Make Room Under the Bus for Sen. Burris

Senator Roland Burris may soon be former Senator Burris. The guy who walked him onto the Senate floor for his swearing-in is even abandoning him:

Sen. Roland Burris is rapidly losing any political support he once had among colleagues, with Democrats from the statehouse to the White House raising questions about his entanglements with ousted Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich.

On Wednesday afternoon, Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) told the Chicago Tribune, in a phone interview from Turkey, that “at this point, his future in the Senate seat is in question.”

Burris is now hunkering down in damage control mode, saying in a feisty Chicago speech today he has “nothing to hide” and that he has no intention of resigning, despite calls from several Illinois legislators and at least two Democratic members of the Illinois congressional delegation for him to quit. Burris has canceled his public schedule for the rest of the week.

In the past few days, Burris has revealed much more extensive contacts with Blagojevich associates than he previously admitted, and he also revealed he had been asked to raise money for the impeached governor.

The pressure on Burris is literally increasing by the hour, with the latest damaging comments straight from Air Force One, where Robert Gibbs, President Obama’s spokesman said “the people of Illinois deserve to know based on some of the things that have happened over the past few days, deserve to know the full extent of any involvement” by Burris in raising money for Blagojevich, according to a White House pool report.

Asked if Burris should resign, Gibbs said: “I'm not going to get ahead of investigations and say anything like that yet.”

Oh well, at least he'll still be able to put "Senator" on that fancy mausoleum of his.