Two Republican politicos lost their gigs with John McCain's campaign this weekend because of their ties to Myanmar's brutal military government. Doug Goodyear, who was to organize the GOP convention, and Doug Davenport, who was to manage McCain's campaign in the Mid-Atlantic region, tendered their resignations following a cyclone-triggered burst of media interest in the duo's lobbying on behalf of Myanmar in 2002. Makes sense, we guess, given that the junta's cruelty is now on full display for a global audience, but it nonetheless raises questions about staff purity standards at Team McCain. Why, some might ask, do these chumps have to walk the plank while other McCain aides who have lobbied for tyrants, terrorists, and testicle-eaters get to stay aboard? Uh, probably because the other guys are running the friggin' campaign! A quick look at some McCain insiders who didn't get pushed out of their jobs despite their sketchy foreign business associates ...

Rick Davis. Though McCain has said he would "be very harsh" on Russian strongman Vladimir Putin, his campaign manager has cashed in on Putin's power clique. Davis' firm has assisted Kremlin crony and Ukrainian Prime Minister Viktor Yanukovych in rehabilitating his image following that nasty 2004 presidential election in which his opponent Viktor Yuschenko was poisoned, in addition to helping a shady pro-Putin billionaire realize his dream of meeting McCain.

Tom Loeffler. As we've noted before, McCain's top money man is a paid stooge for Saudi Arabia, a country that more than holds its own in the global hierarchy of oppressive governments and poses a far greater threat to America's security than Myanmar.

Charlie Black. McCain's senior adviser heads a lobbying operation (owned, incidentally, by Mark Penn's mega-PR firm Burson-Marsteller) that has worked for a menagerie of unsavory foreign entities. Among them: Ahmed Chalabi, who helped create the illusion that led to the invasion of Iraq and who seems to have leaked highly sensitive U.S. intelligence to Iran; the China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC), an appendage of the Chinese government; and Equatorial Guinea President Teodoro Obiang Nguema who, in addition to being a brutal dictator, reportedly eats the testicles of his enemies.