Remember how Enron’s Ken Lay was George Bush’s best pal and biggest contributor in Texas, until the Enron scandal, and the Bush had never heard of him? Remember how Abramoff was the kingpin of Republican lobbyists, until he was indicted, and then no one in the Republican Party, especially the White House, ever recalled meeting him? (In fact, some Republicans whispered that he was actually serving Democrats.)

Now Merle Ted Haggard, an evangelical leader, has been implicated in a drug and sex scandal. (Haggard is credited with rallying conservative Christians behind Bush in get-out-the-vote rallies, and is said to be included in weekly phone conversations with Bush.) So far, Haggard has admitted only that he bought crystal meth but didn’t use it and never had sex with that gay prostitute. Which probably won’t go over well with conservatives, who have practically made a mantra out of criticizing Bill Clinton for his statements that he smoked pot but never inhaled, and never had sex with that woman.

But here’s the inevitable reaction from the White House, which has close connections with Haggard:

He had been on a couple of calls, but was not a weekly participant in those calls. I believe he’s been to the White House one or two times. . . . But there have been a lot of people who come to the White House.

Who would like to take the side of any bet that Haggard was part of only 2 or 3 calls and not more?

I know that it’s a natural political reaction to distance yourself from a political liability, but how many times can you claim that you had never heard of a close friend, ally, or advisor who has fallen from grace before people start to wonder?

A side note on the affair: it seems like the media has finally gotten a juicy story (read: sex and/or drugs involved) to replace the Kerry non-story. Strange, I would have thought that the Bush administration publishing how-to documents on building a nuclear weapon on the Internet and keeping them there for weeks for terrorists, rogue states and dictators to read would maybe have qualified–but then, I’m not a news editor, so what do I know?