Poindexter to quit Pentagon post after disputed scheme

Retired Adm. John Poindexter has decided to resign his Pentagon position after an outcry over a scheme to create an online futures market designed to anticipate terrorist attacks, assassinations and wars in the Middle East, a senior defense official said yesterday.

Wasn't Ron Wyden the one who, during his run for the senate, couldn't identify Bosnia on a globe, didn't know how much a gallon of milk cost, didn't know the unemployment rate in his state, etc.? Oh yes, here it is Dim and Dimmer:

SENATOR RON WYDEN
Democrat, Oregon
Political observers in Oregon have always suspected that Wyden--elected to the House in 1980 and then to his first Senate term in 1996--is good at following a script prepared by aides, but would disintegrate if ever required to think for himself. Those suspicions were confirmed a few years back when a TV interviewer gave him an on-air pop quiz. Asked to name the president of Canada, Wyden, who had boasted of his foreign-policy expertise, replied, "You know, in the Congress, we're faced with a variety of problems, and I don't have that information today." When the interviewer presented Wyden with a globe and asked him to point to Bosnia, a befuddled Wyden explained, "Without my glasses, I can't see it."
Wyden was equally confused about domestic issues. In the same interview, he conceded that he didn't know the unemployment rate in Oregon or the price of a loaf of bread or a gallon of milk.
Nor is Wyden famous for his political courage. When Congress was considering a bill to reduce the Forest Service's road-building budget last year, Wyden called it one of the most important votes of the year and one on which the fate of Oregon rested. He pointedly refused to take a position, though, apparently fearful of angering loggers, who opposed the bill, or environmentalists, who favored it. He resolved this dilemma by supporting the bill after his colleagues had voted it down.
Wyden is a favorite of Republicans, who consider him hopelessly ineffective. "He doesn't know how the Senate works or how to move a bill," says one GOP staffer. "I'm not sure he could even find his way to the Democratic cloakroom."

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