The Road to Impeachment
Posted in Main Blog (All Posts) on January 10th, 2009 5:37 am by HL
The Illinois House has voted to impeach Gov. Rod Blagojevich on charges of corruption—like, for example, trying to sell a U.S. Senate seat to the highest bidder. The road to impeachment now leads to the Illinois state Senate, where a two-thirds majority is needed to boot Blagojevich.
ABC News:
The Illinois House of Representatives voted 114-1 on Friday to impeach Gov. Rod Blagojevich on corruption charges that include allegedly trying to sell the U.S. Senate seat vacated by President-elect Barack Obama.
The article of impeachment—essentially an indictment—now goes to the state Senate for a trial. A two-thirds vote is required there to convict Blagojevich and remove him from office. The trial will be presided over by the chief justice of the Illinois Supreme Court and could begin as early as Jan. 26.
In the state Senate trial, impeachment managers and Blagojevich will have the opportunity to present witnesses and evidence.
If convicted by the Illinois Senate, Blagojevich would be removed from office and Lt. Gov. Pat Quinn would become acting governor.
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While Barack Obama banned corporations and big donors from funding his inauguration so as to not trammel the public celebration, the big event’s multimillion-dollar bill is instead being footed by Wall Street executives and other financial employees acting as fundraisers. Abracadabra—no more special interests.
The Wall Street Journal:
President-elect Barack Obama has banned corporations and big donors from funding his Jan. 20 inauguration. But 90% of donations received so far have been raised by well-heeled fund-raisers, including Wall Street executives whose companies have received billions of dollars in federal bailout money.
A total of 207 fund-raisers have collected $24.8 million of the $27.3 million in contributions disclosed by Mr. Obama through Thursday, according to an analysis by nonpartisan campaign finance group Public Citizen commissioned by The Wall Street Journal.
Wall Street employees, as a group, have been the biggest single source of these private donations, according to the analysis. Much of their donations—$5.7 million total—has been channeled through financial-services executives who each have bundled together donations worth hundreds of thousands of dollars.
Related Entries
- January 9, 2009 ‘Left, Right & Center’: Will Obama Take on Wall Street?
- January 9, 2009 ‘Daily Show’: Joe Plumbs the Middle East
- January 9, 2009 The Road to Impeachment
- January 9, 2009 Jay Feldman on ‘Concentration Camps on the Home Front’
- January 9, 2009 Smile
