…alternatively, he’s just dumber than soap.  From a CNS interview (H/T: Instapundit):

CNSNews.com: “So, in general, if a person doesn’t want health insurance, do you think they should be required by the government to actually have to get it?”

Senator Burris: “Under state law, we have every one required to have automobile insurance. Now, think about that.

Sure, let’s. You see, ‘under state law’ people are not actually required to have automobile insurance: people are required to have automobile insurance if they want to own a car.  So, either this is not a good analogy - which means that Senator Roland Burris is dumber than soap - or it is a good analogy; which would mean that he thinks that people should be required to have insurance if they want to stay alive.  Heaven forbid that I suggest that any sitting Senator could possibly be about as sharp as a sack of wet mice, so I am forced to assume that he’s ready to have the willfully non-insured executed for their crimes.

Also: the Preamble to the Constitution contains the enumerated right for Congress to mandate that people buy health insurance!  Except that it’s only visible to people using those special glasses that Ben Franklin made…

Moe Lane

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

Doesn’t matter if I had: it’s worth repeating. Via @MelissaTweets comes the wonderful news that Roland Burris is giving this ‘run for election’ thing serious consideration.  Yes, I know that the conventional wisdom is that he won’t, but Roland Burris is neither conventional, nor particularly wise - and he’s not actually ruling out a run. Admittedly, right now his major problem is that he’d need to find some surefire and very public way to appeal to the liberal faction of the Democratic party.  But how to do that?

…Sen. Roland Burris just put out a statement saying he won’t vote for a bill that doesn’t include a public option, which is not supported by many of his moderate Democratic Senate colleagues.

Yeah. Yeah, that’ll do it.

Moe Lane

PS: Just remember: if he does run, and you’re a Democrat who votes against him in the primary, it’s because you’re a racist. Just ask Jimmy Carter.

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

This would only be a bombshell if it had been unexpected.

AP Exclusive: Blago talked to Durbin about Senate

CHICAGO (AP) - Just two weeks before his arrest on corruption charges, then-Gov. Rod Blagojevich floated a plan to nominate to the U.S. Senate the daughter of his biggest political rival in return for concessions on his pet projects, people familiar with the plan told The Associated Press.

Blagojevich told fellow Democratic Sen. Dick Durbin he was thinking of naming Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan to the seat vacated when Barack Obama won the presidential election, according to two Durbin aides who spoke on condition of anonymity.

[snip]

The aides said the concessions Blagojevich wanted in return were progress on capital spending projects and a health care bill that were stalled in the Legislature.

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I am perilously close to being gobsmacked by this transcript of the Burris/Blagojevich conversation (via Hot Air). I’m not a lawyer, but it seems to me that there’s enough there to indicate that Roland Burris flat-out lied about not trading favors and money for the Senate seat.  I am not, however, so stunned as to be unable to remind people about this, this, this, this, this, this, this, this…

Hold on: let’s see that video again.

Ha!

…this, this, this, this, this, this, this, and, finally, this.  In short - and may you have as an enjoyable time reviewing those posts as I did - Rod Blagojevich’s pick of Roland Burris for the Illinois Senate was a transparent trap - and Harry Reid and the rest of the Democratic Senate caucus sprung it anyway.  In fact, not being content with springing the trap, Reid and his caucus insisted on making every possible mistake that they could, too.  All because they were afraid.  People will be writing about this act of political revenge fifty years from now, and mocking the Senator from Nevada on every page, too.

Deservedly.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

Ace of Spades (H/T, by the way) has kindly given me permission to use the Flaming Blagojevich Skull for this, so I shall:

Sun-Times exclusive: Burris promised Blago campaign a check by mid-December

In a November conversation caught on an FBI wiretap, Roland Burris promised Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s brother that he’d write the governor a campaign check by mid-December, Burris’ lawyer said today.

That was about a month before Rod Blagojevich appointed Burris to the U.S. Senate.

But lawyer Timothy Wright told the Chicago Sun-Times today that his client never sent the check because he believed it wasn’t a good idea given Burris’ interest in the U.S. Senate seat appointment. Wright said Burris’ decision not to send the check had nothing to do with Blagojevich’s Dec. 9 arrest.

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It’s been a while since we visited the Matter of Blagojevich, but one thing that you can always count on: there’s always going to be something new coming out from that glorious trainwreck.

Judge OKs release of wiretap of Burris

CHICAGO (AP) — A federal judge said Tuesday he would allow the U.S. Senate Ethics Committee to have a federal wiretap of former Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s brother having a phone conversation with U.S. Sen. Roland Burris.

To summarize why the Senate might want to listen to this recording: Burris, in the course of getting the US Senate to seat him…

• Signed an affidavit indicating that he never talked to Blagojevich’s aides.
• Admitted in his testimony that he actually talked to one of the Governor’s unofficial aides.
• Said in the same testimony that he didn’t remember talking to anybody else.
• Signed another affidavit later on - after he officially became Senator - that he actually had talked to some of Blagojevich’s aides.
• Admitted to reporters that he tried to do some fundraising for Blagojevich.

At this point, as the AP remarked:

Then he stopped answering questions, letting others speak on his behalf.

I’ll let Vice President Joe Biden, who is himself no amateur at this sort of spin control, provide the Democratic response:

Succinct, that.

Moe Lane

Crossposted to Moe Lane.

Roll Call reports that Senate Democrat leaders have basically decided that they won’t succeed in getting Roland Burris to resign anytime soon:

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Roland Burris’s reelection website is live, and the first thing that jumps out at the viewer is his lengthy list of accomplishments (see right; click here for full screencap).

In all fairness, I’ve got to give Senator Burris full credit for having the most honest accomplishments section of a campaign website that I’ve ever seen. Pity it (likely) won’t last.

Whatever changes on the page, though, we’ve now got a baseline from which to measure the changing story that seems to be a hallmark of Mr. Burris’s senate career thus far.

Open thread.

I have been saying for some time that we will have our recalcitrant Illinois Senator Roland Burris representing himself… er, I mean us… at least until 2010 and quite probably during the upcoming primaries for those seeking a full term afterward, as well. This weekend more proof to that eventual end was arranged by a room full of black ministers from Chicago.

ABC channel 7 news televised a report of Senator Burris’ appearance in a church on the south side of Chicago for a laying on of ministerly hands and a defiant claim that he isn’t going anywhere but right back to Washington D.C.

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Roland Burris may not have many friends, but he doesn’t have much to lose. He’s 71, so doesn’t have to consider how the fight over his place in the Senate might affect his electability down the road. His Senate appointment revived a moribund political career, so it’s not as if he’d be favored for some other office if he gave up the seat. He’s the only African-American in the Senate, and in Harry Reid he faces a leader who’s already backed down against him once, rather than alienating the African-American community. So according to a source close to Burris, he’s not going anywhere:

Embattled Sen. Roland Burris (D-Ill.) has not considered resigning — at least not yet — a source familiar with his situation said late Friday, as calls for Burris to consider such a move were being issued by high-ranking Democrats, including the administration of President Barack Obama.

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The faulty-memoried Blagojevich appointee is rapidly losing support from all quarters, and the rumor mill Democratic PR machine news media is starting to get cranking with reports of Sen. Roland Burris’s (D) imminent resignation.

Personally, my fake money’s on this afternoon. As living proof that there really is no such thing as a clean Chicago Democrat, Burris has become a liability to President Obama (D) — and, as he already cast one of sixty deciding votes for the unread $787,000,000,000.00 “stimulus” bill, he has already served his purpose to Obama’s (and Harry Reid’s) cause, and can now be jettisoned from the bus to his appropriate place beneath its tires.

Updates to come as the story develops.

Abandons him quite comprehensively, in fact:

WASHINGTON–Embattled Sen. Roland Burris (D-Ill.) is cancelling his Thursday schedule, where he was to have met with Rockford area civic, elected and religious leaders as Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) sent out a very frosty statement, saying Burris failed to disclose under oath the nature of his relationship with former Gov. Blagojevich.

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Pithily put:

Mr. Burris’s story has more twists than the Chicago El, and none of them good. Caught in a swirl of accusations of perjury and calls for his resignation from state Democrats and Republicans alike, Mr. Burris said yesterday, “I welcome the opportunity to go before any and all investigative bodies, including those referred by Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan and the Senate ethics committee to answer any questions they have.” When that opportunity arises, why should anyone believe him?

Link.

We’re really not going to entertain serious arguments that Burris was being honest in answering the questions asked of him concerning his dealings with Rod Blagojevich, right? I mean, everyone has the right to a defense but that doesn’t mean that all defenses are equally credible, does it?

Despite my disgust with the shenanigans of the erstwhile governor of my state, and despite a similar disgust with the unwillingness of my state’s legislature to authorize a special election for the Senate seat vacated by Barack Obama–can’t run the risk that the seat go to a Republican after all; democratic republicanism only works for some people if they win elections–I was always in favor of the Senate seating Roland Burris, our new Senator, when he was appointed to the position by former Governor Rod Blagojevich. I had assumed–and was given no reason to believe anything to the contrary–that the appointment was free of the taint that surrounded so many of Blagojevich’s actions while Governor and while I wanted the law to be changed so that a special election would occur, the law is nevertheless the law.

Of course, these were my beliefs before I had the chance to read this:

Former Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s brother solicited U.S. Sen. Roland Burris for up to $10,000 in campaign cash before Blagojevich named Burris to the coveted post — something Burris initially failed to disclose under oath before an Illinois House impeachment panel, records and interviews show.

Burris acknowledges being hit up for the money in a new affidavit he has sent to the head of the House committee that recommended Blagojevich be removed from office.

The affidavit is dated Feb. 5 — three weeks after Burris was sworn in to replace President Obama in the Senate.

[. . .]

Burris’ statement offers the third version of events he has given about his discussions concerning the Senate seat, to which Blagojevich appointed him in late December, after Blagojevich was hit with federal corruption charges that included an allegation he tried to sell the Senate appointment.

More here.

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