I believe it was Charles Barkley who said, “I’m no role model.”
It’s the same advice Richard M. Nixon should’ve given an impressionable Rod Blagojevich when the two met briefly outside Nixon’s New York home in 1980. Nixon, of course, had already been shamed and destroyed by the Watergate scandal, yet the young Blagojevich insisted he and his traveling buddy, who snapped the above photo (it briefly appeared in a WTTW profile about Blagojevich after he was elected), wait vigilantly for the former president.
In 1980, most twentysomething men probably pined to bump into one of the Beatles or maybe Bo Derek; Blago wanted the autograph of our nation’s most notorious politician. Knowing this is like being handed the lost first chapter of The Blagojevich Saga after reading three-quarters of the way through: You’re already up to your eyeballs in drama, but everything that transpired thus far now rings truer— The taped conversations! The threats during taped conversations! The swearing during taped conversations!
Blagojevich himself acknowledged the Nixonian quandary he’s in. “Those who feel like they want to sneakily and wear taping devices,” he said during a press conference the day before his arrest, “I would remind them that it kind of smells like Nixon and Watergate.”
You now have to wonder whether he said that with some amount of pride.
If Blagojevich did set about modeling himself after Nixon, he’s most of the way there. Like his jowly political hero, Blago’s not going down without a fight. Tricky Dick didn’t resign until after the House Judiciary Committee had approved the articles of impeachment and Nixon was certain he would lose the House vote and the subsequent Senate trial.
Earlier today, speaker of the Illinois House, Michael Madigan, took the first step in the impeachment process, appointing a special panel to review Blagojevich’s case.
Soon the only thing Blago will have left to do to complete his lifelong Nixonian metamorphosis will be throwing up his hands in a two-fingered “victory” salute and walking away from politics forever.
Rod roxxx Adidas?!? Um, hahahahahahahaha. Hahahaha. Honey, I can’t. I can’t. Honey, I can’t. It’s not fair. Honey, no. I can’t. Hahaha. [Snort] Take a shit. Hahahaha. OMG! That’s not funny. Honey. HAhaha, this isn’t funny. I gotta take a shit [fart]. Haha.
Blago: “Those who feel like they want to sneakily and wear taping devices… I would remind them that it kind of smells like Nixon and Watergate.”
Know what else wearing a wire “smells like” Blagojevich? Fighting morally hopeless, grotequely ambitious politicans who use their office illegally!
Before “walking away from politics forever,” Blagojevich will have to find someone to commute his sentence. Maybe he’d better arrange for that now, nudge-nudge, while he’s still “in office.”
Chicago Tonight had this last week.
Alright people. I think we need to get the “write the funniest caption” going for this photo. Lets hear ‘em.
“Roddy, I wont be able to pardon you. I’m not President anymore. Take this classy resignation speech instead”
“In this picture, Richard Nixon signs a check for the open presidential office. 1969.”