is in his Heaven and all is right with the world.
UPDATE: Yesterday, I noted that the prime examples of incompetence and duplicity in the Bush administration such as Paul Bremer, Tommy Franks and George Tenet generally receive the Presidential Medal of Freedom for their damage to the nation. Today, President Bush unveiled a new list of recipients and mercifully John Philbin wasn't on it. But former Illinois Congressman, right-to-life zealot and unfaithful critic of Bill Clinton's infidelity Henry Hyde was.