Roland Burris, Rod Blagojevich: Illinois Politics Gets Weirder and Weirder
By Robert Schlesinger, Thomas Jefferson Street blog
So...Rod Blagojevich emerges from the miasma of scandal that has enveloped him long enough to appoint a law-enforcer type to replace Barack Obama as a U.S. senator from Illinois. (What is Burris thinking here?) Or attempt to, anyway—the Secretary of State of Illinois says he won't certify the appointment, and Senate Democrats say they won't seat him. The surreality is breath-taking.
Blago's finest comedic moment came when he implored (with as much moral authority as he could muster) that the allegations surrounding him not interfere with the appointment.
(No—scratch that, as I wrote that last sentence, he took the mic again and said that he had enjoyed the limelight he's had for the last couple of weeks. Wow.)
Rep. Bobby Rush, who in a previous life co-founded the Illinois Black Panthers, appeared and was thoughtful enough to make explicit the racial politics in the would-be appointment (having another African-American senator apparently trumps questions of propriety and scandal).
So to sum up, Blago is essentially saying that the (attempted) appointment is only scandalous because people won't ignore his scandals. He's like a schoolyard bully pummeling a nerd with the loser's own arm, all the while saying, "Why do you keep hitting yourself?"
- Read more by Robert Schlesinger.
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Tags: Illinois | corruption | Rod Blagojevich
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Reader Comments
Barnum & Burriss
I live in Chicago, and, although I don't applaud myself for much, I am proud to say I haven't gone near the Trib for the past few days. The NY Times is all over Gaza, and that's what I've been reading. Burris was dead to me ever since he said he'd except the appointment. I thought, 'Oh, another Illinois maniac...' Plus, as soon as Blago appointed him, I knew it would become a race thing. Booooring. Nonetheless, this last stunt was very entertaining. Great TV. Burris is all chest-out walking to the door, gets denied, and then he says he wasn't seaking a confrontation. Hey, at least he didn't say he wasn't expecting one, cuz he must have showed up with every black minister and politico in the state! Playing the race card? He played the whole deck.
Illinois--what a GRATE place!
GRATE as in grating! As much as I admire Roland Burris (a fellow distinguished alum of my college, has a wife who is an absolute doll, and he's an all-around good guy), I'm having a hard time with why he would accept an appointment from a clown like Radioactive Roddy! Who'd even wanna be in the same room with him, let alone the same state?! None of this back-and-forth would be going on if Pat Quinn had appointed him--Burris managed to get thru stints as comptroller and atty general with no sturm und drang, and maintained his integrity. Now this! Stop the madness!!
I don't get it. All I know is, the silliness seems to have no end! I don't care how long Fitzgerald needs to get a conviction, but the STATE General Assembly needs to get this perpetual bad-hair-day idiot out of office POST HASTE! In the meantime, the Prairie State will keep the rest of the nation entertained!
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