Karl Klockars

So since that Cheney guy  has just seated our esteemed Junior Senator Roland Burris this afternoon (read: we’re stuck with him for at least a couple years), I figured there’s no better time to discuss how all this is going to play out in the real world.  Also known as:  The world Roland Burris left behind a few weeks ago.

There are a couple things in all this that I haven’t seen anyone discuss yet, so I figure why not have me do it?  I’ve got nothing better to do this afternoon, anyways.  Come with me for a small trip down Politics Lane with a cross-street trip through Looking Forward To 2010 Avenue.

1)  I for one like the fact that Roland Burris is a perpetual loser.  Lost a ton of elections.  Hasn’t run for much lately, right?  Kinda took the hint?  Perhaps he thought, “A messed up state like this doesn’t deserve someone like me – someone who has no taint* whatsoever.”

Given the way we’ve actually seen the state run in the last month or so, would you want to find someone who was actually successful in this messed up dumbass filthy political process?  It’s the winners who have thus far ruined everything.  We want someone who could make the system work for himself?  No!

We really need a dipshit who’s failed consistently – that’s the only way we know he’s really fit for office.  The best way to get a solid candidate for Senate out of our idiot Governor is to find a constant, constant loser.  An epic political failure.  He might as well have put in Jim Oberweis, for the love of god.  In fact:  That would have been even more awesomely interesting.

2)  A solid political lesson to come out of this whole appointment debacle is the following:  You can be a dick, and have everybody hate you, and still get away with stuff if you follow the letter of the law. (And it helps if you call people racists, but everyone knew that already.)  It’s fine if everyone stonewalls Roland Burris when he finally starts doing some Senate work.  But they were stuck seating him because we have to follow the rules even if we don’t like them.

This is one of the main reasons why everyone loves this country.  Even if you are the biggest jerk on earth, if the law agrees with you, you win.  It’s not a popularity contest.  It has nothing to do with handshakes or money or big grins or anything like that.  (Whether or not the run-up to that remains to be seen, but I think Burris was too stupid to try any of that.  Stupid like a fox, as it turns out.)

3)  Barack Obama has one less vote that he needs to get.  If Roland Burris votes against a single thing that Obama doesn’t want him to, he knows he’s slitting his own political throat.  This is not a “you scratch my back I scratch yours” situation.  Obama is now actually a President AND still a Senator.  He’s still sitting right there in his own Senate seat.  He just looks different.

All Obama has to do is tell Illinois that in no way, shape or form will he continue to support Roland Burris as Senator from Illinois and he’s dead in the water.  Therefore, Burris’ main job for the next two years is to pucker up and kiss wherever he sees fit to put those appointed lips.

If you have any questions about whether or not Roland Burris is going to run in 2010, I only have to ask you this:  How many people went to Washington talking about things like “term limits” and “citizen statesmen” and then went on to spend the rest of their lives in office.

Being a Senator has got to be a lot like being 1/100th of 60s/70s era Hugh Hefner.  Everyone wants to be you, you have tremendous amounts of power, everyone wants to take your calls, everyone wants to hang out with you for their own personal reasons and use you for their own devices.  Oh, and the access to all that tremendous cocaine.**

So enjoy it, Mr. Burris.  It’s not everyone that wins this kind of lottery.  Just know that it’s going to end one way or the other.  Do us a favor and steal as much as you possibly can to justify everything we want to believe about you.  That’s pretty much all we expect from you anyways.  We don’t really think you’re going to get anything done.  Everyone just wanted this whole thing to go away before the Inauguration, which I imagine I’ll probably see you at.  No dancing with my wife – I don’t want you to get your taint all over her.

Just know that when next year rolls around and everyone starts running ads against you, you’re going to have to get used to seeing those handshakes and high-fives with your buddy Rod Blagojevich are going to get a whole lotta press.  And things are going to be even worse for him by then, so build that bunker now.

*  The consistent use of the word “taint” has been one of the greatest things to come out of this whole situation.  Anyone would support more prosecutions of dirty politicians, but I want it mostly for the continued use of “taint.”

**  There may or may not be access to tremendous cocaine in the Senate.  But a guy can dream.