Will Durst: Giving governors a bad name

Pub date December 17, 2008
SectionBruce Blog

By Will Durst

(Durst is a comedian who writes a little. He is the author of “The All-American Sport of Bipartisan Bashing, the Common Sense Rantings from a Raging Moderate.”)

Hats off to the Illinois Governor for shooting so high above and beyond the normal arc of political malfeasance that he’s probably annoyed NASA by interfering with satellite traffic. After years of highlighting nuances and scrutinizing minute distinctions, it’s downright thrilling to finally find someone acting crookeder than a dump truck full of dissembled wire hangers. Excuse me. I mean, finally finding someone GETTING CAUGHT acting crookeder than a dump truck full of dissembled wire hangers. Not everyday the FBI arrests a sitting Governor at his house at 6 in the morning: We’re talking movie of the week here. I see Casey Affleck in a bad wig. With Aaron Eckhart as Patrick Fitzgerald.

Rod Blagojevich has lined himself up to be the fourth Chief Executive of the Land of Lincoln since 1974 to be offered a long- term residency at the Gray Bar Hotel. That Springfield Capitol building must be quite a feat of social engineering. It seems to work like a halfway house in reverse. He has single handedly smashed all doubts that Chicago is to corruption what Santaland is to elves. What Los Angeles is to plastic surgery stitching. Upper Michigan and deer ticks. The list goes on. Seattle and mildew. See.