mer Gov. Rod Blagojevich to appoint him to fill the U.S. Senate vacancy created by the election of Barack Obama as president.Blagojevich’s harshest critics who want to take down anyone who was even remotely connected to him (if I were Milorod’s kindergarten teacher, I’d be very wary these days) say that tape shows Burris was in cahoots with the brothers Blagojevich in order to get a U.S. Senate appointment.
PERSONALLY, I THINK the transcript released this week of a wiretap recording made by the FBI during their attempt to get the evidence of criminal behavior against Blagojevich really doesn’t say much of anything.
Assuming that the recording has been accurately transcribed (I haven’t heard the actual tape, whose aural quality likely is very poor), what we know is that Burris once spoke with Blagojevich’s brother about the possibility of help with political fundraising.
Burris wants us to believe the fact that he is heard to say that he can’t just provide direct assistance is evidence that he knew there were legal restrictions on what kind of assistance he could provide.
Yet the Blagojevich critics want to believe the fact that Burris did not immediately say “no” and in fact tried to consider what legal forms of assistance he could provide to the then-governor is evidence that he was eager to make a deal to get himself the Senate appointment.
MY POINT IS to say that this transcript, which may become one of those things we hear about over and over in coming months, is almost the equivalent of a political Rorschach test.
People are going to read into it whatever they want to in order to confirm their preset beliefs. And I suppose what I am writing here is that I read these quotations from Roland Burris and Robert Blagojevich and I see the political equivalent of just a batch of ink blots.
In the end, it really doesn’t matter much.
Most people appear to have already made up their minds about Roland Burris, and the impression is not a positive one. Despite his past years of political posts and doing “the people’s business,” Burris these days has become little more than the doddering old man who doesn’t realize he should quit.
REGARDLESS OF HOW much money he ultimately raises for his re-election campaign, people are always going to talk about the fact that during his initial months in office he raised the grand total of $845 (which is barely enough money to pay for the sound system used at one political rally).
And now, they’re going to talk about Burris being the guy who had repeated chances to tell various panels the “whole” truth about how he got Rod Blagojevich to resurrect his political career (he had been out of office for 14 years), but kept getting caught in, not quite lies, but half-truths.
I even consider that to be something of a political Rorschach test, since I have always been under the impression that when someone is under oath, they answer the specific questions put to them and usually try to say as little as possible.
If it sounds like I think anybody’s testimony about any issue could be taken apart by people who want to nitpick, then you’d be correct.
I REALLY DON’T know what to think of Roland Burris these days.
While the political science geek in me can appreciate the need to understand the circumstances under which a soon-to-be-impeached governor used Burris to deliver a “drop dead” statement to his critics, I’m more inclined to want to look ahead to the future.
And when I think about the future, I don’t really see Roland Burris as a factor. He will serve his purpose as an “interim” member of the U.S. Senate, while the long-term choice to represent Illinois will be determined in next year’s elections.
I don’t expect him to get the Democratic Party’s nomination, although I’m not sure who the party’s nominee will be. The only thing I am sure of is that the party primary will be a contentious one.
PERHAPS THAT’S THE way it should be.
What I want to see is if so many people get their feelings hurt that the party can’t unite behind whoever does win the nomination, which could be the Republican Party’s best chance of having their candidate ultimately prevail come the November 2010 general election.
I keep getting hung up about the fact that the people who are most eager to dredge up nasty little details about the selection process are the ones less interested in legal issues and serious political study and who are more interested in playing partisan games related to next year’s elections.
That makes the Senate ethics committee, which got permission this week to review the FBI tapes in their effort to determine of Burris should be censured for his behavior, little more than opposition researchers for the 2010 campaign.
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EDITOR’S NOTES: Does the phrase “keep me in mind” amount to something improper (http://voices.washingtonpost.com/capitol-briefing/2009/05/senate_committee_gets_tapes_of.html?hpid=moreheadlines) when it comes to the process of trying to get a political appointment?
This ought to be enough evidence that partisan politics, and not any sense of good government, is a large part (http://www.chicagobusiness.com/cgi-bin/news.pl?id=34182) of the movement to dump on Roland Burris.
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