CE Week #18: “For Obama, two early lapses”
David S. Broder
It was not lost on anyone that the president-elect of the United States, riding the crest of his popularity, and the Democratic leadership of the U.S. Senate were outsmarted last week by a state politician who won his last election almost 20 years ago.
When and if Roland Burris claims the Senate seat from Illinois formerly occupied by Barack Obama, it will represent the greatest climb-down by an incoming president since Sam Nunn turned Bill Clinton around on the issue of gays in the military at the start of Clinton’s first term.
Fortunately for Obama, the voters are much more concerned with the economy and Obama’s effort to fix it than they are with the infighting over the Illinois Senate seat.
But politicians keep score on each other all the time. And, after a near-perfect month of transition operations, Obama has stumbled twice in two weeks, first being caught unaware by the investigation of Bill Richardson, his choice for commerce secretary, and then being outmaneuvered by Burris and his tawdry sponsor, Gov. Rod Blagojevich.
There are lessons for Obama in both incidents, starting with the importance of really knowing the other players in the game. Obama has had such a rapid rise in national politics that there are many key figures in both parties he barely has had time to size up.
But Richardson was a familiar fellow traveler on the 2007-08 presidential campaign trail, and Obama should have known that there were reports of a grand jury investigation of pay-for-play in New Mexico.
As for Blagojevich, Obama had to know, from his years in Springfield and Chicago, about the governor’s tawdry and ruthless reputation. But Obama seriously underestimated him.
Harry Reid, the Senate majority leader, got all 50 members of his caucus to sign a statement vowing they would never accept a Senate appointee from Blagojevich’s tainted hands, after prosecutors had published excerpts of wiretaps in which the governor had salivated obscenely over the way he could cash in on Obama’s Senate vacancy.
Obama personally endorsed that hard-line stand against seating anyone “tainted” by Blagojevich, issuing a statement that backed Reid and the others. But Burris was no more impressed than Blagojevich had been.
When the governor called the senators’ bluff, Burris launched a public relations blitz on television, insisting that it would be unfair to punish him for the governor’s alleged sins. Ignored for the moment was the fact that Burris had been rejected by the voters in three straight Illinois Democratic gubernatorial races and in one primary for mayor of Chicago. Had the Democrat-controlled Legislature ordered a special election, the odds against Burris would have been enormous.
But Burris’ ego is limitless. And it turned out that Reid had, once again, failed to do his homework or line up his votes. When Chicago black congressman Bobby Rush played the race card, questioning why anyone would stand in the way of Burris succeeding Obama as the lone African-American senator, you could feel a wave of anxiety go through Democratic ranks.
Soon, Sen. Dianne Feinstein, the outgoing chairman of the Rules Committee and a potential candidate for California governor next year, publicly called on Reid to relent. The Congressional Black Caucus weighed in on Burris’ behalf. By the time Burris sat down with Reid and Majority Whip Dick Durbin of Illinois, the fight was effectively over and Burris was gracious about accepting their surrender. Obama conceded as well, saying that if the Senate seated Burris, “then I’m going to work with Roland Burris just like I work with all the other senators.”
Obama justifiably figured that Burris was not worth a knockdown fight when he has so many bigger battles ahead of him. But the lesson that other politicians have drawn is that Obama may not always be able to count on his congressional allies and they may not be able to count on him. That is not the way he wanted to begin.
David S. Broder is a columnist for the Washington Post. His e-mail address is davidbroder@washpost.com.
It’s not like Obama can know everything about everyone… With so many people to choose from for so many offices, it’s not really a big deal that he didn’t know a trial was going on… And he never had control over the incident with Blagojevich either. The selling of the Senate seat is something that probably happens with frequency, it’s just that Blagojevich was dumb enough to get caught. Corruption is something that is very difficult to see, but is even more difficult to stop. I don’t think that Obama should be blamed for any of this – he isn’t directly involved with it at all. He didn’t commit any crimes. And as for Burris, well, he’s pretty much a failure. I don’t mean it to be so harsh; but really, he is probably like the worst candidate the democrats could have picked. So they will probably just make him sign a paper that says that he cannot run for reelection in 6 years.
Connection – Patronage. People paid money to try to get this Senate seat. It was similar back in the day when the Chicago machines ran rampant. People were getting jobs just because they knew people, or because they paid them extreme amounts of money. Well, patronage still goes on, but just usually on a smaller level.
Obama’s two “slips” should have been avoided since both of these events were the entirety of the national media spotlight. But as a human, humans make mistakes. I guarantee that these two things that took place were not really tied to Obama in the public eye. These events were probably only brought out by Republicans because as the article said “the president-elect of the United States, riding the crest of his popularity” and the public is the crest upon which the President-elect Obama is riding. So these two mishaps went right under the radar for most. For me personally I was aware of the whole Blagojevich scandal in which I also knew that the President-elect had condemned the whole thing so any ties to that went away. But as for Bill Richardson being under investigation for the “pay to play” thing, I was not aware of this until I read this article. Which proves that it could not have been that big of a problem because it is no longer being talked about over any media medium (that I have see at least) so either that is one big wave of public support or it is not as big as it seems.
Connection: Honeymoon period: this article proves that even before inauguration most things in the eye of the public just slips under the radar going completely or almost completely unnoticed by anyone except the staunch Republicans who are trying to call foul on anything.
I think that it is rather funny that the senate successor of one of the newest faces to politics and most liked politician (not to mention our president elect) will go down in history as “the greatest climb-down by an incoming president since Sam Nunn and Bill Clinton.” Although I guess Burris should be happy that he FINALLY got his dream of sitting on the senate, even if it came to him by such convoluted ways. And thankfully people aren’t too worried about it because of their concern for the economy. However, I definitely think that Obama needs to come down off of cloud nine and start paying better attention to his surrounding “players.” He definitely should have known about the scandal with Bill Richardson. I completely agree with the statement that “Obama has had such a rapid rise in national politics that there are many key figures he barely has had time to size up.” I think the was too focused on other things to have time to fully check out potential players on his team. And honestly how could Obama not have known about Blagojevich? I mean he was governor of the state that Obama was senator! I just don’t understand how he could not have been at all suspicious.
Connection:
This connects to all the discussions we have had about Blagojevich and Burris in class. How, Blagojevich came up with the great idea to try and sell the senate seat and hope that he didn’t get caught. And how Burris, after numerous times of failed elections, has now received the senate seat.
I fail to see how Obama made such serious missteps during the transition so far. So Bill Richardson was a poor choice, what with his criminal activity. I am under the impression that cabinet positions are held by people who have worked in politics. Therefore, President-Elect Obama would be hard-pressed to find someone who is not corrupt. At last count, there were 387 criminals in Congress. Not all of them were felons, but some of them were. The moral of the story is that power attracts ugly people. Even Obama isn’t the golden boy the media has portrayed him as. FDR said that Japanese internment camps were okay in WWII. Lincoln suspended habeas corpus. JFK has all kinds of moral smirches on his record. The point is that people should just relax about Bill Richardson. Is anyone really surprised? As for Roland Burris, Blagojevich was within his rights when he appointed his little marionette to the Senate. The Senate really didn’t have it within their rights to turn him away. However, they stole a little more power from the state governments and slipped it into their own pockets. Again, not surprised. It will probably be a precedent, and anyone Congress decides isn’t good enough for them will be shot in the cloakroom. These people are so predictable. And last but not least, what does Blago or Burris have to do with Obama? He said that Burris shouldn’t be allowed in the Senate, and that is it. I don’t know why Mr. Broder thinks Obama underestimated Blago. Blagojevich is not Obama’s problem. He has bigger fish to fry. Now I can say that I confirmed two things: politicians are basically evil, and there’s no news like no news!
Connection: Amendment Numero Ten. It says that the states get rights not delegated to the federal government, at least rights that they haven’t claimed with their stupid elastic clause. So where does Congress get the right to say no to Burris? I say no to Congress! Sit down in your little Article 1 and stay put. You have no right to leave. Pretty soon there will be no state government powers left. And then it will be time to pull the militias out of Amendment II.
In response to Dave:
I agree with you. It’s ridiculous that people all of a sudden expect that, with the presidential confirmation looming in the future, that Obama has been endowed with God-like knowledge of all that is happening and will happen. No matter how hard he tries, he can’t know what’s going on everywhere(if he did, then people would be angry at him still for violating their rights. He can’t win).
He was at least bright enough to know the oh so shady history of his beloved state of Illinois. In that regard, at least he knew that the Governor wasn’t so straight. Obama just didn’t know that Blagojevich was going to do something so drastic. Actually, maybe he did. He just didn’t know he was going to be caught. But the people can’t know of any sort of connection between them regarding the Senate seat or Obama’s going to be in trouble.
Anyway, I’m glad and disappointed in a way that Burris is the new Senator. Harry Reid must be too nice for his own good, but then again he didn’t really have much of a choice. Either way, he’d have to deal with Burris either positively or negatively. I’m glad he sucked up his pride and apologized and surrendered the chair. But at the same time, Blago may have been proving something by doing this. Perhaps he realized the hurt the Democrats of Illinois would be in if Burris decided to run again, even though he promised not to. I guess Blago isn’t going down without a fight or something.
In response to Clarin McDonald:
How could Obama not know about Blagojevich? Quite easily. Blagojevich is the governor, and Obama was a state Senator and U.S. Senator. Neither office really interacts with the governor enough for Obama to get to know Blagojevich well enough to know whether he was corrupt or not. I don’t think anyone in Illinois knew that Blagojevich was corrupt until this scandal broke (excluding, or course, the people involved with Blagojevich in these affairs). The governor and the legislative branch only get involved with each other when they are at work. Obama had no way of knowing about Blagojevich’s corruption, just like the state legislation didn’t know about it, until the scandal broke open. I will admit that given Illinois’s track record with governors and corruption, there should have been so inherent suspicion, but I don’t think that the masses of Illinois would have thought Blagojevich would have done that, since he ran on a platform of cleaning up the last governor’s, also corrupt, mess and to end corruption. I think it is perfectly understandable for someone to not have known about this story until the whole world knew, despite that fact that the idiot governor was using a wiretapped phone to make his phone calls about the senate seat.
Well, seriously I thought this was kind of a lame article. All it was was a lot of blovitating and pointing fingers at Obama for stuff that he really shouldn’t be blamed for. Give him a break. We have all learned how long and tedious the job of a president can be, with a lot of extraneous information to process and keep tabs on. That’s what his personal staff and assistants are for. So to blame Obama for not knowing everything about everyone is just unfair. However, I think Obama lacked insight when he chose Bill Richardson as commerce secretary. If he’s going to choose a team who will work closely with him for four maybe plus years, then he had better keep close tabs on them, knowing their lives inside and out at least politically. That’s where Obama’s inexperience might be a factor. He’s going to have to learn a lot of things the hard way because he’s playing with the big boys now. However, at least he knows when to concede a point when he stated, “then I’m going to work with Roland Burris just like I work with all the other senators.” For Obama to pick petty squabbles with Burris would be completely senseless. Again he’s having to learn that not everyone you work with will be your best friend so deal with it. You are going to have to work things out whether you like it or not.
Connection: In Hardball, we learned that it’s good to keep your friends close but your enemies closer. I believe that Obama will have to learn this lesson, maybe with a few bumps along the way.
In response to Alena:
I agree with you, I fail to how these are such serious missteps. They definitely could have had much more of an issue. An investigation over his former senate seat does not compare to an issue where he was caught talking to terrorists or he secretly had some harem of women that he’d been having affairs with. As far as issues go, I think Obama’s still in the clear. On top of that, Alena also mentioned former great presidents made their own wrong doings. I do not think that we can compare suspending habeas corpus to Burris outmaneuvering Obama. Especially when Obama has much larger fish to fry. Voters are more concerned with what his plans are on fixing the economic recession, and issues abroad than what some guy did to obtain a senate seat and who did what in his cabinet. The whole issue with Burris has been blown out of proportion in some ways. His appointment was legal after all. Blago was still acting within his power. Obama also can’t be associated with Burris really anyways, considering, “Obama personally endorsed that hard-line stand against seating anyone “tainted” by Blagojevich, issuing a statement that backed Reid and the others.”
In response to Dave Marshall,
I agree with you on the idea that Obama “never had control over the incident with Blagojevich either” (Dave Marshall). If Obama did indeed condemn Blago’s actions, then I guess there really isn’t a tie between these two. Or maybe I’m stuck in the honeymoon mindset like so many other Americans, thinking that the first year of this promising presidency should be uninterrupted by terrible crimes such as Blago’s. However, I can imagine the stress that Obama has felt already as the president-elect, not even having become president just yet. With so many appointments and events occurring at the same time, it is indeed hard to keep track of them all.
In response to Jordan Yaeger:
I agree with you on some aspects. But I believe that it doesn’t really matter that these “slips” happened – they aren’t a big deal at all. Like you said, “everyone makes mistakes,” and I totally agree with that. And that is why these “mistakes” shouldn’t be covered by the media. The media, after the Watergate Scandal and after the Vietnam War, now appears to try to cut down the President. It disgusts me. We should be almost worshipping our President as a great leader of our country. Look at Roosevelt, he was paralyzed. The media did the best they could do to make this man look normal and an exceptional leader to our great America. Today, the media wants the President to make as many mistakes as possible, even if it is bad for our country. And they just think “Hey, whatever makes us more money!” That is also why these mishaps should have gone entirely under the radar. If the media wasn’t so greedy and wanting to tear down our President’s reputation, then we wouldn’t have had to hear about these things. But it is good that he is making these mistakes, well, even before he is President, because people don’t really care, once he’s in the honeymoon period.
In response to Clarin McDonald:
I think you are being a little to harsh on Obama in the aspect that he should know about all the scandals going on in the Senate and his own state. Its called a scandal for a reason, it’s suppose to not be out in the open. Obama is just about to be inagurated, take over to job to lead this country, fix our economy, deal with the war in Iraq, and so many other pressing issues in America. I think we should give him a little slack. Obama showed that he disagreed with the matter of Blagojevich in the quote; “Obama personally endorsed that hard-line stand against seating anyone “tainted” by Blagojevich, issuing a statement that backed Reid and the others”. He also nobly states that if Senate choses him, “then I’m going to work with Roland Burris just like I work with all the other senators.” What else can he do, once the guy is seated, Obama has the job of working with him no matter what. Through all this I believe Obama has chosen the right words, the best choices of action, and at the same time dealing with everything else going on in America right now.
In Response to Alena
I have to completely agree with you. I don’t see how Obama is connected to Burris and Blagojevich in any way. Republicans seem to be trying to put this scandal on Obama, which is utterly ridiculous. Obama no longer has anything to do with his old Senate seat in Illinois. It’s not like Obama has been sitting around thinking about his old Senate seat. He has been thinking about who to appoint for his Cabinet. In my opinion, Obama hasn’t made any mistakes really. Is it really that shocking that a politician did something wrong, and then everyone found out? No. I’m pretty sure that we haven’t had a single president that never did anything wrong, or was ever involved in some sort of scandal. Power corrupts, and the main reason that people go into politics is for power. I also have to agree with Alena that the Senate didn’t really have a right to turn Burris away from his Senate seat. Blagojevich was within in his right to appoint him, and there is no evidence that Burris was involved with the selling of the Senate seat. Burris should be allowed to take his seat, and that is that.
In Response to Dave:
I agree with you on so many levels. Obviously Obama had no control over all the corruption and such. That whole Burris thing just got out of hand. John Stuart had a great segment on it. Burris supporters claimed him being denied was just like Birmingham Alabama in the 60’s. It showed a picture of Blacks being sprayed with fire hoses in Birmingham, and then it showed Burris under an umbrella, that he wasn’t even holding. This is going to sound so incredibly insensitive but I am tired of blacks playing the race card. Burris lost the Senate bid 6 times, the fact that he is black had nothing to do with the hesitation that the Senate leadership showed. I think that the race issue has been blown out of proportion lately. It is still around to an extent, but nothing compared to the 60s. Are whites not victims of racism as well? In some places whites have just as much racism against them than in others. I think its time to call it quits. Well it looks like the dems are stuck with Burris, I am sure that he respectfully step down after 6 years however, meaning the dems will have to fight to keep their precious seat.