Clearly they didn’t want someone with independent star power. If I remember, he ran for the seat against Chris Dodd, and Dodd lost by just a vote or two. They didn’t want a Lyndon Johnson type leader, who would twist arms, play off factions, offer carrots and sticks for committee assignments, amendments and all. Many of the Senior Democratic Senators are more attracted to their committee chairmanships than they are to floor leadership and consultation regarding every member’s particular interests. Harkin finally has his Ag Committee, Boxer her Environmental assignment, Finestein gets Intelligence after all these years, Leahy keeps Judiciary, Kerry gets Foreign Relations — and on and on it goes. Who do they really have, into a second term, and gifted at herding cats from the center who doesn’t want a starring committee chairpersonship? We don’t have all that many mid-career Senators (Elected at least 6 years ago, but not yet a committee chair,) largely because we lost some during the Clinton Years and the Republican Domination But we have perhaps 19 Democrats in their first term. But in the classes of 2006 and 08, I can see several real leadership possibilities. Cardin, Webb and Whitehouse all come to mind.

I think the constant refrain that Harry should grow a spine and all the rest is misplaced, because he was selected to be the Senators’ leader — not our leader, and he must be pretty much what those who voted for him have in mind.

First of all “All Things Considered” says the Illinois House will take up the impeachment of Blago early next week, and apparently the votes are more or less counted, so the Illinois Senate will do the trial in about three weeks. House requires a simple majority to impeach, they didn’t say what was required for conviction in the Senate. Point being, Blago could be long gone by the end of January.

Rather than just looking at the legal issues here, I think we need to look at the whole saga in Political Culture terms. Illinois and Chicago do have a particular way of thinking about political constructs, and has for generations, and people who live thereabouts, study the system, or even participate in it know it has strange rules, some of which are decidedly illegal, but what the hell, it is Chicago.

One clear rule of Chicago Politics is that you never let anyone “get ahead,” “get out front” if you will, unless you have something on them, something that can serve as blackmail currency in case you need to control them or the process. It can be as simple as knowledge that you once fixed a traffic ticket, or that you greased a contract of some sort that probably didn’t need greasing at all to succeed — the Chicago Political game is just played with the “got something on them” in your pocket at all times. Rather like the old curious habit in Chicago of putting your driver’s license in a plastic holder, and keeping a ten dollar bill behind it. Cop asks to see it, hands it back sans your bill, and off you go.

As I look at this whole Saga, I think what Blago was initially playing for was “a little something on Obama” — he may have thought he had something with Rezko, but that Investigation/Trial pretty much showed the Rezko/Obama relationship was trivial. But putting Obama’s Senate Seat on the Block, and letting Obama’s people know that, just might have been the “something on him” that might be useful at some future juncture. I suggest that Blogo thinks like this, and the vast majority of other Chicago Pols do too.

Once it happened — I see Reid and the rest of the Democrats in the Senate stepping in to put up a barrier. That is why Reid is out front with a firm line laid on the ground, and it is why all the Senate Democrats are lined up with and behind him. Harry knows a lot about Chicago Pol rules — a variation on them is the play in Nevada after all. My guess is that as soon as the Obama people understood what Blago intended to do with the seat, (an auction) they let Senate Democratic Leadership know, and they rounded up the troops to make it unanimous. There are all sorts of reasons why they would want to get the target off Obama’s back, and at the same time get it off theirs.

Notice I haven’t mentioned Fitzgerald yet — I rather doubt if they knew details as to what Fitzgerald already had, how far his investigation had gone, and indeed who he might be targeting before they drew the line in the sand and began to set up the defenses. Given what Fitz put on the record, they can’t back down.

They can kick the can down the road — send the appointment to the rules committee for 3 months, by that time Blago is impeached, perhaps indicted, and then they can negotiate with Burris and the new Governor for a transparent and fair settlement.

[The particular cases discussed are Bilbo and Langer - both as corrupt as anyone we’ve seen in the last eight years.]

my apologies if it has already been posted on another thread.

In 90’s, Burris Sought Death Penalty for Innocent Man

http://www.propublica.org/arti…..t-man-1231