Blagojevich to name Roland Burris to Obama’s Senate seat :: CHICAGO SUN-TIMES :: Gov. Blagojevich
Gov. Blagojevich today is expected to name former state Comptroller and Attorney General Roland Burris to Illinois’ vacant U.S. Senate seat, a knowledgeable source said this morning.
Former Illinois Attorney General Roland Burris, 71, had lobbied the governor for the position in recent weeks.
So….how much did he have to pay for it?
Oh, and remember when the Illinois legislature was either going to impeach Blago, or rescind the governor’s power to appoint a Senate replacement, or both?
Whatever happened to that?
About what I expected to happen. Nothing.
And a related thought: Have you noticed how media interest in what Rahm Emanuel/Barack Obama knew and did about the Blagojevich play-for-pay deal seems to have entirely dried up, even though no credible answers to either question have been reported? (No, I’m not talking about Obama’s phony self-investigation results…or, rather, I am. They aren’t credible.)
I guess issues of corruption in the Obama administration just aren’t news.
UPDATE: Senate Dems say they won’t seat Obama replacement
WASHINGTON (AP) - Senate Democrats said Tuesday they would refuse to seat the man Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich has picked to succeed President-elect Barack Obama, saying that the taint of scandal would follow the new senator to Washington.
“Anyone appointed by Gov. Blagojevich cannot be an effective representative of the people of Illinois and, as we have said, will not be seated by the Democratic Caucus,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada and his deputy, Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, said in a statement.
I’ll believe they stick to this when I see it.
UPDATE: Eugene Volokh says the Senate, absent evidence of corruption in the selection/appointment process, must seat him. I don’t think Eugene’s argument preclude seating him and then immediately expelling him, though.
UPDATE: Illinois Secretary of State Jesse White refuses to certify the appointment.
Submit to Stumbled Upon!
Fixed it for you!
(See Charlie Rangel, Chris Dodd, “Refrigerator” Jefferson, etc., etc.)
I had thought that once it became clear that the seat was for sale, the appointment would become so tainted that no pol who actually cared about re-election would want to touch it. Either Roland Burris doesn’t care about reelection, or else he’s convinced that Illinois is such a political cesspool that it just won’t matter.
Bingo. Well, sort of. The rest of Illinois doesn’t matter, and Chicago would elect an imprisoned felon, as long as there was a “D” after his name on the ballot. Especially a black imprisoned felon.