Two stories within days of each other, involving corrupt politicians in Illinois. One is found guilty on ten counts of corruption, and is now awaiting sentencing. It remains to be seen whether his influence will affect how much jail time he gets, or how his sentence is handled. The other, already convicted and serving time in prison, has been pardoned by Trump.
Here's the message, if it's not abundantly clear up front. We have a President who repeatedly finds ways to deliberately thwart the rule of law.
That's not news, though.
Turning the Law Upside Down
For all of the criticism heaped by conservatives on Illinois politicians, Chicago politicians, and the reputation both have for political corruption, the conservatives are losing credibility in a huge way on this one. And the timing couldn't be better for Democrats.
Former Illinois Speaker of the House, Mike Madigan, a Chicago politician who was a huge figure in Illinois Democratic party politics for decades, was just convicted on 10 different counts of various kinds of political corruption. It was a long, and very public trial in which Illinois Democrats have made clear they will not tolerate this kind of political corruption. They had already started down that road with Blagojevich's conviction, until Trump made friends with the former governor, and decided to commute his sentence during his first term. Ultimately, that turned into a full pardon.
Well, what do we expect from a President who is, himself a convicted felon, 34 counts up to this point to be exact, and guilty of multiple more. It's really difficult to figure exactly what it is that has pushed Trump to pardon Blagojevich, a Democrat, or should we say a former Democrat, though he must think he is going to get something out of it. He got Blagojevich's loyalty, and devotion, and public thanks, and support, for whatever that might be worth at some point down the road.
This should earn him the disgust, and criticism of Illinois Democrats, and it sure has done that. Whether the full force of that narrative ever gets out there remains to be seen, but it would be to the benefit of the Illinois Democratic party to disavow this pardon, point it out as part of the full picture of the total corruption of the Republican party, and make a lot of points with voters as a result.
Blagojevich, among other things, tried to use his ability to appoint then Senator Barack Obama's successor as a means of gaining personal profit and political standing, and he said so in a conversation caught by the FBI. Trump's full pardon of the guy tells us all we need to know about the depth of his own corruption and what he is willing to do to defy the constitution and push his own agenda.
Trump's Pardon of Blagojevich Nullifies Critics of Democrats and Madigan
"To me, this is the most significant political corruption and conviction in at least my lifetime because it truly reflected that, for 40 years, Mike Madigan corruptly ran his operation in Springfield, never for the benefit of the citizens of the state, all transactional," said political consultant Pat Brady.
"Here you have another example of another extremely powerful Democratic politician who is going down because of the pay to play system that he dominated at," said political analyst Laura Washington.
And then along comes convicted felon Trump, with the power of the Presidency, and gives a full pardon to another former Democratic Illinois politician for corruption charges arguably as bad as those against Madigan, and since they involved bribery in choosing the replacement for a United States Senator, I'd say they were worse. But a conservative, Republican President doesn't seem to think so. And the timing of this couldn't be better. It's possible, people, to put two and two together here and come up with the conclusion that Trump is more corrupt than Mike Madigan. And he's proved it.
So come on, Republicans! Fire up that "own the libs" rhetoric!
It seems like Madigan does have a way out of this. He can open his mouth, pay allegience to Trump and make friends with a fellow felon.
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