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of the conservative philosophies his father had embraced after coming to America. Because of what he saw the Soviet Union do to Yugoslavia, Rade Blagojevich deeply hated communism and embraced the Republican Party in America for their hard-line stance againstreds. His conservative beliefs usually upset Millie, a New Deal Democrat who witnessed America’s progress under FDR, and didn’t match up well with the relatively liberal kids at Northwestern.
    But Rade’s influence and passion rubbed off on both Blagojevich boys, especially as they attended college during the tumultuous Jimmy Carter years. Studying politics and history, Rod gravitated toward men who made something of themselves from humble beginnings. He admired Alexander Hamilton, born poor in the West Indies, so much that he would later describe having a “man crush” on him and claim he memorized several of the Federalist Papers. Rod also identified greatly with Richard Nixon, confiding to friends a certain kinship with the shamed ex-president who had to work harder than everybody else to succeed.
    In the post-Watergate era, it was more popular than ever on college campuses to be a Democrat. But Blagojevich went out of his way to debate his classmates and always took the conservative side. What the Kennedys did was just as bad as Nixon, he said dismissively. Nixon was a true American success story. His background and persona resonated with Blagojevich, who embraced the same chip-on-your-shoulder, up-from-nowhere attitude Nixon carried with him throughout much of his life. Blagojevich was embracing his role as outsider.
    His uncanny ability to memorize always helped in his campus debates. Trying to sound smart, he’d recite another famous speech from Republican Teddy Roosevelt, declaiming verbatim Roosevelt’s famous “Man in the Arena” speech.
    â€œIt is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better. The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood.”
    To Powell and the rest of Blagojevich’s buddies, Rod wasn’t just trying to show off. He believed the words he was reciting. What’s more, Blagojevich was collecting his odd stable of political heroes: Lincoln, Teddy Roosevelt, Nixon. He’d soon add a fourth: Ronald Reagan, for whom he’d vote for president in 1980.

    But as much as Rod was maturing in his political beliefs, he was still immature in many other ways. Blagojevich, Ascaridis, and other friendscrank-called Chicago radio talk shows on WIND with Ascaridis trying to sound Latino and identifying himself as Rico La Verga.
    â€œWe would all dissolve in laughter. Mike had just gotten on the air calling himself Rico the Dick,” wrote Powell, who became a foreign correspondent for
Newsweek
and
Time
and wrote an article about his times with Blagojevich in
Men’s Journal.
Rod called another time, on St. Patrick’s Day, when listeners were invited to talk about what they loved about the Irish.
    â€œI think they’re a bunch of sloths,” Blagojevich said before hanging up.
    The friends recorded the pranks and put them on a tape they called the Classics. Blagojevich also just liked screwing with people for sport, a character trait that continued well into his adulthood and political career.
    At a Chicago Bulls game one night, Blagojevich and Powell brought along a nerdy friend named Rob, whom Blagojevich spent the entire first half trying to convince that a player had a fake nose because he was wearing a protective facemask.
    â€œSeriously, Rob, this guy has no nose,” Rod deadpanned. “Can you believe that? That’s an artificial nose the guy’s playing with.”

    By the time he received his degree from Northwestern, Blagojevich had decided politics was in his future and his best bet was to detach himself from the