Plausible deniability.
Exactly.
The Web site, PhoneyFred.org, was created by Wesley Donehue, a business partner of Warren Tompkins, a South Carolina political operative on the Romney payroll and Romney's top adviser in the early voting state.
Still, if Mitt doesn't fire Tompkins, he has tacitly endorsed the website and it message. Plausible deniability has its limits.
Plausible deniability was the intent, no doubt. But the deniability of this sleaze is no longer plausible.