Roland, Harry, and Barry

I'm past the schadenfreude of the Burris mess.  OK, not completely, but I'm still scratching my head over two things, prompted by this post from Jennifer Rubin:

1. Why are there no demonstrations, nay, riots, in the streets at the sight of a duly appointed black Senator being turned out into the rain by the Majority leader (the lily white majority, as it happens)?
2. Did I miss the presser with The One in which he calls Harry Reid a "typical white man"?  Where was Obama during all this?  Let me put this in terms The One might understand, he of the Harvard Law Review and scourge of Chi-town pick up b-ball: this was a slam-dunk.  The law was on Burris's side, and more importantly, the photo ops were on Burris's side.  I don't know, but if I were a black rabble-rouser, or even just an ordinary person who voted for a black man because he was black (those number in the millions), I'd be making up some window stickers that look like this:

Things I don't have an opinion about

I needed to do a short post.

[...]

Tammy Bruce is supporting CarKen's bid for Hillary's senate seat.  I don't have much of an opinion on this.  To the extent that the entire senate is being reconfigured, Chicago-style, by the elevation of many members to the cabinet, then back-filling with close relatives/ place holders/ sentimental favorites who walk like Walter Brennan who are appointed by governors, yeah, I think its undemocratic and it makes the World's Greatest Deliberative Body (yawn...) look really even stupider.

I'm just surprised that Michelle didn't get Barack's seat.  Hell, I'm surprised Auntie Mame Kinte in Boston didn't get his seat.

Update on Thursday, December 18, 2008 at 06:45PM by bbmoe

Disclaimer: I'm really a very bad person.

In my heart of hearts, all these years, I have waited for some really unflattering pictures of "icons" to come to light. I never expected that that moment would come for Caroline Kennedy. I have to say, I find all of this terribly amusing. The press have finally decided to get tough...on a middle aged woman who has led a life of bland, unexceptional do-gooderness who has the temerity to trade off her families ties/histories/connections to catapult herself to a senate seat. Until today, all pictures of her reflected her "American Aristocrat" heritage, her Camelotian romance (if only she hadn't married a Schlossberg...), her tragic, uh, tragedy or something. She's been low-key, dignified (we think), and generally, nothing to write home about. Nice clothes, walks like she's used to handling a plough, and has managed to raise three children to more or less maturity without any of them getting into the papers (for that alone, she deserves a medal.)

But, for some reason, the gloves are off as far as the press is concerned. I guess since the election, they've been cleaning out the gadget drawer and found their testicles ("Whoa, lookee here...I wonder if they still fit?") and are taking them out for a test drive on the easy course. "Mrs. Kennedy! Mrs. Kennedy! You haven't told us your qualifications!"

What a joke.

Meanwhile, Joe Biden is dumbing down the office of the vice-presidency so that it synches up more snugly to his own capabilities originalist traditional constitutional view of the office.

I once read a novel by V.S. Naipal about an Indian immigrant's experience coming to Britain as a lackey circa 1970. He couldn't figure out how to use the toidy on the airplane (never, never fly coach from India) and when he got to his employer in London, he was given a closet to live in- a closet, that's c-l-o-s-e-t. And he thought it was great! Today I'm thinking, how clever of V.S. to accurately portray Joe Biden's place in the Obama administration. And what about that foreign policy experience!

Jennifer Rubin sums it up:

And it only adds to the merriment that the accidental New York Governor, who didn’t get his position on his own, is deciding between two dynastic progeny –Andrew Cuomo and Caroline Kennedy. But in fairness to Cuomo, he has run for office and done something in his career. He’s actually qualified. Which used to be important when considering the vice presidency, but isn’t anymore when you’re pondering a real job with actual power.