I stayed up a little past my bedtime yesterday afternoon so that I could watch the 3 p.m. press conference from Chicago, featuring Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich (henceforth, "Blago"), who is being pursued by the Feds for allegedly planning to sell the appointment to replace President-Elect Barack Obama in the Senate to the highest bidder. And what was the press conference for? Why, to announce the man that Blago has chosen for that appointment: An African-American politician named Roland Burris. This was despite the fact that other members of the Illinois state government have said that they will not certify anyone appointed by Blago, and despite the fact that the Senate's Democrat caucus has said that they will not recognize a Blago appointee, because of the cloud that the Governor is currently under. Blago, however, is shameless, and proves that one need not be Jewish to have chutzpah.
And then, it got even weirder, when Rep. Bobby Rush (D-Illinois) who is a former Black Panther, played a race card the size of a tombstone, saying that since there were no African-Americans in the Senate with Obama moving up, that the other Senators wouldn't want to be the ones trying to keep another African-American man from joining the Senate. Don't be trying to "lynch" the appointee, you racist crackers!
I watched this and thought, "How sexist! If this is the designated 'reserved-for-African-Americans' Senate seat, then it is only appropriate that African-American women from Illinois should receive equal consideration!"
And I knew exactly which African-American woman from Illinois should be named to fill out the rest of Obama's term. Yes, they should replace one O (that's a LETTER O, not a ZERO!) with another: They should appoint the third-most popular woman in America (behind Hillary Clinton and Sarah Palin), Oprah Winfrey.
Yes, Senator Oprah! It makes sense: She meets all three criteria: She's at least 30 years of age, a citizen for at least the past nine years, and a resident of the state that she would represent. And she's richer than Croesus, so when the time came for her to run for election to defend the seat, she would have plenty of financial resources to draw on.
Some might say, well, she has no political experience! But then again, neither does Caroline Kennedy, who is being seriously touted by some for the appointment to replace Senator Hillary Clinton in New York if she is confirmed by the Senate as Secretary of State. And indeed, Senator Clinton herself had no political experience when she became New York's Senator, other than being married to a President. Caroline Kennedy's experience consists solely of being the daughter of a President. Oprah? She's a friend of the incoming President. And in Chicago, it's all about who you know and whose palms you grease.
