One of the more amusing disclosures (and there are so many) that followed the recent ousting of Hewlett-Packard Co. CEO Mark Hurd was that the company was booting him due to a reported $20,000 worth of travel expense padding.

According to reports, HP’s board discovered that Mr. Hurd had filed inaccurate expense reports as they were investigating the now infamous sexual harassment charge brought by Jodie Fisher, a 50-year-old actress whom HP had hired to work at marketing events. Apparently, Ms. Fisher jetted near and far on HP’s dime, including trips to Europe and Asia, where the marketing contractor was employed to greet HP’s customers.

No matter: An investigation by HP’s board failed to turn up evidence of sexual misconduct by its CEO, and both he and Ms. Fisher have denied having a romantic relationship. Enough said. Now back to the $20k and subsequent expunging of $13 billion from HP’s stock market value.

The willingness of HP’s board to validate its actions using such a meager dollar amount is absurd. This is, after all, the same board that approved a compensation package for Mr. Hurd that made him the world’s fourth highest paid CEO in 2009.

Meanwhile, when Mr. Hurd’s actions came under fire in the press last week, who became his most prominent and loyal defender? Not his CFO, Cathie Lesjak, who now serves as the company’s interim CEO. (Ms. Lesjak has put her own spin on the tried-and-true CEO/CFO loyalty code.)

Instead, Hurd’s defense was left to, of all people, the world’s highest paid CEO — a.k.a. Larry Ellison of Oracle Corporation. (Was there any national news organization that Oracle’s CEO did not express his outrage to last week?)

I guess my point is that when HP attempted to justify the firing of one of the business world’s most highly regarded CEOs for supposedly abusing a five-digit number, the sweltering fog being emitted by Ms Fisher’s allegation momentarily evaporated.

Again, this is the same board that dished out a sizable discretionary bonus to Hurd shortly after he had only just accepted industry kudos for taking a 20 percent salary cut last year.

“This is the third year in a row that HP gave its CEO a discretionary bonus. Maybe it’s time for a new compensation committee,” Paul Hodgson of the Corporate Library, a corporate governance research firm, told The New York Times earlier this year.

More pay in stock and less in cash became a favorite refrain of Kenneth Feinberg, the Obama administration’s “pay czar” for banks. During his short reign, Feinberg also advocated that executives pay golf club dues and personal trips on corporate jets out of their own pocket.

It seems that HP’s board may have been listening, at least in part. Back in February 2009, the company terminated a policy that allowed a “tax gross up” to its CEO and other executives with respect to personal usage of corporate aircraft.

A so-called “tax gross up” allows executives to be compensated for all or part of the taxes the government requires that they pay for using the corporate jet on personal matters. At the same time, HP also ended a policy that allowed its CEO to receive a tax gross up for his spouse or even other guests who might step aboard the jet for personal use.

Was Ms. Fisher ever aboard the jet? I have no idea, but it seems to me our fascination last week with sex and the c-suite may have only helped to obscure Mr. Hurd’s true failings as well as those of HP’s board. The absurdity of the $20K figure momentarily drew our attention away from the sex, and back to compensation and governance issues where HP’s true foibles undoubtedly reside.