To call Rod Blagojevich‘s alleged crimes lunacy is to give the moon a bad name. So I won’t even ponder here what led him to do what he is said to have done.
Blagojevich earned a brief mention in Freakonomics, in a section arguing that having a lot of books at home doesn’t cause children to do better at school. It’s true that kids from book-filled homes do better at school — but that’s because the books are a proxy for well-educated parents.
But Blagojevich was a true believer:
In early 2004, Governor Rod Blagojevich announced a plan to mail one book a month to every child in Illinois from the time they were born until they entered kindergarten. The plan would cost $26 million a year. But, Blagojevich argued, this was a vital intervention in a state where 40 percent of third graders read below their grade level. “When you own [books] and they’re yours,” he said, “and they just come as part of your life, all of that will contribute to a sense … that books should be part of your life.”
O.K., so he kind of talked in a circle. And O.K., his plan was ultimately rejected. But at least he wasn’t trying to get a piece of the book sales (as far as we know).
But that wasn’t even the first section of our book that came to mind while reading about Blagojevich. Rather, I thought about how sumo wrestlers collude to throw matches. One of the pieces of evidence in the argument was that the collusion stopped for a while whenever corruption charges hit the media. There is nothing like scrutiny to improve behavior.
So now that Blagojevich’s corruption charges have hit the media, I’m guessing we’ll see some super-squeaky-clean behavior among those governors and other politicians who are in the middle of handing out U.S. Senate seats and other goodies. What kind of quid pro quo can, say, New York Governor David Paterson be expecting as he considers replacements for Hillary Clinton‘s seat? He may not have expected much to begin with but, for Paterson as well as a lot of others, a gloomy Christmas season may have just gotten a little gloomier.
The upside, of course, is that any politicians hoping to cash in on an appointment or a contract or a piece of legislation will probably be scared off by the Blagojevich bust. Which might — might — mean that politics becomes a bit less corrupt, at least for the next few months.
and 
. You can also watch it on 
It must take a team of stylists to maintain his Donald Trump-esque haircut. That requires cash flow, which may have led him down this road of pay-to-play corruption.
If it’s true that the extra scrutiny leads to less corruption, would this suggest that Rod-o simply didn’t hear about the fate of the former Illinois gov’r?
Or could corruption and Illinois politics be positively correlated?
Very similar to the questions: Does it snow because it’s cold or does the snow cause it to be cold or is there some other factors that cause both?
Does corruption cause Illinois Politcs?
Does Illinois Politics cause corruption?
Or are there other factors causing both?
Something like 2% of all men are sociopaths and the portion is higher among lawyers, stock brokers and politicians. Some are just smart enough to memorize at an intellectual level the difference between right and wrong. Being sociopaths they don’t really understand what the fuss is all about over issues like honesty but the smart ones learn and remember where society’s hot buttons are.
The plan to send books might have worked if instead of books they had sent comics.
The obvious argument against this line of thinking is that Rod Blagojevich committed some of his accused crimes in the midst of the former IL governor’s extremely public corruption trial!
I’m just wondering how many horses had to lose their tails to make that hair possible.
#8. To further your point (besides the obvious that it was his own words), there’s no real Republican party to speak of at the Illinois State Level or in the City of Chicago…just different factions of Democrats.
#10 Being from the Chicago area my whole life, I would say that the Chicago Politics cause corruption…it’s just become the way of life for all of these guys. It’s the accepted way of doing business, unfortunately. From a national perspective, this whole thing seems shocking, but from people here (outside of politics), it’s not shocking that this was going on. It’s just shocking how stupid this guy really was in the manner he got caught..
Maybe it could have the opposite effect — kind of when you see a cop in the highway you might believe you won’t see another one in miles. So I think this is the right time to be corrupted. The defense can always be the “do-you-think-I-am-that-stupid” kind of defense.
On another note, I do not find the quotes from Blagojevich that outrageous. He plainly says, hey I’m giving a senate seat. I’m giving something of high value. He needs to get something on return. Isn’t that what politics is all about? I have yet to hear him mentioning dollars.
Do you really think that you’ll give a senate seat for nothing in exchange? At the minimum you choose somebody close to your party, your ideals, and that has an economic value to you. So what’s the big deal. Maybe senate seats should have a price.
There is, of course, an obvious and simple answer to the question of why Blagojevich kept participating in the corruption, despite his knowledge of the scrutiny he was under as well as the former governor’s demise – he’s an idiot!