Sunday Snippets

From the patio table in the sunshine, with Socks Monster the Feline Action Hero relaxing on the bricks nearby (yep, he's got the aluminum reflector set up along with his iced tea and current novel)...


Chelsea Clinton has her wedding dress. It was on Yahoo just now. How lovely she looks. How little I care. I hope she has a terrific wedding and a long and happy life with her beau.
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Chicago's CBS-2 is bringing back two stalwarts who drove the ratings for the station back in the 70's and early 80's. Bill Kurtis, most recently seen "discovering the Internet" for AT&T and seeking justice on Justice Files on cable, and Walter Jacobsen, will be anchoring Channel 2's 6pm newscasts. It's a shame they agreed to the re-pairing for a number of reasons, primarily because it smacks of a last stand by CBS to stay in the news game at 6. Family Feud would have been better.
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The Blago trial jury is deliberating our former governor's future. My best guess is he may do a year or two but will walk on the primary count of trying to sell Barack Obama's U.S. Senate seat. Why? The Government stopped short of presenting its entire case. Interestingly enough, the Defense, after promising Blago would testify, backed down entirely and presented no case whatsoever. I find that . . . odd. It suggests to me a scenario where the Defense predicted Blago would testify in such a way that information derogatory to certain political, or perhaps business, interests would come out in open court. The Government decided that should not happen and agreed to ratchet back if the Defense agreed to keep Blago's mouth shut. I'd hate to think that U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, a guy regarded even among his peers as incorruptible, would allow such a thing to happen on his watch.

Then again, maybe that's not what happened at all.

Do we think we will ever get the real story? Nah.

Have a great Sunday everyone.

All Bluster, No Muster

Not really surprised to learn that Blago's been fired from The Celebrity Apprentice.

The Sun-Times story this morning says our former governor couldn't work a computer at "even the most basic level" and had trouble using a smartphone. It also comes as no shock at all that he tried to run his team from Orlando while they were working in New York. Shades of a governor who was terrified to leave Chicago and assume the appropriate seat of power in Springfield.

It's pretty sad, actually. A man so desperate for attention that he's willing to become a bumbling idiot on national television. And to repeat the performance in one way or another for months and months, every time he's given the opportunity.

He's mentally ill, of course. The question is: is he exposing himself this way to set up a fallback insanity defense when his corruption case goes to trial? Or is this the way a sociopath melts down when he's not smart enough to stay in control? Or, another possibility, is this just a guy having all the fun he can, knowing the end is approaching?

But who is ultimately at fault? We elected him, didn't we? We pulled the levers that put him in office without doing a whit of due diligence to determine whether his qualifications were real or a political sham.

We're poised to do it again. Two mopes running for governor. Two mopes running for the U.S. Senate. To apply the word "statesman" to any of them is a joke of diabolical proportions.

Whether "crook" is also an accurate description remains to be seen but, after all they are Illinois politicians.

And we are the Illinois electorate that has not learned from its mistakes.