Nice work, Gov. Blagojevich. Really.

Two big holiday season cheers to floppy-haired Ilinois governor Rod Blagojevich for giving us faith again.

Just when we thought we couldn't squeeze out one more drop of righteous indignation. Just when continuing big executive financial sector bonuses and automaker private jet rides threatened another one of those stupid "Death Of Irony" moments, along comes Mr. Blagojevich to remind us that there are always new standards to strive towards and records to be broken.

"There's politics, then there's crime," said crusading avenging angel and US Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, as though the two are so distinct. But this is clearly an Olympic gold medal moment in the history of political corruption.

You have to hand it to the governor: there's something to be said for brazen self-destruction - a "teachable moment" in the Gavin Newsom meaning - in a culture always looking for new heights of chutzpah. When famous San Francisco Madam Brandy Baldwin was busted for the third or fourth time running a cathouse in Pacific heights, her lawyer, the late Art Groza, got her a deal that saved her hard prison time and had her serving her sentence in a local convent instead. I visited Brandy there to do a story and, while she was fighting with the tough sister who ran the place and shocking the nuns with risque tales late at night, she was also running an outcall escort business from the pay phone.

But this bald-faced Chicago chicanery makes Brandy look like an amateur.

I stand here though (sit here, actually) in defense of Governor Blagojevich. While he may have tried to sell a US Senate seat, held up kids' hospital funding waiting for some kickbacks and tried to gangplank journalists he didn't like through extortion, at least he didn't cheat on his wife like Elliot Spitzer and John Edwards. In fact, this faithful husband even tried to dip into his shakedown skims and get ransom money to secure his wife a grifter job. That's got to be a Cosmo cover line on a 10-great-qualities-in-a-husband story.

His compulsion, like Mr. Edwards and Mr. Spitzer, was powerful, but chaste.

Now, I do have to say that Jennifer Aniston made better and more efficient use of her hometown newspaper (see photo) than Rod Blagojevich tried to make of his.

Even there, the Governor has done some good: He may have shined a rare and precious light on the respectable and ethical side of an otherwise vilified Tribune Company owner, Sam Zell. We don't know the details yet. But if Mr. Blagojevich's alleged lengthy blackmail scheme, page 12, subsection A (agreeing to help Tribune sell Wrigley Field in exchange for Chicago's venerated paper firing editorial page writers the Governor didn't like) actually reached Mr. Zell's ears, then whoa! That means Sam Zell, even if he does look like the deceased satanist cult leader Anton LeVay, actually stood up for principle and didn't can the journalists. And that guy just declared the Tribune Company bankrupt, so it's not like he didn't have extra pressure to say yes to the scheme.

Not only that, but the Tribune both continued to hammer the governor while also holding back on stories about the investigation to let Mr. Fitzgerald do his job. Let's ignore for now that Mr. Zell borrowed from his employees pension fund to buy them worthless stock in the company; that won't get him a 6 a.m. FBI wake-up call.

That reminds me of the time, at the old Examiner, when folks from the local Archdiocese tried to get us to pull reporter Elizabeth Fernandez off a beat covering the church sex scandal. The publisher at the time, Lee Guittar, wrote back one of the best "buzz off" letters I've ever read, eloquently defending the right of the paper to cover the story with whichever reporter we thought was appropriate.

Or maybe Sam Zell didn't know about the scheme. Let's try and stay positive all around, though. At a minimum, Mr. Zell looks better because his financial bankruptcy pales in comparison to the Governor's general moral bankruptcy.

The other shining star of this delicious scandal is Patrick Fitzgerald. Once again, he's the avenging angel. Not since 60 Minutes' Mike Wallace has there been a guy you never, ever want to have show up at your door.

So, for just a minute, even though Thanksgiving is over, let's give a big Richard Daley, Sr. thanks to Governor Rod Blagojevich for taking our minds momentarily off the full collapse of our faith-based economy, giving cable TV something else to blanket, reminding us that hubris is boundless and that actions - even among the powerful - sometimes have consequences.

Amen.

For more, read Bronstein at Large.

Comments

[xu2mofox]

Blagojevich might also have anti-social personality disorder in addition to the reported narcissistic personality disorder because he feels no remorse over his actions and he will "fight till the very end," which basically means he can even pass a lie detector test since people with anti-social personality disorder show no abnormal parasympathetic activity while lying.

This is the reason why lie detector tests are not admissible in court since it is inaccurate in a minority of our population. Interestingly personality disorders are not covered by most health insurances so if Gov.Blagojevich wants to get help, he'll have to dish out $100 an hour in private pay therapy sessions (which I doubt he will do since he will likely deny to his last breath that he even has any personality disorder and instead rather assert that he is an innocent victim of a political media assassination campaign).

So by comparison, New York Gov.Elliot Spitzer can be regarded as an honorable public hero with the humility of Gandhi since he has saved the taxpayers much time in costly litigation and distraction of our public media, servers and officials. However Blagojevich Senate nominee, Roland Burris, probably has narcissistic personality disorder due to his bold defense of his nomination through a self-promotion campaign even in the face of all the public and political outrage at Blagojevich's conduct. I guess he feels he is special enough to deserve it.

[Wayne R. Serbin]

As they say concerning the gross amount of political corruption in Illinois, "another one bites the dust."

[BarryS]

sex is bad utter poilitical corruption is good. What values we [actually you] have!

[acacia72]

What was Blagojevich thinking?! If these allegations are true, he must be in some kind of financial hot water as it's hard to believe he would do something so stupid out of simple greed. Let's hope something positive comes from this one way or the other. Oh, and thanks for the good timing Blago.

[lovethesinner]

Great post, Phil. Loved the "teachable moment" comparison to Gavin Newsom.

[Dots]

giving cable TV something else to blanket

[StevieRae]

After reading the lengthy indictment, I'm curious as to why the FBI didn't bring charges against Illinois' Deputy Governor? Beginning with section 86 of the indictment, recorded conversations show he was involved in scheme to extract $$$ for Senate appointment.

It will be fascinating to learn who is the Washington DC based consultant, "advisor B". Section 99 shows how this individual was involved in conversations to conspire through a "pay for play" scheme for the senate seat.

Bottom line: it would seem several heads will roll once these individuals are identified.

[Chardin]

How do you know he didn't cheat on his wife?
Maybe he thought getting her out of the house would provide him with more 'free time'
There won't be much 'free' time on the agenda now...
For a wheeler dealer , Gov. Bargain-ovich definitely bought the one eyed mule.
who kicks back and hard! One of Obama's new public works projects should
be the immediate dispatch of corps of psychiatrists to treat our nutcase errant heads of state.
This mess feels like watching them pull down Saddam;s statue..or pull down his sweat pants.
The ignominy! I've heard that ignominy is good for building character ...speaking of which...
I wonder if the nunnery has any co-ed dorms? They would definitely need the soap on that mouth.

True, Zell looks like Anton LaVay AFTER he was deceased, and MAYBE one could call his
snubbing of Blab on ovich 'princiiples' but it could be a whiff of Fitzgerald put spell on him.
Nobody likes chippin rock in an Illinois prison and who knows how far his dalliance with Bragovich
may have pushed him down the oily slope. Why, he could have become the Al Capone of Publishing.

All in all. another one bites the dust. It's pruning. Ted Stevens sold out for a 2 Grand vibrating bark o lounger and all Phone-ovich got was new set of horns...oh....and a bridge to nowhere.
it looks alot like a plank.. What a bad boy.

[45245]

it is funny as hell though

[billbb]

I have been wondering about old Rod since his blatant attempts to hold Chicago transit funds hostage to moves to up his own popularity. Among these was forcing CTA to provide "free" rides for all seniors - with no additional funding from the state. In fact, they had to do this out of their already tight funds in order to get ANY state funding. Several accidents traceable to these financial difficulties have already occurred, fortunately none of them fatal on CTA.

While rides for seniors may be a worthy goal, the way it was handled smacked of something rotten. Nearly as rotten a transportation scandal, in it's own way, of the depredations of former governor (and current convict) George Ryan and his licensing of unqualified truck drivers via bribery, one of whom may have driven his truck in front of the Amtrak train in Bourbonnais, IL, trying to beat the train to the crossing. Eleven died in the wreck, in case anyone is of the opinion that political scandals are just white-collar financial crimes with no real-world consequences.

[Jesster]

I was thinking that this would be a situation in which having a poor, long-suffering wife might be quite helpful - in at least generating a semblance of sympathy. But after hearing Mrs. Blago cursing and sounding totally self-absorbed - we she kind of made me think of Lady MacBeth. The Gov. himself lacks the class and stature to come across as a Shakespearian tragic figure.

It's one thing to be feared or even hated, but nothing more humiliating and virtually impossible to overcome than to be reduced (or in the case having reduced himself) into a pathetic joke.

The sheer cockiness AND stupidity have most of us a bit stunned. But there does seem to be some kind of element of psychosis or (self) destructive pathology. Everyone I know spent the day just shaking their heads in disbelief - not at the corruption - but at the blindness, arrogance, stunning stupidity and immaturity.

I know most of these political creeps and criminals get caught thanks to a stupid combination of arrogance/invincibility and overestimating their power and cleverness. But Blago seems to be genuinely pathologicial and somehow anti-social.

[MarkInEugene]

Thank you Phil....that was a very satisfying opinion to read! How does such scum of the earth manage to become Governor of Illinois? We have got to pick the bar off the freakin ground and raise it above our heads!

I think we should require mandatory intelligence testing and extensive psych evaluations for anyone holding high office in this country. We cannot afford to have people in high positions of authority undermining the public trust and the rule of law. It should be harder to qualify for governor than it is to be an FBI agent and a Harvard graduate. The qualifications should be stiff and the compensation generous indicating how much regard we have for the very few who qualify!

I'm sure I speak for every American when I say; we are so fed up with lying, cheating, corrupt politicians whose actions have nothing to do with the common good and everything to do with cash and power.

[pigsatthetrough]

More fodder for Nancy Grace, where everyone is guilty until proved innocent. I can see how his hairdo adds the the criminal profiling. Nice of the prosecutor to give the media the evidence in advance. It hardly seems worth the time to have a trial now. FOX and CNN have it down pat. A presidential elect doesn't need to be connected to something like this directly or indirectly. One can only imagine what a day it would be if the press ever were to investigate and report on how many Iraq civilians have been wounded maimed and killed, since the Shock and Awe campaign began. Probably a little too much for them though as counting to 800,000 is way beyond their ability. As long as they get one criminal at home they seem to have done their job.

[GrainOSand]

Excellent analysis or take on the story -- He is obviously (if guilty) an AC/DC fan.

What I am curious about is this Lee Guittar guy, interesting name.

[KoolBreez]

The governor is not corrupt enough to get away with it. Bush, Cheney Rummy got away with worse.

[bajabenedik]

OK, lets set aside the partisan politics. The bottom line, governor Rod Blagojevich deserves everything he gets from his criminal behavior while serving the people of Illinois. I hope he gets jail time and he is made an example to other governors so this doesn' t happen again from either party's governors. This has nothing to do with Democrats and Republicans. For those that are against the Bush administration because of their behavior of the last 8 years, also need to hold their own party politicians to the same standards and prosecute the bums that take advantage of their political positions. Good job by the FBI to bring this dishonest man down.

[VegasPhil]

The worst crime is never mentioned by name.

It is not in the law books and never the charge in an inditment.

But it carries some of the harshes penalities of all.

The crime: STUPID!

Loved the part where the phone was used to to point out not to talk about this stuff on the phone.

[Chardin]

the crime that doesn't dare to speak its name