Quick Links 2/17/09

*Patterico on Roland Burris’ changing story on raising money for Blagojevich.
*Moe Lane notes a report about Obama looking for still more ways to rely on staffers, a script and prepared softball questions at his press conferences. Obama may have a lovely voice, but he really is not all that good an extemporaneous speaker and he relies very heavily on other people’s prepared texts in ways that are really not all that dissimilar to George W. Bush and sometimes even more egregious. Yet, while Bush was pilloiried as being a moron due to his weak public speaking (and recall the outrage over the obscure Jeff Gannon), everybody lauds how articulate Obama is even when they can’t remember a single thing he said. Is Obama, on balance, a better communicator than Bush? Sure he is even despite the vapidity of his pronouncements compared to the blunter Bush. But – I have made thisanalogy before in the comments here – comparing Obama’s public speaking to Bush’s is like comparing Vince Coleman’s baserunning to Mike Piazza’s; when that’s your only skill, you have to be a lot better than a guy for whom public speaking is his biggest weakness.
*Jay Cost: three cheers for partisanship!
*The NY GOP may not have suffered its last at the hands of Al D’Amato. But David Paterson has problems. Serious ones. And Kirsten Gillibrand may face a tough primary as well.
*Ted Stevens’ conviction looks pretty shaky at this point, not that it really matters politically anymore.