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Pay to Play
Ever since December 9, 2008, when U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald came forward with allegations that then-Gov. Rod Blagojevich tried to sell Barack Obama’s vacated Senate seat, our guy has been on something of a magical mystery tour. He became an also-ran on I’m a Celebrity…Get Me Out of Here!, giggled as Joy Behar gave him a noogie on The View, and gave Joaquin Phoenix a run for his money as biggest WTF moment on Letterman. Ostensibly, this was all to make the governor—shrouded in what Fitzgerald called a “political corruption crime spree”—more human. Instead, it turned him into an even larger cartoon buffoon.
To get a sense of the ex-guv’s humanity, you’d need a book like Brackett’s new Pay to Play. A WTTW reporter and correspondent for NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, Brackett conducted more than 30 interviews in the span of a few short months to get this book onto shelves while Blagojevich was still in his own dim spotlight. The best of her book dives deep into that humanity, digging through Blagojevich’s family history. It’s a fairly charming story, one that Brackett limns well to inform the story of the Rod we know and impeached. Once, Blagojevich’s father raised his belt to Rod’s older brother Robert, but the youngest stepped in front to share in the punishment. In telling the story, Rob said, “And so I’ll always be grateful in that case for the loyalty that Rod demonstrated.” Later, when Fitzgerald froze the funds in Citizens for Blagojevich, he asked Robert’s lawyer if big bro would be willing to talk to the feds. “Not a prayer,” came the response.
It’s easy to see, through Brackett’s portrayal of Blagojevich’s young life, how what actually was a hardscrabble life could morph into the folk-hero myth the former governor built around himself. Blagojevich shined shoes as a kid. He boxed, but not very well. He followed his brother to college in Florida but didn’t have the grades for a scholarship. He transferred to Northwestern but had to stay at home and deliver pizzas. He failed the bar exam on his first try. After a few middling first steps as a professional lawyer, he rented a storefront and had his mother work as his receptionist.
What’s most fascinating is the discovery that people were weirded out by him long before he started quoting Tennyson and jogging around Ravenswood Manor with camera crews in tow. His hair, his Elvis obsession, his near-bipolar personality that flipped from glad-handing to stiff-arming at the drop of a dime. None of these were new to those who knew him his whole life.
Much of the second half of the book concerns the nitty-gritty of Blago’s political life, territory lived out on the front pages of the city papers for the past half-decade and finely combed over during the past few months. Nothing much will surprise there, though it’s good to remember some of the juiciest bits, such as the strange scene that played out when federal agents arrested him: “The governor commenced a series of stretching exercises, started jogging in place—and then stunned agents by lying down in the fetal position. He went through this strange routine several times without saying a word.”
The timing of Pay to Play is everything. Obviously, from a marketing standpoint, now is the time. And a Blago bio published on December 8 just wouldn’t have been as rich in context as it is now. But with so much still to drop in Blagojevich’s case, one does get the impression that this is a little early to the party. Brackett does what she can, but there’s not much new news here, and the post-trial perspective will surely color the events of the past few months.
For that, though, we may just have to wait for Blago—who signed a six-figure book deal in March—to write the final chapter. But the former guv should thank Brackett for sketching such a humane portrait. As he heads to court, he might find it—in the parlance of our civic leader—a fucking valuable thing.
Brackett celebrates the release of Pay to Play Thursday 21.
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