Randall Tobias, a senior official at the State Department (Director of U.S. Foreign Assistance and USAID Administrator), resigned this week after his name "surfaced in an investigation into a high-priced call-girl ring." More details from ABC News via ThinkProgress:
ABC: Brian, I know you were the only reporter to talk to Tobias late this week before his resignation. What did you learn from him?
ROSS: Well, David, I talked to him one day before he resigned and told him that we had found his name and personal phone number on a list of clients of the so-called DC Madam’s escort service in Washington. And what he told me was that he in fact had been a customer of the service, but that he had not had sex. He had had what he called gals come over to his condo to give him a massage. He claimed there was no sex but that he was stunned by the fact that we were aware he was a client and that was his conversation. I asked him if he knew any of the young women, their names. He said he didn’t remember them at all. He said it was like ordering pizza.
Ah yes, just like ordering pizza. Can't you imagine it? "I'd like one Central American woman, medium size, please. And easy on the eyes, ok? Can I have the total? Thanks."
Unfortunately for Tobias and others, the women, or more specifically, the woman at the center of this scandal sure remembers his name. And thousands more. Brian Ross at ABC News bluntly lays out the sheer magnitude of this growing scandal:
ABC: And Brian, I presume there are others on this list who will turn heads?
ROSS: There are thousands of names, tens of thousands of phone numbers, and there are people there at the Pentagon, lobbyists, others at the White House, prominent lawyers — a long, long list, and as well, the women who work for the service, David, include university professors, legal secretaries, scientists, military officers.
Break out the pizza popcorn. Things are going to get very interesting...
Update: What Atrios says:
Let me say now that to the extent that this is consensual, legal, and doesn't involve gross hypocrisy of public figures and the agenda they advocate it's none of our business. To the extent that such qualifications are met I hope it doesn't become our business.
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