Chicago-Style Politics

Roland Burris was already destined to be a nonperson in the U.S. Senate before he arrived to take the Senate seat that Rod Blagojevich insists he gave him for free, but he's already making a fool of himself with his comments. Not so much with what he says but how he says it. He's complained about how the controversy surrounding his appointment is political "thee-A-tur," and defended his appointment as Blagojevich's "deshis-son," and thanked Ray Suarez on PBS's "The NewsHour With Jim Lehrer" the chance to talk to him and his listeners. Uh, Mr. Burris? You were on television! Ray Suarez hasn't been on NPR for years!

Meanwhile, Chicago congressman and noted Black Panther Party alumnus Bobby Rush - who trounced Barack Obama in a 2000 House primary - defended Blagojevich's appointment as keeping at least on black in the Senate where there otherwise wouldn't be one, and that blacks need representation in the Senate. Well, so do double-amputee female Asian-American Iraq War veterans, so would Rush (Rush is a congressman) be standing up for Illnois Veterans' Affairs director Tammy Duckworth if she'd been the governor's choice for Obama's Senate seat? Except that no one else under consideration would have taken the appointment from Governor Slimeball.

Not even Danny Davis, another Chicago congressman, who stood to be the fourth black senator since Reconstruction when Rod the Clod offered him the appointment first.