'What's wrong with Illinois politics?' Obama's Reply
A BUZZFLASH NEWS ALERT
by Christine Bowman
Following a press conference today announcing Tom Daschle's nomination as Secretary of Health and Human Services, President-elect Barack Obama faced reporters' questions regarding corruption charges against Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich. Obama reiterated that he was "appalled and disappointed" by what he had heard in the FBI transcripts and said, "I did not speak to the Governor."
Source: Nicholas Kamm/Getty Images
The President-elect said that in the next few days his transition team will finish their internal review of any possible contacts that may have occurred with the Illinois governor or his agents in recent weeks and promised to share that information. He said flatly, there had been "no deal making."
"I won't quote back any of the things said about me," Obama said drawing laughs, a reference to obscene insults hurled by the Governor and recorded by the FBI.
Mike Flannery, political editor of CBS 2 Chicago, asked Obama, "What's wrong with Illinois politics?"
The President-elect gave a lengthy reply, framing his answer in terms of what's wrong with politics in general nationwide. Obama contrasted the tradition and spirit of politics as service to the cynical view of politics as a business propelled by the question, "What's in it for me?"
"Our whole campaign was about changing that view of politics," he asserted, adding that his presidential race sought to model a more idealistic, service-driven version of politics. His campaign hoped to demonstrate, "You can get elected by doing the right thing."
Obama cited the honorable tradition of Illinois lawmakers Abraham Lincoln, Paul Simon, Paul Douglas, and Dick Durbin as a contrast to the disturbing alternative of using politics as a "means of self-aggrandizing."
A BUZZFLASH NEWS ALERT
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Politics just keeps getting
What is wrong is a state with more than 100 years
Of criminal pols.
Indict, try, convict, appeal, habeas and then send them up for Life without parole, forfeiture of all assets, isolation in prison (no calls, mail, visitors) and plant the withered corpse in an unmarked grave on prison grounds - and in another 100 years the crooks won't have such a prominent presence in IL politics.
"In the part of this universe that we know there is great injustice, and often the good suffer, and often the wicked prosper, and one hardly knows which of those is the more annoying."
- Bertrand Russell -