Rather than cleaning up Springfield, Blagojevich further defiled it. Yet running for re-election in 2006, his TV ads slimed incorruptible opponent Judy Baar Topinka as if she were the crook in the race. We were writing that the scent of scandal around him signified more than smoke — it was a five-alarm fire. The fatal, let’s-never-repeat mistake was that in order to re-elect Blagojevich, Illinoisans had to look past all of this: