The Junior Senator From Illinois
by Barbara Morrill aka BarbinMD
Sun Mar 01, 2009 at 08:00:05 AM PST
As the saga of the unlikely Senator rolls on, there is one thing we can say with absolute certainty: Nothing that has happened is Roland Burris' fault. So says Roland Burris anyway:
"But the media now is almost destroying my character because they're not accurately reporting what really transpired."
And in a funny way, Burris has a point. Because when the media reported that Burris had no contact with anyone connected to Rod Blagojevich before Burris was appointed to the Senate, that was inaccurate. And when the media reported that Burris testified to having contact with just one of Blagojevich's cohorts, that was inaccurate. And when the media reported that Burris had had no contact with the former Governor's brother, that was inaccurate. And perhaps someday, Roland Burris will explain how the media destroyed his character by simply reporting what he was saying from day, to affidavit, to testimony, to affidavit, to day. Or as a Chicago reporter once put it:
"I'm not interested in his fantasies ... I mean there's gotta be something there other than Roland Burris saying it."
Neither here nor there, because in the end it won't matter that Burris finagled and fudged his way into the United States Senate, because it's become clear that he feels the same way about his seat as Charlton Heston felt about his guns. It doesn't matter that the White House wants him gone, and it doesn't matter how many times a Senator or legislator or newspaper editorial call for him to step down ... short of a perjury conviction, Roland Burris isn't going anywhere. After all, he has a lot of tombstone left to fill.
So what are the people of Illinois left with until 2010? An ineffective Senator with the first name "embattled".