The Chicago Blagger
By Graham Davies

There is something rotten in the State of Illinois, and even an intervention by Obama himself can’t get rid of the smell.

Last week, we saw the comically awful Governor Blagojevich appointing diminutive Roland Burris to fill Obama’s Senate seat. Burris exuded the smug smile of someone who knew that he was utterly unqualified for the role but still thought “bollocks to all of you, I’ve got the job anyway”. It took a quiet word from the President-Elect before anyone else on the Hill would even speak to him.

A little later, we saw the even more bizarre sight of Blagojevich swearing in the Illinois senators who will effectively serve as his jurors at his impeachment hearing on counts of federal corruption. Once they’d been sworn in, he slipped out a back door, and the senators immediately set to the task in hand – voting 58-0 to run the impeachment according to a certain set of rules.

Finally, the Blagger called a press conference. As props, he pulled in a couple of dozen of the halt, the lame and the impoverished. Without Blagojevich’s sterling legislative work and personal interventions, apparently, these folk would be even more disadvantaged. Impeach me, Blagojevich was saying, and you will be throwing such people to the dogs.

He quoted Tennyson, Jesus and Abraham Lincoln as he communicated a messianic passion for … er … himself. Naturally, he walked off without answering any questions. Had I been there, I suppose my first one would have been “Can you give me the names of anyone who actually voted for you?”.

A little presentational advice for any politician about to go on trial: if you still look ridiculously guilty after invoking the aid of a Romantic Poet, the Son of God, and the founding father of the United States of America, then no mere lawyer will be able to help.