* The governor said this today on Don & Roma’s show…
“Give me a right to call witnesses, give me a right to subpoena witnesses and documents, to properly prepare a case — and I’ll be the first one there,” said Blagojevich.
* But Senate President John Cullerton made a very good point today in the Sun-Times…
“No party has the unrestricted right to subpoena witnesses,” Cullerton said. “It’s not a criminal matter. It’s an impeachment proceeding.”
Get that? Neither side has an unrestricted right to subpoena in this impeachment trial. Actually, neither side has an unrestricted subpoena right in a criminal trial.
The governor could have filed subpoena requests. He could have brought in witnesses who have been ordered by Blagojevich to do goofy things and testify that they knew he didn’t really mean it and they never followed through. He could have brought in witnesses who could testify to his character, who perhaps talked to him about the Obama Senate seat vacancy and how he wanted to make sure he did the right thing for the people.
But he couldn’t do that because it would’ve likely harmed his criminal case. So, he boycots and throws verbal bombs…
“If I participate in that sham impeachment . . . I will undermine the people,” Blagojevich said. He also said, “I can be soldier in the fight for constitutional rights.”
He already “undermined the people” with his behavior the past two years. And he’s “soldiering” for his own constitutional rights as he sees them, not for anybody else…
He said if he is forced from office, it would set a dangerous precedent, putting all future governors in the position of having to “cower” to the legislature “and kiss their you-know-what because he’ll be afraid that what they did to me, they’ll do to him.”
Yeah, OK. The precedent this sets is if a future governor is arrested by FBI agents at his home at six o’clock in the morning, handcuffed, hauled off to jail and then refuses to resign and claims he is completely and totally innocent even though he is caught on surveillance tapes, that future governor is gonna get impeached.
Period.
Blagojevich likened the current drama surrounding him “to a 21st Century Frank Capra movie… how the good guy was up against the establishment… But he stood firm for the people. That’s what this is about.”
The only person Rod Blagojevich is standing for is himself. That’s what this is really about. His own skin.