Illinois Governor Impeached

[Kim Taehyung]

Governor Rod Blagojevich of the US State of Illinios has been removed from office after the state Senate unanimously convicted him on impeachment charges.
The charges include trying to sell the US Senate seat once held by President Barack Obama.
The Illinois Senate, acting as a jury, voted 59-0 to oust the second-term Democrat immediately.
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The lawmakers also voted by the same margin to bar him from ever holding public office again in the fifth most populous US state.
Mr Blagojevich had pleaded with the body hours earlier, asking: 'How can you throw a governor out of office who is clamouring and begging and pleading with you to give him a chance to bring witnesses in to prove his innocence? ... A crime has not been proven here.'
He later told reporters outside his Chicago home he was 'saddened and disappointed but not at all surprised' by what happened.
'It was a fixed deal from the beginning,' he sad.
Mr Blagojevich skipped the chance to make a formal defence during the proceedings because, he said, the rules restricted him from calling the witnesses he needed or playing in full the federal government wiretapped conversations that led to charges involving Mr Obama's Senate seat.
Democratic Lieutenant Governor Patrick Quinn was sworn in as governor almost immediately, saying 'The ordeal is over' and urging people 'to make the sacrifices necessary to address the serious challenges we have before us: the integrity challenge, the challenge of our economy, the challenge of making sure that we pay our bills.'
President Obama pledged full cooperation with the new governor. From RTE News.

Well, this is the first time in Illinois history that the governor has been impeached. And he wasn't just impeached over trying to sell President and former Illinois Senator Barack Obama's senate seat; according to Newsmax.com, he and his Chief of Staff, John Harris, were arrested also on charges of the following:
- federal corruption charges alleging that they and others are engaging in ongoing criminal activity
- threatening to withhold substantial state assistance to the Tribune Company in connection with the sale of Wrigley Field to induce the firing of Chicago Tribune editorial board members sharply critical of Blagojevich
- and to obtain campaign contributions in exchange for official actions – both historically and now in a push before a new state ethics law takes effect January 1, 2009.

My opinion of all this is that I am truly not suprised about it one bit. I'm sure there is corruption in Politics; I think the two go hand-in-hand. *cough*Watergate*Cough* This has been a crazy case that makes the people really start to think, "I trusted the governor to do what's best for the state, and he goes and does this?". At least, that's what I thought.

Discuss Blagojevich's impeachment, or Corruption in Politics in general.

 

[Shu]

If you want my honest opinion I think the dude is a freaking idiot. This is something I thought would only happen in another country (no offense) but seriously not something that would happen in the states.

I thought people were smarter than this. I mean this seems so unreal. I did not think it could happen to be honest. (selling a seat)

 

[strifehart]

i live in Illinois, so this hits close to home lol. the guy's a moron. but then again, so is everyone in politics. but you can't blame em too much. i mean, if you were charged with appointing somebody, and some random guy says, "hey i'll give you $1,000,000 if you give the senate seat to this guy who's not the best guy for the job, but is still pretty qualified and would be a reasonable pick anyways." what would you do? power corrupts.

 

[GameGeeks]

Correction absolute power corrupts. This guy was just stupid. If you're going to do something like this the least you'd want to do is not use a phone and do it at your house to keep the risk to a minimum.