Dianne Feinstein was in the news earlier this week; first she was upset that Obama named Panetta to CIA without consulting her (she's on the Senate Intelligence Committee, which did a very poor job of oversight of the CIA and NSA during the Bush administration), and then she broke with Democratic leadership over whether to seat Blagojevich's pick for Obama's Senate seat, the incomprehensible Roland Burris (she's on the Senate Rules Committee, and therefore it's her decision whether the Senate has the power to eject Burris)
But she also was very briefly in the movie Milk, which I saw this week (the day after she had come out in favor of Burris). She plays a minor, minor role in the movie even though she played a slightly larger role in real life--in real life, [spoiler alert] she was the one who found the bodies of Mayor Moscone and Harvey Milk after they were shot by former city supervisor Dan White.
For some reason, on a human level, I feel like that explained to a certain degree her decision to side with Burris. Something about being in the front row of watching a sidelined politician lose out because of the larger political atmosphere... well, that's where Roland Burris is right now.
Of course, I don't think Dianne Feinstein is backing Roland Burris because she thinks if she doesn't, he's going to shoot Harry Reid and Dick Durbin. That would be ridiculous. But her decision to stick by the rules (of which Harry Reid is aware and feels less bound by) may partly be her role on the Rules Committee, but it may partly be a sense of personal compassion for the man.
It's just some speculation, for if one day we decide to make a movie about this AWESOME Blagojevich story. Trust me, it'll make a great movie.
