Penn-itence

So Mark Penn is gone, after his peculiar efforts to juggle working for his lobbying firm with serving as Clinton's chief strategist. (Was the latter job not time-consuming enough?) The final straw was his meeting last Monday--in his lobbyist capacity--with Colombia's ambassador to the US, about efforts to pass the Colombia-US free trade agreement. Clinton opposes the treaty.

One of the great mysteries is not simply why Penn decided to take the meeting last week, but why Colombia hired Penn's firm last year in the first place. Surely Colombia was cognizant of Clinton's position, and Penn's relationship with her. Very strange.