Gov Blagojevich

If only he had invoked Caesar from the start, instead of civil rights heroes whose legacies are so sacred to so many, perhaps he could go down more gracefully (or at least less offensively).

What Blagojevich did is so shocking that it could make "Lincoln turn over in his grave." But Caroline getting the seat because of her zillion-dollar fund raising ability wouldn't do the same?

Senate Democrats have no choice but to change their tone about Roland Burris becoming a U.S. senator because Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich "called our...

Blagojevich, by any reasonable standard, ought to be beside himself with embarrassment over the 114 to 1 vote to impeach him. Yet he's reciting Tennyson in front of cameras.

In this contest of wills -- the governor's rightful authority to appoint a senator as opposed to the Senate's power to judge the qualification of its members -- the last word simply belongs to the Senate.

The Democrats should cut their losses and seat Burris. Perhaps they should cut their losses with Reid, too.

From a legal and Constitutional perspective, the question of whether or not Burris should be allowed to take his seat as the Junior Senator from Illinois is not especially difficult. He should.

Though Blagojevich is regularly described as the apotheosis of the shady Illinois politician, he does not come close to the finesse and style embodied by masterful machine politicians. He's no McGinty.

It doesn't matter how clean his record was when he was in office a decade ago or if he didn't pay a cent for his appointment: Roland Burris is a willing pawn in a very corrupt game.

The Obama transition team is taking questions again at Change.gov -- while the press has fixated on the Blagojevich scandal, the allegations of torture by officials in the current administration receive scant attention.

In electoral politics we want to avoid the rich and famous in favor of the modest but qualified. But we make it impossible for anyone but the rich and famous to get the jobs and then keep them.

Diane Nash is a pillar of the civil rights movement who happens to be a blue ribbon Chicago citizen and is certainly more qualified than Caroline Kennedy to be a US Senator.

The Blagojevich scandal is widely seen as a heavy blow for the incoming administration, but in fact it's good for Mr. Obama that it happened early on.

There would be the added cost of a special election, but that's a small price to pay for a Senate seat (which, as Governor Blagojevich so eloquently reminded us, is no cheap thing).

It's been amusing watching the media try to turn a scandal affecting the governor of Illinois into a scandal affecting the president-elect. Every detail was milked for maximum ominousness: a recent handshake between Obama and Blagojevich, a list of favored replacement candidates delivered by Rahm Emanuel, Rahm's "beet-red" face, David Axelrod's work for Blago in the 90s. All inflated to fill a sparse news cycle. But wouldn't it have been weird if Obama hadn't shaken Blago's hand, and weirder still if he'd shown no interest in who his successor would be? Trying to turn any of this into a suspicion of pay-to-play carries about as much weight as the Obama citizenship case. Sorry, guys, but Blagojevich said it all: the Obama people were "not willing to give me anything except appreciation."

Walt Whitman, speaking from beyond the grave, with an eye toward our current ills.

Barack Obama and others should relax and let Governor Blagojevich appoint a Senator. I have a suggestion too. That is Blago's job. The Senate's call ...

Blago is actually the Governor's nickname, and please don't confuse it with "blogger," which is what I am. I'm not the governor of anything, and I left Chicago at age 6, with my morals more or less intact.

It's not just Lincoln turning in his grave, as U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald suggested, this would make even the first Mayor Daley turn in his grave, a man who could peddle boodle in his sleep without a scratch.

CHICAGO — His career in shreds, Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich clung defiantly to power Wednesday, ignoring a call to step down from President-el...