The Chicago Crowd

Cruz was indeed innocent and was eventually pardoned by Republican Gov. George Ryan, who is now serving time in jail for a pay-to-play scheme from his time as Illinois secretary of state. It's hard to know which is worse—turning your office into a shakedown operation or letting an innocent man stay in prison and face execution. I think I'll choose the latter.

By the 1990s, Burris was becoming the Harold Stassen of Chicago politics. He ran unsuccessfully for mayor against Richard M. Daley in 1995 and for governor twice, the last time in the Democratic primary in 2002. Burris's presence in the 2002 race complicated the efforts of the best candidate, Paul Vallas, the Chicago schools superintendent (now running the schools in New Orleans), whose fear of flying kept him from traveling downstate enough. A third candidate, Chicago congressman Blagejevich, had no such reluctance to travel, and his big hair and wiseguy style didn't prevent him from making inroads with Democrats beyond Chicago. With Burris splitting the progressive Chicago vote with Vallas, Blagojevich won the primary, then was elected Illinois's first Democratic governor in nearly three decades. He was succeeded in Illinois's Fifth Congressional District by Rahm Emanuel.

State Sen. Barack Obama endorsed Burris that year even though Vallas was clearly the superior candidate. Obama had to. Two years earlier, in 2000, he had lost in a bid for Congress to former Black Panther Bobby Rush, who painted Obama as not being black enough. Endorsing Burris was essential to Obama maintaining his minimal street cred in the black community. Of course having lost to Rush, the assumption was that Obama's political career was over.

In 2004, the man who had dislodged Carol Moseley Braun from the Senate, Peter Fitzgerald (not to be confused with U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald), retired. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. considered running but declined in the face of well-financed white opposition. Moseley Braun was about to run for her old seat but decided on a quixotic campaign for president instead. That opened the door to the failed House candidate, Obama, to be the African-American in the race. His family and friends thought it was preposterous for him to seek a seat in the U.S. Senate when he couldn't even win one in the House, but Obama sensed that he could appeal to white voters. Even so, he was running third at best in the polls until shortly before the primary.

Thanks to a sex scandal that felled the front runner and an Axelrod ad featuring the daughter of the recently deceased Senator Simon, Obama won the primary. The Republicans couldn't field a candidate against him; even former Chicago Bearscoach Mike Ditka declined. Finally, crackpot Alan Keyes was imported from Maryland. He lost to Obama by 40 points.

By this time it was clear that Blagojevich was a useless governor, prone to fighting with the legislature and anyone else who crossed his path, including the Democratic leader in the state legislature, Mike Madigan, and his daughter Lisa, who now held Burris's old job as attorney general.

But if his record was nonexistent, Blagojevich had cleverly used pay-to-play shakedowns of anyone doing business with the state to raise a huge campaign war chest that scared away strong candidates in 2006. Daley, Obama, Durbin and the rest of the Chicago political establishment knew that Blagojevich was no good but refused to help a smart challenger, Edwin Eisendrath, in the primary. Blagojevich won easily. The first stirrings of an impeachment inquiry began shortly thereafter.

The 2008 presidential campaign exposed Obama's tensions with Jesse Jackson Sr., who couldn't quite get over being eclipsed. The fact that his daughter Santita had been a bridesmaid in the Obamas' wedding didn't seem to make him feel any more familial toward the younger man. The Jacksons became entangled in tape. When Jesse Sr. was caught on TV tape saying he wanted to cut Obama's nuts off, he was rebuked by his own son, Jesse Jr., soon to be caught on surveillance tape in the Blagojevich scandal sounding as if his own ambition to go to the Senate had gotten the better of him.

I heard informed speculation that Fitzgerald arrested Blagojevich as early as he did so as to avoid having to further ensnare young Jackson in the case. He wanted Blago, not Jesse Jr. But this left the gathering of evidence incomplete. That might explain why the indictment of the governor has been delayed for weeks.