Burris whines that 'Media and Republicans are almost destroying my character'

“We all have a lot of questions,” State Representative Jack D. Franks said. “He wasn’t forthcoming, and that’s the bottom line. I feel betrayed. The real problem here is the question of trust for the citizens of Illinois. We were supposed to rise to the occasion and, again, Illinois becomes the laughingstock for the nation.”

Mr. Franks was a member of a panel assigned this winter to consider impeaching Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich after federal prosecutors accused him of trying to sell the Senate seat left empty when Barack Obama won the presidency.

In January, the panel heard testimony from Mr. Burris, who had been appointed by Mr. Blagojevich but not yet seated in Washington, about his ties to the governor.

At the time, Mr. Burris described to the lawmakers under oath an occasion on which he had spoken about his desire to become the next senator with one of Mr. Blagojevich’s former chiefs of staff.

But Mr. Burris now acknowledges he also spoke with others, including Mr. Blagojevich’s brother, Mr. Blagojevich’s chief of staff at the time and two close advisers to Mr. Blagojevich.

The senate should kick this lying rascal out and insist that Illinois hold a special election to fill Obama's unexpired term. That is the only fair way to insure that the citizens of Illinois get a reasonably honest person to represent them.

But it won't happen. Democrats, both national and state level pols, are fearful that all the slime created by Ali Blago and his 40 Thieves would rub off on the party and make the election of a Republican a real possibility. So they will play along with Mr. Burris and pretend he simply forgot to mention the attempted bribe (as well as his other "forgotten" contacts with Blagojevich's staff) while counting on Burris's African American base to run interference for him.

Meanwhile, Illinois Republicans, who are out of power and can do little except complain, are calling for a prosecutor to investigate Burris for perjury charges. Fat lot of good that will do. Here are the "wait and see" Democrats:

“This is troubling,” said State Representative Lou Lang, a Democrat, adding that he intended to study all of Mr. Burris’s previous comments, and hoped that his colleagues would do the same. “My take is that this could still go either way. We could determine that Mr. Burris was simply negligent and had a failing memory in a very honest way. On the other hand, we may find out that he knew more than he was willing to explain.”

"Negligent" in "an honest way?" 

Ain't Illinois politics grand?