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SUNDAY, JULY 18, 2010
Charged with excess: Blagojevich trial shows spending habits to which he was ill-suited The Blagojeviches’ spending:
ROBIN GIVHAN On Fashion
T
here is no smoking gun quite like a six-figure fashion bill.
As the prosecution lays out its
case against Rod Blagojevich, who is charged with trying to sell President Obama’s old Senate seat, the former Illinois governor’s penchant for buying custom-made suits, fancy shirts and expensive ties has been put into evidence. Both Blagojevich and his wife, Patti, had a debilitating fashion habit, one that totaled about $400,000 over almost seven years. That dollar figure, which surpassed what they spent on their mortgage, helped sink them deep into debt. After combing through their credit card bills, the prosecution extracted tantalizing tidbits, such as how on one April day in 2006, Blagojevich spent $1,302.53 on ties. Even for a gentleman splurging on four-in-hands by, say,Hermes or Charvet, that’s an awful lot of neckwear. Other ledger entries showed, according to the Associated Press, that Blagojevich spent more than $10,000 in a day on suits. In the universe of custom-made clothing, this probably amounts to two suits. But if this was a regular expenditure, where, pray tell, was he storing them all? The prosecution did not limit itself to generalities. No, no, it got specific. A basket-weave tie from Saks Fifth Avenue cost $179.85. His wife spent $1,847 on a designer dress one day and $2,264 on a jacket. For anyone who regularly peruses the racks of Prada or Dolce & Gabbana, these prices would not come as much of a surprise. But they are startling in light of statistics that indicate the cost of those three items is just a couple hundred bucks shy of the total annual clothing budget for an American family of four. Clearly, Norman Rockwell’s America is not shopping at Saks. The Blagojeviches were, as one might have guessed, great fans of Saks, as well as Neiman Marcus —shops where the couple could make a date night out of a high-end shopping spree. For instance, they spent, over time, $28,000 at Neiman’s. They had expensive taste — taste that, it turns out, they couldn’t afford. More than that, they seemed to be breathless consumers whose desire for pricey goods simply could not be sated.
Surely Blagojevich never expected that his credit card
BY THE NUMBERS $200,000
The couple’s consumer debt when Rod Blagojevich was arrested in December 2008.
$392,000 $205,000
$1,302.53 $1,847
Amount spent on ties in one day.
Amount Patti spent on a designer dress.
$2,264 $10,000
at Saks and Amount she spent on a jacket. Their mortgage payments over a six-year period from 2002 to 2008.
The bill for Tom James custom-made clothes for Rod. Individual examples of spending:
$179.85 $2,590 $3,800
What Rod spent in a day on suits. In six years, they spent a total of
$57,000 $28,000
at Neiman Marcus. CHARLES REX ARBOGAST/ASSOCIATED PRESS
FOLLOWING THE MONEY: Patti and Rod Blagojevich, as his federal corruption trial shows, spent money on the finer things in life. But they clearly missed the finer points of truly appreciating luxury.
records would be made public — certainly not by a prosecutor trying to put him in prison. But now that the closet door has been opened, so to speak, one can’t help but to look inside and ask two questions. What sort of message did the prosecutor send by providing so many details about the expenditures? Instead of just getting a look at the final bill, the public now knows that Blagojevich likes, for example, Tom James custom-made suits. And second: Did he look good in these clothes that cost him so dearly? A politician can take quite a scalding for spending excessively
on a wardrobe. But it’s not necessarily just the cost that matters. It’s whether it gives the perception of gluttony. Indeed, a host of officeholders
in Washington spends significant sums on clothes, from designer labels to Savile Row tailors. And most constituents do not begrudge them this luxury. Folks want their representatives to look good. And unless they have campaigned on their Wal-Mart bona fides, there’s no reason they shouldn’t spend their clothing allowance as they please.
But the rules that apply in the foodie universe also apply in
fashion. Foodies will tell you that it’s more satisfying to sample one high-quality chocolate than to gorge on cheap candy bars. The unspoken corollary is that one should be astute enough to know that overdoing it on expensive truffles is the ultimate in nauseatingly bad taste. The point of luxury is to savor it, to recognize it as something special. Not to treat it as cavalierly as one would a McDonald’s hamburger. The Blagojeviches gorged on
luxury. They bought and they bought until just the thought of their spending was dizzying. It was enough to make your teeth
hurt. They couldn’t afford their purchases. That’s sad enough. But even if they could have supported their shopping habit, wealth would not have absolved them from harsh judgment. There’d be something unseemly about their spending, even if the couple had been worth billions. The socially accepted argument for giving big spenders a pass has always been that if you’re worth a billion dollars, something such as the Blagojeviches’ $57,000 shopping bill from Saks means nothing. It’s akin to the average person’s $570 bill. But that’s not true. A dollar is a dollar. And $57,000 is still more than a lot of people make in a year. It still represents a house down payment. A year’s Ivy League tuition, room and board. It’s not what folks buy that galls observers, or even how much they spend. It’s when their purchasing style, as laid out by a prosecutor going for the jugular, suggests they no longer recognize the value of a dollar. They splurged at Saks; they scrimped on child care. ($57,000 vs. $50,000, according to the Associated Press.) Rod Blagojevich’s acquisitive
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nature would have resonated quite differently if he had been going on spending rampages at the Gap or Macy’s. It would have read as excessive, as hoarding; but it would not have had the ring of greed. (Maybe he’d have wound up on TLC’s “Buried Alive” rather than Donald Trump’s “Celebrity Apprentice.”)
By comparison: they spent less than
$50,000 $100,000
in that time for child care and less than
on groceries. Mass-market clothes, the kind
that people think of as interchangeable commodities, are often characterized as just generic stuff. Buying it in large, overwhelming quantity calls to mind images of an eccentric, not a braggart.
But in the luxury market, where the goal is to craft each item with a unique character, the message is as important as the product. The brand speaks volumes and so does every other detail, right down to whether the buttonholes are functional or not —in case anyone happens to be staring at your buttonholes. When a couple spends so much money they do not have on fancy clothes, one wonders: What sort of facade were they trying to build? How were they attempting to “brand” themselves? As fabulously successful? As accomplished? As carefree?
When he walked out of the
courthouse, Blagojevich asked the assembled media what they thought of his suit. It’s a question that suggests that all that shopping wasn’t personally satisfying, it wasn’t for his pleasure. It was in search of approval. In hopes of getting a nod of respect. The prosecution has spent weeks attacking Blagojevich’s reputation and his aptitude as the state’s chief executive. His disastrous finances have been laid bare. But he can at least be reassured in knowing that his suit, well, it looks really, really nice.
givhanr@washpost.com
For his basket-weave tie from Saks Fifth Avenue.
What he spent in a single store on shirts.
A charge on Patti’s credit card for furs.
C304 MC 2x5.75
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