Jesse Jackson Junior Walks the Walk. 
The Chicago dailies leap to report in banner headlines and gigantic photos that Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr., (JJJ) (below after denials on Capitol Hill) is now self-identified as
Candidate 5 in the Blago/Harris complaint by Patrick Fitzgerald. A pause to stop pausing. Also now reported is that JJJ yesterday hired Chicago mouthpiece James Montgomery Sr. who took to the media to declare his client is "completely guiltless." Clearly Mr. Montgomery (below right) knows how to signal to the gallery that this is going to get noisy, sweaty and operatic quickly. The confusion over Candidate 5 was short-lived and suggests that the mobile chatter in Chicago moved beyond who is it? to what does he do now? and how can Emil Jones, the other suspect, take advantage? Today Emil Jones Jr. jumped up with the idea to take the power of naming the Senate seat away from the governor and give it to a special election. This works for him, because he is now the number 1 candidate since JJJ now retires to explain himself for the next six months of grand juries and media avails and photo ops and so forth. Jones is the very one that the President-Elect did not want in his seat and now, thanks to Blago, he has the inside track. Meanwhile JJJ is hysterical with honesty and candor and hurt feelings and the kind of noble wounded pride that suits a persecuted innocent. The Chicago dailies love this. The Jackson family is the Chicago version of royalty, a 1960s born version of the Kennedys. Mr. Obama worked to get into the Jackson posse and now he has stepped beyond it. Or has he? Mr. Obama today reconsidered his taciturn sadness from yesterday's remarks and called for Blago to resign immediately. This surrogate sound bite is getting attention but not nearly the scale of JJJ's remarks on ABC News. JJJ was reluctant, coy, shy to admit he was Candidate 5, but he didn't run away from the idea. "I don't know," was the extent of his denial if he was #5. Then, "I am not a target of this investigation," said JJJ, which is a peculiar conclusion for him to make since the investigation just started with the arrest of Blago and Harris, and JJJ just hired Montgomery yesterday to deny guilt. JJJ added that he would talk to the US Attorney "as
quickly as possible," but only after he meets with lawyers. Smart, but again not anything less than calling attention to the fact that your hands are moist -- as they should be. When Eliot Ness comes knocking, James brother of Jesus would be anxious. Finally JJJ managed a construction that sounds even more fantastic and illogical than it reads, "It is impossible for someone on my behalf to have a conversation that would suggest any type of quid pro quo or any payments or offers. An impossibility to an absolute certainty." Read this again slowly. It is a non denial denial but so clumsy and labored and triple negative that it comes out alarmingly guilt-soaked. "Payments or offers," sticks out like an Icelandic flag. No conclusions possible at this time except that mouthpiece Mr. Montgomery now begins a lush winter of billing and media appearances, so we all recommend he buy new ties, remember that shoes are in the TV shots and reconsider the "completely guiltless" overstatement. "Innocent" will do. Better yet is, "Mr. Jackson will do whatever it takes to help..."
Blago Day 2.
Meanwhile Mr. Golden Thing (right, pitching for the White Sox) is now the genesis of a new word in the political lexicon, identified by the genius writing team at the Letterman Show, "Blagojeviching." The definition is loose, and I rush to suggest that it means anywhere from extremely colorful and threatening rhetoric in government and finance to self-destructive weirdness associated with absolute power, desperate vanity, bipolar outbreak, chemical abuse, and a phone bill the size of the Matterhorn. Blagojevich started yesterday as competition for Obamanizing -- which is the exact opposite, a dreamy crooning about utopia, paradise, community bliss by modest public servants who live simply and honestly. Today, Day 2 of the Wacky World of Blago on the Front Page, with the JJJ scenario developing swiftly, it is fair to say that Blagojeviching has replaced Obamanizing as the choice contact sport in political exchange. It is easy to imagine the mobile phone remarks of the principal suspects in this present investigation, for example, JJJ to his father, JJJ to his lawyer, JJJ to his staff, JJJ to JJJ voice notes. Is it possible that there is JJJ to David Axelrod or Valerie Jarret or Rahm Emanuel? Something like, "Why the () did you () get me into this () golden thing you ()." Then again, it is also possible that JJJ is still Obamanizing, something like, "Excuse me, is it possible for you to explain to me, sir, (ma'am), how it is that we have reached this unhappy moment in our pursuit of a better world for our children?"
Obamanizing Playing Catch Up.
The President Elect sent his press officer elect Robert Gibbs to say that Mr. Obama wants
Blago to resign immediately. This is a day late Obamanizing to quiet Blagojeviching. It is also insipid. And it is also off-key. Isn't the vigorous, speedy, comprehensive, investigation and prosecution in order to protect the people of Illinois and the Congress more critical than Blago's fate? And what is the point really of calling for what you know will not happen? President-Elect Obama (right after speaking of Blago yesterday) calls for the moon to stop rising? Insipid and infantilizing. When the man to be the POTUS calls for something it is supposed to happen. Blago's SUV arrived at the office as usual. In brute contrast to the President-Elect's Obamanizing, Patrick Fitzgerald's observation is accurate and appropriate to the facts about Blagojeviching and Blago, "He is still the sitting governor of Illinois today, now, and that is not something we have any say in or control of."
Permit me to "Filligerize" on this for a moment.... (defined as shooting wildly at a topic with the end result of alienating as many readers as possible with the fewest possible words.) If Blagojevich were a conservative, we'd want him to get due process. Also, watching a Democratic Governor and the FBI duking it out is like watching a couple of boxers from communist countries going at it: hard to root for either corner. Real hard. I personally am against wiretapping even if it's court-authorized, even if it uncovers an assassination plot. It's an invasion of privacy, plain and simple. Whether it's a legal or a moral or an ethical invasion of privacy is another matter, but my own personal belief is that if you can't catch somebody by some other means besides spying on them, you don't deserve to catch them. It's like pee-testing for drugs: If drugs are really so bad, why do you have to resort to a complicated chemical analysis to confirm their presence? It gives the lie to your belief that the person's behavior is a crime in the first place. (Remember: if you're having difficulty coping with my nonteleological thinking, I did warn you I'd be Filligerizing.) Finally, in response to the "Batchelorizing" about how Blago's failure to resign after Obama asks him to, makes Obama look weak, I say: give it a couple days to sink in. I expect we'll have Blago's resignation within 48 hours.
Mr. Filliger manages to make some excellent points. His aim is true.
I would add that I am sick unto death of the modern trend of making more and more crimes a Federal matter. Ought it not be the responsibility of the people of Illinois to deal with this Blagojevich creep, rather than a bunch of power-drunk Feds?
Lou Filliger may have a point. Are we going to destroy a man before he even takes office? If I remember correctly, that's just about what we did with Bush. And when we ended up with no leadership, we all laughed along with Leno, Rosie and the rest. Now look where it's gotten us.
We elected a man who promised us a socialist paradise after all. Or did we elect a man we could sacrifice on the altar of partisan politics; someone who would satisfy our blood lust in the now proverbial Roman Colosseum where Christians were routinely martyred for sport? I'm with Lou on this one. Let Obama do his stuff; but let's not settle for crummy leadership once again and watch the country go down the crapper.
Look what's happening in Greece. We're not immune. Our universities teach the same rot right here in America. Only this time we may have cut them off at the pass - by electing Obama. The spoiled, little Marxists wouldn't dare raise a finger against one of their own. Maybe we've bought ourselves some time; time to show the rest of the world what exactly it is they're all yelling about. At least we did it without having to shoot 15-year olds.
How old were the students at Kent State?
The reverse side of the 4th Amendment protection against "unreasonable "searches and seizures is that there are instances where they are completely reasonable.
It's the Democrats who are throwing Blago under the bus.
Reminds me of when I was a kid: own up to the LESSER malfeasance, hoping (hehe) that mom wouldn't pursue/notice the GREATER malfeasance.
Obama was, is, and will always be a Crook County political marxist thug.
Can a President-Select be impeached? What a disgrace.
(s)Elected for the color of his skin, NOT the content of his character.
A lot of these conspiracy crimes, notably RICO, get Federalized because they involve interstate use of the mails and the wires. This gets the Feds involved and opens up new realms of penalties with which to plea bargain. Additionally, selling a Senate seat seems to be a Federal crime, by any measure.
This seems to be more than a partisan matter, however, because the current Governor's predecessor, a Republican "reformer," also spent some time in "Club Fed" at the end of his political career. As Illinois is only considered the 18th most corrupt state, this is either a sign of endemic corruption in modern American politics or a sign that Illinois has decided to improve its standing.
In response to Mr. Filliger........when you stated that court authorized wiretaps, obtained through probable cause that current criminality is ongoing, is immoral, you said it all. Such statements betray an naivete regarding the realities of modern day crime fighting. Perhaps we should disband our state and federal crime fighting organizations in favor of the honor system?
In response to Kenneth Stevens, what a lovely idea that the people of Illinois would take care of their own criminals. Unfortunately they have not done so. The people of Illinois continue recycling the same corrupt bunch of pols year after year, decade after decade. And now the whole country gets to join in the fun.
Ken, your leap in logic from my dislike of wiretapping, to my supposed naivete of current crimefighting methods, is faulty; namely, it discounts the possibility that I dislike the crimefighters more than I dislike the criminals. What's the worst a criminal can do to me? Rob me or kill me? I'm going to die someday anyway, and I can always buy a new ____ (whatever was taken). What's the worst a government wiretap can do to me? Take away my liberties. I'll take my chances with the criminals any day. If you're not free from government shackles, you're not really alive anyway.