Inside the Asylum

A senior White House aide has quit over his role in a presidential plane's low-level fly-past that caused panic among New York office workers. The White House said President Barack Obama had accepted the resignation of military office director Louis Caldera... The half-hour fly-past by a presidential jet and a fighter plane escort on April 27 did not involve Mr Obama. The US Air Force has estimated that it cost $328,835 to stage, the Associated Press news agency reported. Mr Caldera said in his resignation letter that the controversy over the flight had made it impossible for him to continue in his job, and had become a "distraction" for the president.

Nice of the BBC to clear that up for us ... did you get that? Obama was not involved. It was all a lowly functionary's fault. But don't worry, he's fallen on his sword. We can't have any distractions for the president.
[Update] Prediction. Louis Caldera, the functionary who threw himself on his sword, will turn up later in some other comfortable government role. After all, he has to be rewarded for sheltering the emperor from blame.
[Further update] Here's what Obama had to say about him a little while ago:

"Louis has served his country with distinction in uniform and in government, and his pedigree is second-to-none. I know he'll bring to the White House the same dedication and integrity that have earned him the highest praise in every post, from Secretary of the Army to university president," said President-elect Obama.

Good to know we've got a president with such great judgment concerning his political appointees.
[Further further update] Isn't it amazing what you find when you start doing the slightest bit of digging? It turns out that Obama left out another important aspect of Caldera's recent experience. His work on corporate governance with IndyMac would also have more accurately predicted his future performance in his White House appointment.
[Further further update] Things just keep getting more interesting. As Althouse says:

Yes, I know. I've moved into conspiracy theory territory. It's not my thing, normally. But this is just staring me in the face, and I feel required to say what I see. The pieces don't fit. I want to know more. The Caldera resignation does not turn the page. Who was in Air Force 1?

Dark energy and dark matter ... Can't find it, and can only very marginally prove it even exists ... but nevertheless it seems to make up the vast majority of the universe. Until today I'd read that all visible matter and energy in the universe made up something like 13% of the total. It seems that this was an over-estimate. We're now down to 4%. What a stunning thought ... most of our universe is missing. Until 11 years ago, we didn't even suspect this. What a humbling thought ... man is in his arrogance once thought he was on a verge of understanding everything. Now we realize that we've only just learned enough to discover how ignorant we really are. I remember reading something Heinlein once wrote, but I can't find it to quote it exactly. Basically it was the idea that our ignorance is a cloud on the horizon. Back in 1900 or so we didn't know much about the cloud because it was away on the horizon ... but it looked pretty small. As we learned more (getting closer to the cloud) it gradually got bigger and bigger until finally the bank of clouds stretches as far as we can see to left and right. We've only just reached the point of knowing how little we know.