Obama can't and shouldn't bully Burris

by Frank James

Mark Brown, the Chicago Sun-Times columnist, argues President-elect Barack Obama should either tell Roland Burris directly, or have some tough-talking emissary (Rahm Emanuel perhaps), tell the senator-in-limbo to end his bid to be seated in the Senate.

Obama doesn't want to do that. He's got bigger fish to fry and would prefer to stand pat with what he's already done, which was to issue a statement from a safe distance saying Burris is a great guy but agreeing the Senate shouldn't accept an appointment made by a governor accused by federal prosecutors of selling the very same seat. While that was helpful, it's not enough. We need Obama's direct intervention.

But we're in a bind here, one created in part by Obama's run for president. He bears some responsibility.

Here's the problem for Obama with Brown's recommended approach.

If Obama does the full LBJ on Burris, inviting him over to the Hay-Adams Hotel or whereever and leaning into him and imploring, cajoling or threatening Burris and Burris ignores him, it would give off a whiff of weakness.

As a popular president-elect with a stratospheric approval rating Obama currently has tremendous political capital. But he has some heavy political lifting ahead on a number of important fronts, the economic stimulus and health-care being just two that come to mind.

So he wants to conserve his capital, not waste it on situations where he's likely to be rebuffed as in the Burris case. Burris doesn't strike many people who've seen him up close as the kind of person to walk away from an appointment to the Senate, not when there's more room to record such an accomplishment on that mausoleum.

Sending someone to deliver the message would make it less of a personal diss to Obama but would still leave him in the same place. Burris would politely agree to disagree and Obama would appear to be something short of the powerful leader of his own party.

Given that, the best political play for Obama and for his agenda is arguably to get no further involved in the Burris affair, allowing the situation to play out, as increasingly looks likely, with Burris filling the president-elect's old seat.

Sen. Burris would face election in two years which would give Obama time to find another Democrat to support in the primary if he chose to punish Burris. Of course, Obama would face a similar concern then too. His preferred candidate would have to win or President Obama would be weakened as he prepared for his own re-election bid.