* 5:29 pm - Mark Kirk has more problems. He spoke to both the Tribune and Sun-Times editorial boards today and may not have come off too well. The Tribune got its story out first…
In a new disclosure, Kirk acknowledged that his campaign’s promotion of him coming under fire while flying aboard an intelligence reconnaissance plane in Iraq may not be correct because there is no record of whether his aircraft was being fired upon.
Oh, man, that’s not good at all.
More…
Kirk also acknowledged a constituent letter sent out by his North Shore congressional district office last year that described him as a member of Operation Desert Storm, though he did not participate in that effort.
“I am sorry, absolutely,” Kirk said. “You should speak with utter precision. You should stand on the documented military record. In public discourse, for high office, you should make sure that there is a degree of complete rigorous precession.”
More on that one from Daily Kos, which broke the story earlier today. Kirk wrote this in a constituent letter…
As you may know, I am a veteran of the Desert Storm and Enduring Freedom missions.
I’ll post the Sun-Times stuff when it goes online. From the paper’s Twitter page…
So, Mark Kirk happened by. He wouldn’t cop to “embellishment.” He claimed “mistakes” in translating precise military records into civilian.
Rep. Mark Kirk on his misstatement: “I misremembered,” “was distracted by Congressional campaign”
Um, huh?
* While Kirk was meeting with those editorial boards, his campaign appeared to dump a bit of oppo on Alexi Giannoulias…
Giannoulias is currently the state treasurer of Illinois. And, according to his official website, “He founded and chairs the AG Foundation, a not-for-profit charity that donates money to treat child-related illnesses, curb poverty and assist disaster relief organizations.”
The problem is, the charity no longer exists. According to the AG Foundation’s tax return, “The organization was in existence only for the two-year period from 2005 to 2006.”
Giannoulias has since changed his website to “chaired” from “chairs” and “donated” from “donates.”
*** UPDATE - 5:51 pm *** The Tribune story made it sound like it was Kirk’s campaign that made the claim about him coming under fire over Iraq. Turns out, Kirk himself made the claim during a House floor debate. Watch…
The quote…
“The last time I was in Iraq I was in uniform flying at 20,000 feet, and the Iraqi air defense network was shooting at us.”
“I simply misremembered it wrong,” Rep. Mark Kirk told the Sun-Times Thursday.
The North Shore Republican was trying to explain how he could have reported on his resume for a decade that he had been awarded the “Intelligence Officer of the Year” when he actually was describing a group medal awarded to his Naval unit as a whole.
Over and over again, Kirk tried to explain how tumultuous his life was when he got the award — he just won a primary election against 10 opponents and now was facing a tough general election for his first term in Congress.
“I swung by D.C. and picked up this award, but I was no longer focused on the award,” Kirk said.
“I apologize to you and your readers,” Kirk said several times.
…Blago’s playing for up to 415 years in prison and $6 million in fines — the maximum sentence if he’s convicted on each of the 24 counts of fraud, conspiracy, bribery and racketeering of which he’s accused.
415 years. How fitting.
* Watch the strangeoids who show up to cheer the goofball near the end of this video…
* This is trivial, but it’s still an interesting insight into how the media thinks…
With no sign of huge crowds yet, Judge James Zagel has decided to keep the trial in his courtroom on the 25th floor, as opposed to moving it to a larger space. So far, the media, which includes more than 20 television cameras bunched up in the “bullpen” in the lobby, are buzzing about two things while it waits for the trial to start: The ambiguity over Zagel’s permission of smart-phone usage in the courtroom and how unimpressive the crowd is.
Jury selection began in the case of former Gov. Rod Blagojevich today — and not surprisingly, all seven potential jurors questioned so far said they had heard something about the case.
One woman said she watched a reality TV show involving “Mrs. Blagojevich,” referring to Patti Blagojevich’s stint last year on “I’m a Celebrity . . . Get Me Out of Here!”
“Something about some bugs or something?” the woman said to U.S. District Judge James Zagel. Rod Blagojevich laughed and turned to look at Patti, who was sitting in the front row.
His brother, Rob, who is also on trial and sitting behind the ex-governor, was not smiling.
Check back later this afternoon for our first post from the BGA.
* The Carpenters Union has filed suit against the new law intended to reform McCormick Place’s operations. Click here to read the suit, which was filed late yesterday. The union wants the law declared unconstitutional for several reasons, including…
In Count III, Plaintiff claims the MPEA Act, as amended, violates the Contracts Clause of the United States Constitution, Article I, Section 10, Clause 1 because it substantially impairs an existing contract between the Plaintiff and the Defendant MPEA which is known as the Labor Agreement for the Metropolitan Pier and Exposition Authority
Indian Prairie school board President Curt Bradshaw appears to be pushing forward with his plan to withhold monthly payroll tax payments to the state department of revenue - even though district officials already have paid their attorneys $1,520 to tell them it’s illegal.
Support from some of his fellow Unit District 204 board members also appears to have fallen by the wayside.
* One of the more interesting stories I’ve seen to date on the Blagojevich trial is from Illinois Statehouse News…
[Robert Hirschhorn, a jury selection specialist] said the defense should be eyeing a very particular type of juror.
“The defense is going to want what I call a ’shades of grey’ juror,” he said. “If you see the world in terms of right and wrong, good and bad, black and white, I think that’s pro-prosecution.”
So what is a “shades of grey” juror?
Hirschhorn said the defense should look for a blue-collar juror, preferably a food server who does not report his or her tips. He believes Blagojevich’s best bet will also be somebody familiar with the world of politics, someone who can empathize with what it takes to accomplish things in Chicago.
“The inference is that he was trying to sell this vacant Senate seat,” he said. “What the defense is going to try to do is say…he was being a politician, not a crook.”
* ‘No easy answers’: Faced with the dire uncertainty of absent or delayed state funding, libraries statewide are preparing for big changes in how they serve the public.
* Reform for state’s legislative scholarship program is out, for now“This particular bill is dead, but the issue isn’t dead,” Cullerton spokeswoman Rikeesha Phelon said Wednesday. The issue may re-emerge in separate legislation during the fall veto session, but Cullerton “doesn’t see a need to get rid of the program,” she said.
* Here’s another one: Today’s General Assembly scholarship outrage: Former state Rep. Robert Molaro granted tuition waivers totaling $94,000 to a longtime political pal’s four children, who met the residency requirement only if you squint at their paperwork really, really hard.
An early fixture in the young administration of Gov. Pat Quinn is going back to the private sector.
Bob Reed, 56, of Evanston has been Quinn’s communications director but told me Wednesday he’s moving on.
“I’m leaving state government early this month and, after a short European vacation, returning to my business writing and consulting business, which is ambitiously titled Reed Enterprises,” he said. “This assignment has been a great experience, and as I told you some 18 months ago, I do believe in public service — now more than ever.”
* The Question: Who should be Gov. Pat Quinn’s new state spokesperson? Snark heavily encouraged.
…Adding… An explanation would be nice as well.
…Adding more... I already knew this and deliberately withheld it to make the QOTD more fun, but the Tribune is reporting that Bill Cunningham, who is currently Cook County Sheriff Tom Dart’s chief of staff, will replace Reed. Ignore the facts! Keep commenting!
* Roll Call’s executive editor Morton Kondracke has written a super-strong defense of Mark Kirk on all points, including a somewhat uncomfortable topic. The Kirk campaign sent it around last night and posted it on their campaign’s website today. Here’s the beginning, but you should really read the whole thing…
I confess upfront that I’m not neutral in this year’s Illinois Senate race. For numerous reasons I’ll stipulate, I’m rooting for GOP Rep. Mark Kirk over Democratic State Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias.
That said, the flap over Kirk’s misstatements about his military service is reaching ridiculous proportions — exaggerated into a mini-scandal by Democrats and both local and national media.
And now, the left is peddling sleazy allegations that Kirk is gay as payback for his vote — cast for defensible reasons — against repeal of the Pentagon’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.
I’ve known Kirk for nearly 10 years, since his first term in Congress, and in 42 years in Washington, I’ve rarely encountered a Member with a greater range of expertise or better judgment.
* The FrumForum, which has been unabashedly pro Kirk, is not pleased with the way the candidate has been handling the military story and offers up some advice…
There is just no way around it: Mark Kirk screwed up. He misstated his military record. He admitted this and apologized for it in a blog post but in that same blog post, Kirk did not come totally clean, and now the story continues to linger in both the blogosphere and mainstream media. Now his military record, which should be a strong point, is turning into a liability. Going into the Blagojevich trial, which should be huge positive for Kirk, the Kirk campaign must come all the way clean and stop the bleeding. This story is distracting and it should not be an issue. While some Republican strategists expressed reservations about Kirk’s staffing, the reality is that Mark Kirk is a professional politician and he should know better. The Kirk campaign needs to come completely clean, all at once, and move on. It is time to stop the bleeding.
* But instead of taking that advice, Kirk is sticking to his story, which isn’t wholly satisfying…
Kirk also released a statement from retired Navy Capt. Clay Fearnow, who said he nominated Kirk for the Rufus Taylor award and thought it was “more specific to Mark and not his team.”
“The reality is, there would have been no team without Mark’s leadership and there certainly would have been no award,” Fearnow wrote. “I can certainly understand why he would have referred to his award over the years as intelligence officer of the year – it’s how I viewed the award.”
Kirk said the award was given in 2000.
“The skipper called me up and said, ‘Hey, get back to Washington, accept this award. It’s a big deal.’” There were “a lot of speeches – ‘Great work, Mark. It was your team,’” Kirk said.
The award clearly states what it is. Kirk is an intelligence officer, for crying out loud. His job is to deal with tiny details. But he got some very big details wrong for about a decade about something that pertained to himself and he ought to just admit it and move the heck along. To be dragging this thing out over semantics rather than putting it to rest and moving on is a little difficult to understand. All he’s doing by keeping this story alive on his downstate fly-around is prompting ledes like this one from WSIL…
“If a man has to lie about his service record, he’s gonna lie to you about everything else,” [said Army veteran Marshall Freeman.]
It would also help if he would’ve made sure that his campaign website was scrubbed of all “Intelligence Officer of the Year” references. It wasn’t as of early this morning.
The Kirk campaign also issued a “fact check” on its website titled “‘Mob Banker’ Who Never Served Attacks Decorated Naval Officer’s Distinguished Service Record.”
In one of his radio interviews in Springfield Wednesday, Kirk referred to people digging to find out bad things from his record as “high-powered opposition-research goons.” To his credit, WMAY-AM host JIM LEACH asked if Kirk’s own oppo-research folks should also be called “goons”?
“I would say that our team, since they don’t come from Chicago, tend to be a little bit more by the Marquis of Queensbury rules,” Kirk said, referring to a traditional code of fair play. […]
Still, Kirk doesn’t help his claim of civility when he says he hasn’t used a certain characterization against Giannoulias, yet the same characterization is employed both on Kirk’s own website and by the party supporting him. The Marquis would not be happy.
* But he’s darned lucky that the media has decided not to count his “I command the War Room” comment as the first instance of Kirk’s exaggerations. Instead, they started with the “Intelligence Officer of the Year” award and moved on to “in” rather than “during”…
Senate candidate Mark Kirk faced new questions Wednesday about inaccurate descriptions of his military service, this time over wrongly saying that the congressman served “in” Operation Iraqi Freedom.
It is the second time in less than a week that Kirk, the Republican nominee for President Barack Obama’s former Senate seat, has had to explain inaccurate descriptions of his record of service in the military.
Usually, three strikes and you’re out, figuratively speaking. The media is only giving him two strikes now. Like I said, he’s darned lucky.
*** UPDATE 1 - 11:34 am *** From Illinois Statehouse News…
Federal Judge James Zagel on Thursday ruled the jury in former Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s corruption trial will remain anonymous, despite a last minute petition by a group of news organizations.
The group attempted to reverse Zagel’s previous decision to seal the jurors’ identities, but the judge said the objection was “untimely” with the trial less than two hours away. […]
During the trial of now imprisoned former Gov. George Ryan the trial interrupted after the Chicago Tribune revealed two members of the case’s jury had criminal records, which they did not disclose during the selection process.
The trial of former Gov. Rod Blagojevitch has been pushed back to 11 a.m.
“I feel great,” Blagojevich said before walking over & shaking hands with several supporters. “The truth shall set you free,” he told one well-wisher as he shook the man’s hand. […]
Outside court, one woman carried a placard saying, “Rod’s not cuckoo. Rod’s not guilty.”
“We like him and he’s innocent,” said May Farley, 78, of Elmhurst.
And if you have the stomach for it, click here to see the grotesque clown in action.
* Keep in mind as the Blagojevich trial gears up that the media has focused almost solely on the alleged US Senate seat auction. While this is important, it’s not the be-all, end-all of the federal government’s case. The Sun-Times makes this mistake today in its piece about how to keep score during the trial…
Blagojevich’s strategy will be to explain away his comments as typical political horse-trading. He’ll invite jurors to interpret his remarks as pursuing political IOUs for the best interests of Illinois.
He’ll certainly try to do that on the US Senate seat stuff, but he won’t succeed. The truth is, Blagojevich was trying to cut the best deal for himself, not the state. There’s a big difference there. Logrolling is usually legal, if somewhat distasteful to the public at large. Using your government office to pad your pockets is not legal.
But one of the least reported aspects of this case will probably be the one that shocks the jurors the most and will be the thing that he can’t explain away…
On October 8, Blagojevich told a person described only as “Individual A” that he was willing to make $8 million available for Children’s Memorial Hospital, but “I want to get [Hospital Executive 1] for 50.”
Individual A felt that Blagojevich was talking about a $50,000 campaign contribution from the hospital’s chief executive officer and that the $8 million referred to a recent commitment by Blagojevich to secure state funds via “some type of pediatric care reimbursement.”
“Intercepted phone conversations between Rod Blagojevich and others indicate that Rod Blagojevich is contemplating rescinding his commitment of state funds to benefit Children’s Memorial Hospital because Hospital Executive 1 has not made a recent campaign contribution,” the affidavit says.
In other words, the governor tried to shake down Children’s Memorial Hospital CEO Patrick Magoon for 50 large. And there is ample evidence that Blagojevich tried to put a hold on that hospital money until he got what he wanted. In fact, the state money wasn’t disbursed until the day Blagojevich was removed from office. The man is despicable and deserves whatever he gets. And he’s gonna get it.
* Again, most of what you’ve read in the mainstream media lately is just smoke and mirrors from Team Blagojevich. Rahm Emanuel, we learned this week, has been subpoenaed. Blagojevich will try to get Emanuel to say the then-governor did nothing illegal during the US Senate escapade. It won’t be enough.
Just days before the trial was set to begin the state GOP compiled an assemblage of photographs of current political candidates buddying up to the disgraced former Democratic governor. There’s Quinn, a former running mate, standing with Blagojevich at a political rally, Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias, the Democratic U.S. Senate nominee, posing with Blagojevich in tuxedos at an event, and other photos with Blagojevich and Attorney General Lisa Madigan and her father, Michael Madigan.
“The Blagojevich Trial. Starting June 3rd. Check Your Local Listings for Details,” the state GOP noted in an e-mail to supporters that included the photos.
A strategist with one Republican statewide campaign said they expect the trial will provide “opportunities” to tag the current crop of Democratic candidates with problems that go back to the Blagojevich administration, from the state’s mountain of unpaid bills to Blagojevich hires still on the public payroll.
“It may not be a focal point of the trial, but it does shine a spotlight on the problems of the Democratic Party and the excesses of one party rule with Blagojevich at the top of it,” said the GOP strategist, who was not authorized to speak publicly about the campaigns.
Of course, Blagojevich also allegedly did some crooked deals with Republicans, but the GOP won’t be mentioning that. The state party has, however, set up a new website to “help” voters follow the trial. TheBlagoFiles.com also includes a big “Donate” button so readers can give to the state party.
* Speaking of the Illinois GOP, the party sent out an e-mail this morning attempting to make a connection between Blagojevich and Alexi Giannoulias…
On the day Rod Blagojevich goes on trial for pay-to-play corruption, will Alexi Giannoulias cancel his planned Messina fundraiser?
Deputy White House Chief of Staff allegedly offered Andrew Romanoff a job to get out of Colorado Senate race;
Messina due in Chicago for Giannoulias fundraiser on June 19th
Illinois Senate candidate Alexi Giannoulias recently announced that White House Deputy Chief of Staff Jim Messina would be coming to Illinois on June 19 to help him raise money for his Senate bid.
Last night, Politico reported that Democratic Senate candidate Andrew Romanoff publicly confirmed long-standing reports (and provided emails as proof) that Messina attempted to dissuade him from challenging incumbent Senator Michael Bennett in the Colorado Democratic Senate Primary by offering him a paid government position.
Small beans in comparison to Blagojevich, who wanted a job for himself and/or his wife, and/or a whole lot of campaign money in exchange for appointing the “right” US Senator.
* As I told subscribersthis morning, we will have Blagojevich trial coverage right here at the blog. From the Better Government Association’s Andy Shaw…
The Better Government Association has a permanent seat in the courtroom for the Blagojevich trial, and one of our investigative contributors, Chicago attorney and former news producer Darrow Abrahams, will be covering the trial for us on a day-to-day basis. He will be providing me with details of the testimony, the legal maneuvering and the courtroom activities of the participants, and I’ll be contributing regular reports and debriefs on at least two Chicago radio stations and, as needed, on local and national radio, television, print and internet outlets.
Darrow will also be recapping the trial highlights on a daily basis for the BGA website www.bettergov.org. And we’re pleased to be linking those recaps to the CAPITOL FAX Blog so your readers can follow the trial through our eyes. They can also link back to our site for additional trial material, and I hope to offer additional trial insights to your readers via written and video blogs.
The BGA is planning to have a high profile during the trial because the details of the case cut to the very core of our mission: How public officials run our government. In fact, state government itself is on trial right alongside the former governor because the federal indictment alleges that he and his cohorts subverted and perverted government, turning Illinois into an ATM for Blagojevich’s campaign fund and the personal enrichment of his friends and family. Blagojevich denies the charges—calling the case a “persecution,” not a prosecution—so the evidence, the testimony and the crosss-examinations will provide the citizens of Illinois with a rare and priceless “teaching moment” during which we can actually see how government was run during the seven Blagojevich years. The former governor is, of course, presumed innocent until a jury says otherwise, and that presumption will underscore everything we say about the trial. But regardless of the verdict, we should learn some valuable lessons along the way about how government should and should not be run. Those lessons will hopefully result in concrete proposals to clean up any mess we find along the way, end any corrupting practices that are proven, and increase the likelihood that future governors will serve out their terms without the bright lights of a federal investigation blinding all of us.
The fabric of democracy has been tattered and torn over decades of abuse and neglect in the Land of Lincoln. It’s the mission of the BGA to join other groups and individuals who are committed to repairing it. The mission also includes a vigorous debate over the issues raised in the trial, in front of as large an audience as possible, so we appreciate the chance to join the vibrant discussion that CAPITOL FAX already stimulates every day.
We’re hoping to get our first installment today, the first day of jury selection. I’m really looking forward to this.
