Day: February 20, 2009

Illinois Senator Roland Burris, chosen to fill Barack Obama’s Senate seat by disgraced Governor Rod Blagoyevich, has become the center of controversy due to the new revelations that he apparently was involved in trying to raise campaign funds for the now former Governor.  It seems that he did not tell the whole truth about his association with the governor in his testimony before the Illinois General Assembly after being picked by Blagoyevich late last year. 

The whole matter has become a circus and an embarrassment and adds to the bad image that Illinois has developed in the past few months.  It is clear that, with a cloud of scandal and suspicion hanging heavily, Senator Burris needs to restore the dignity of his home state and the Senate and resign immediately.

We do not need any more bad images about appointed senators, and again, as stated in an earlier entry, Senator Russ Feingold’s proposal to have an amendment providing for special elections for vacant Senate seats should be pursued seriously.  Even  the new Illinois Governor, Pat Quinn, has proposed a special law to provide now for an election to fill the Senate seat.  It is time to resolve this issue in a expeditious way!

Rush Limbaugh is on  a real binge of name calling on his radio show.  Now he calls President Obama a Fascist.  This comes after his expressed desire that President Obama fail in promoting economic recovery.  He has become the de facto leader of the Republican party which has decided that opposition and obstructionism is the way to go.  The GOP has no new ideas and has nothing, therefore, to offer the American people.

Meanwhile, other critics of Obama have called him a Socialist, a Marxist, a Hitler, a dictator, etc.  How preposterous this whole name calling is!  It reminds one of the constant attacks against Franklin D. Roosevelt during the Great Depression.  The whackos and nuts came out of the woodwork and accused him of every crime imaginable.  Meanwhile, FDR kept his sense of self and his humor and went about the business of making life better for the American people at a low moment in their history.

Barack Obama is following the same path, with a calm, cool, collected, relaxed attitude, not wasting his time on these silly accusations and insults.  He will not be diverted by name calling from the mission he has, which is the most profound since FDR–the restoration of the American economy.  So let the insults and name calling continue, whether from Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Glen Beck, Bill O’ Reilly, Ann Coulter, Michelle Malkin etc.  These attacks will not hit the mark, and will only delegitimize these talk show hosts and authors who think being nasty and negative is the way to go.  The American people have already made clear their confidence in Barack Obama