This is the Spokesmodel-in-Chief’s 100 Day Ain’t I Great? speech before his third Fuck It, Why Not? press conference. His subliminal thoughts are italicized. The regular type represents his WORM (What Obama Really Meant).
Hey, ‘Bots, how’s it hangin’? Before I get into what you all came for, talking about me, what I’ve done, and how cool I look doing it, ’cause, let’s face it, if it wasn’t about me…okay, and, to a much lesser extent, you, and how much you love me, none of us would be here, right? We need each other, you and me. You need to love me, ’cause I’m black and cute, and this is the only way most of y’all can love a cute black man in public and still have friends, and, to be honest, for once, heh, heh, I need you to love me, no matter how much it costs you. ‘Cause, it ain’t really about you, it’s all about me. Always. See,…Huh? I’m on? Well, let’s do the damned thing, then.
This is the original, pre-Fabreau-ized, pre-Axelrod-approved draft of President Black Obama’s “give up da nukes” speech in Prague, Czech Republic today, written by Just Barely President, Baracus Hubris Maximus, (Hail, Ceasar!) as imagined by me.
Hey, yo, y’all, whazzup? I’ma be rappin’ atcha for a few, so chill. First, let me do my obligatory JFK thing, and tell you how glad I am to be the man who brought Michelle Obama to Prague. She hates being cooped up in the White House (I think it’s a color thing) and she can beat me up, so I didn’t have much choice; besides, the real Jackie Kennedy wasn’t available. Ha, ha. Being from Chicago, I know a lot of Czech people, the town’s full of people whose names I can’t pronounce, and, y’all like to travel back and forth, like the guy whose statue is behind me…what’s his name…the one who drew 80,000 more people when he spoke in my home town in 1918 than I did here today? It’s hard for me to think (read) when my ego shrinks, but, wait a minute, don’t tell me…Tomas Masaryk, that’s it! I’m not pissed, though. Hell, some of my best friends are Czech, like Tony Rezko. Wait a minute, he’s Syrian, my bad. But, since he’s in jail, he’s not the same Tony Rezko I knew, and I’m pretty sure he was Czech back when I did know him. Maybe I’m thinking Blagojevich, he claims he’s Serbian, but, I can’t pronounce his name either, and, since he’s also going to jail soon, he probably used to be Czech back in the day, too. Besides, Czech, Slovak, Serb, Syrian, what’s the diff?
Maybe because his plans to ravage the Republican party by inflating Rush Limbaugh’s importance only to tear it down are working so well. And make no mistake, these are Barack Obama’s plans.
Anybody who’s been paying the slightest bit of attention to ObamAntics the past couple years knows that calling out the press is one of his favorite past times. He chided Don Imus and called for the schlock jock be fired for his “nappy headed ‘ho’s” characterization of the Rutger’s women’s basketball team. From ABC News, April, 2007:
“I understand MSNBC has suspended Mr. Imus,” Obama told ABC News, “but I would also say that there’s nobody on my staff who would still be working for me if they made a comment like that about anybody of any ethnic group. And I would hope that NBC ends up having that same attitude.”
He reprimanded the Chicago Tribune’s John Kass in March of 2008, for not being properly deferential at any and all times, when Kass confronted The Never To Be Questioned One about his ties to ersatz realtor and convicted felon, Tony Rezko:
“I know that there are those, like John Kass, who would like me to decry Chicago politics more frequently.”
Just the corrupt parts, I said.
“I’ll leave that to his editorial commentary, but I think it’s fair to say that I have conducted myself in my public office with great care and high ethical standards,” he said.
Except for Rezko.
He kicked reporters off his campaign plane after their papers endorsed his rival, John McCain. From the Washington Post, October 2008:
The Washington Times, which has had a reporter traveling with Barack Obama’s campaign for nearly two years, has been kicked off his press plane.
“The decision came just three days after the editorial page endorsed John McCain,” Times editor in chief John Solomon said this morning. “I hope a candidate who says he wants to unite the country isn’t using a litmus test for who can cover him.”
What’s more, the Obama operation has ejected reporters for the New York Post and Dallas Morning News, which have also endorsed McCain. And room was suddenly made for two magazines that have not been traveling with the Democratic nominee, Essence and Ebony.
He even got downright pissy with the White House press corps 2 days after he was inaugurated, for daring to ask him a question amidst all the bootlicking he had come down to the press room to get:
“Ahh, see,” he said, “I came down here to visit. See this is what happens. I can’t end up visiting with you guys and shaking hands if I’m going to get grilled every time I come down here.”
And while Politico and others have shown pretty conclusively that the current “Operation: Get Rush” campaign is coming straight from the West Wing via Rahm Emanuel playing field general to suckophants Paul Begala, James Carville and George Stephanopoulis, to lay the blame at the feet of Rahmbo is to miss the larger point.
Barack Obama himself launched the opening salvo in the Limbaugh-Obama war in January. From the New York Post:
President Obama warned Republicans on Capitol Hill today that they need to quit listening to radio king Rush Limbaugh if they want to get along with Democrats and the new administration.
“You can’t just listen to Rush Limbaugh and get things done,” he told top GOP leaders, whom he had invited to the White House to discuss his nearly $1 trillion stimulus package.
As we, the people, try to figure out exactly where President Black Obama might be going with his stimulus, budgets, and bailouts, I thought it might be useful to revisit some earlier articles about him in an attempt to gain insight. Given what we already know, and have seen with our own eyes, the observations and quoted statements written here likely provide a slightly different perspective than one might have gleaned from them when they first appeared in print.
The first series of quotes are from a September 2, 2006 New York Magazine 8 page love letter written by Jennifer Senior:
“To me, the issue is not are you centrist or are you liberal,” he says. “The issue to me is, Is what you’re proposing going to work? Can you build a working coalition to make the lives of people better? And if it can work, you should support it whether it’s centrist, conservative, or liberal.”
“I don’t want people to pretend I’m not black or that it’s somehow not relevant. But ultimately,” he says, “I’d want to be a really great president, you know? And then I’d worry about all the other stuff. Because there are a lot of mediocre or poor presidents.”
“One good test as to whether folks are doing interesting work is, Can they surprise me?” he tells me. “And increasingly, when I read Daily Kos, it doesn’t surprise me. It’s all just exactly what I would expect.”
The next series of snippets from an April 3, 2007 article by Christopher Drew and Mike McIntire, are not direct quotes from the then, Not Quite Obamessiah, But Almost, they reflect the authors’ investigation into his more mortal early attempts at fundraising:
Mr. Obama’s breakthrough in the 2004 Senate race was also made possible by a new wrinkle in the election laws. Faced with a self-financed opponent in the Democratic primary, Blair Hull, who pumped more than $28 million of his own money into the race, Mr. Obama was able to accept up to $12,000 from each donor, or six times the limit at that time.
As a result, nearly half of the more than $5 million that Mr. Obama raised in the primary came from just 300 donors. In a stroke of luck, he had just enough money to pay for a television advertising blitz in the final weeks as Mr. Hull’s campaign crumbled amid accusations that he had abused a former wife.
edit
When Mr. Obama decided to run for Congress in 2000 against the former Black Panther Bobby Rush, he used a $9,500 personal loan to help finance the campaign. When he lost, he found himself broke and fielding questions from the Federal Election Commission about his campaign finances. He later had to lend his campaign committee $11,100 more to cover refunds to donors who had inadvertently given too much.
It took him two years to repay his own loans, mostly with small checks from black executives who agreed to help him prepare for another run.
edit
Antoin Rezko, a Chicago businessman who was later involved in a land deal with the Obamas, gave $10,500.
Mr. Obama’s support also widened among Chicago’s business elite. Members of the Pritzker family, which founded the Hyatt Hotel chain, donated $40,000; Penny Pritzker is now the senator’s national finance chairwoman.
Mr. Crown, whose family’s investments include a major stake in the military contractor General Dynamics, said family members normally avoided taking sides in a primary, in part because it was not good for business. But with Mr. Obama, they made an exception, with 10 family members giving a total of $112,500.
edit
Mr. Obama also attracted major national Democratic donors, including George Soros and members of his family, who gave a total of $60,000.
In December, 2006, the Chicago Sun-Times reported on The President Formerly Known As Bonehead’s pay-to-play involvement with his de facto real estate partner and campaign donor, Tony Rezko:
In addition to a land deal, Sen. Barack Obama’s ties to indicted dealmaker Antoin “Tony” Rezko include an internship the senator provided the son of a contributor at the request of Rezko, an Obama spokesman confirmed Saturday.
John Aramanda served as an intern for Obama for about a month in 2005, said Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs. His father is Joseph Aramanda, a Rezko business associate who was named as an unindicted co-conspirator in a federal corruption case against Rezko. Aramanda has contributed $11,500 to Obama since 2000, Gibbs said.
“Mr. Rezko did provide a recommendation for John Aramanda,” Gibbs said. “I think that it’s fairly obvious that a few-week internship is not anything of benefit to Mr. Rezko or any of his businesses.”
The internship revelation comes after Obama acknowledged he erred in buying property from Rezko in January. The transaction took place when it was widely known Rezko was under investigation by the U.S. attorney’s office.
The Baltimore Sun ran a May, 2007 story about Obuyme’s holier-than-thou attitude about pork, pay-to-pay, payoffs and politics:
“My philosophy was that, if money was being distributed, then it would be inappropriate for me to not get my share for my district,” Obama, now one of the U.S. Senate Democrats’ leaders on ethics reform, said in an interview. “Did I think it was the best way to prioritize government spending? No.”
Ryan Lizza wrote a ten page investigation into Obama’s early community organizing days, clled, The Agitator, and examined how he came to be “faith-based:”
From Wright and others, Obama learned that part of his problem as an organizer was that he was trying to build a confederation of churches but wasn’t showing up in the pews on Sunday. When pastors asked him the inevitable questions about his own spiritual life, Obama would duck them uncomfortably. A Reverend Philips put the problem to him squarely when he learned that Obama didn’t attend services. “It might help your mission if you had a church home,” he told Obama. “It doesn’t matter where, really. What you’re asking from pastors requires us to set aside some of our more priestly concerns in favor of prophesy. That requires a good deal of faith on our part. It makes us want to know just where you’re getting yours from.”
After many lectures like this, Obama decided to take a second look at Wright’s church. Older pastors warned him that Trinity was for “Buppies”–black urban professionals–and didn’t have enough street cred. But Wright was a former Muslim and black nationalist who had studied at Howard and Chicago, and Trinity’s guiding principles–what the church calls the “Black Value System”–included a “Disavowal of the Pursuit of ‘Middleclassness.’”
The cross currents appealed to Obama. He came to believe that the church could not only compensate for the limitations of Alinsky-style organizing but could help answer the nagging identity problem he had come to Chicago to solve. “It was a powerful program, this cultural community,” he wrote, “one more pliant than simple nationalism, more sustaining than my own brand of organizing. “
In March of last year, China Daily (?!?) found it interesting that not all rich black people were putting their money where Obrother’s mouth was:
Barack Obama’s quest to become the first African-American president is being run without the financial support of much of the black corporate elite.
Less than one-third of the 191 black members of the boards of the largest 250 US companies have contributed to the Illinois senator’s campaign, according to Federal Election Commission records. The list of board members was compiled by Black Enterprise magazine.
As Americans try to wrap their heads around their hopey-changey KoolAid Dispenser-In-Chief’s sudden, “surprise” (not) rubber-burning lurch to the left, they might wanna pick their jaws up off the floor and read what Stanley Kurtz (yeah, yeah) had to say about Senator Stealth and the Gamaliel Foundation. In fact, a look back at Sual Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals might be in order; he was the Father of Community Organizing, and the Obamessiah, like Jesus before him, is following in his father’s footsteps, right? So, shouldn’t we all just put our differences aside and let his gentle hand guide us through our current turbulent waters? The problems he’s inherited are inevitable, aren’t they?
Poor President Black Obama. Life as leader of the free world must be so very much different than he thought it would be back in the days when he read about it in the news and decided that gosh darnit, things needed to change. I mean, how was he to know that getting people to give up old ways that worked fine for them all their lives would be hard, really hard, as really, really hard as George Bush found the job to be, too? Back when Obie was conjuring up hypotheticals to challenge the young minds of privileged youth as an “all but what it lack” constitutional law professor in the cloistered confines of the Hyde Park enclave’s Ivy League equivalent, the answers had to seem so obvious. Forget the “duh” factor involved since he was the one who made up the questions; mingling with sharks, tigers, barracudas and lions and trying to turn them into pussycats, puppies and pretty, pretty sparrows is not as easy as you might think from the comfort of your ergonomic Barcalounger. Running smack into the “I hope you take your change and stick it where the sun don’t shine” reality of the “survival of the fittest” predatory jungle that is D.C. politics has to be a cold, cruel wake-up call to the man who dreamed ObamaLand. Oh, well.
Looking out the window of a Rezko subsidized McMansion, the fact that lobbyists are bad, bad, bad, and the country needs clean, honest, transparent government is such an obvious no-brainer. Don’t need a Harvard Law degree to figure that one out. But, funny thing, that. Not only do those stubborn lobbyists not want to give up a single iota of power and influence, (can you imagine?) everyfuckingbody is one! And, they’re all crooks to boot! Even people you like a lot. I mean, sheesh! What’s a Spokesmodel Pres to do?
Barack Obama promised a “clean break from business as usual” in Washington. It hasn’t quite worked out that way.
From the start, he made exceptions to his no-lobbyist rule. And now, embarrassing details about Cabinet-nominee Tom Daschle’s tax problems and big paychecks from special interest groups are raising new questions about the reach and sweep of the new president’s promised reforms.
Maybe he shouldn’t have promised so much, some open-government advocates say. They’re willing to cut him some slack — for now.
The delusional Associated Press is obviously in denial too, since they seem oblivious to the “if it was a snake it woulda bitcha” truth staring them in the face that slack-cutting has become a way of life for those charged with monitoring and assessing the performance of the Baby Pres-In-Training Wheels’ nascent administration.
There was slack-cutting aplenty going on when the “aahh, fuhgeddaboudit” press pass was issued to Turbo Tax Timmy Geithner, tax cheat, via the access given Astroturfing Obacrats assigned to speak on, and off, the record excusing his “innocent” transgressions between proclamations of his stellar qualifications as worthy Obamessiah acolyte. Snip, snip, slack abounds. More slack was paid out in the noose line that threatened to choke the life out of the appointment of another TelePrompTer Jesus disciple, Eric Holder, approved by the bishops just today. And Williams Lynn and Corr were snuck onto the Fisherman’s boat with slack sufficient to jump rope with, despite Lord Changey Hope’s oft-issued earlier proclamations from on high:
However, William J. Lynn III, his choice to become the No. 2 official at the Defense Department, recently lobbied for military contractor Raytheon. And William Corr, tapped as deputy secretary at Health and Human Services, lobbied through most of last year as an anti-tobacco advocate. Corr says he will take no part in tobacco matters in the new administration.
“Even the toughest rules require reasonable exceptions,” said White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs.
That was a big step back from Obama’s unambiguous swipe at lobbyists in November 2007, while campaigning for the Democratic presidential nomination. “I don’t take a dime of their money,” he said, “and when I am president, they won’t find a job in my White House.”
So, now that absolution has been granted to so many other transgressors, Tax Cheat II, Tom Daschle, is almost assured forgiveness, despite the fact that he’s a liar who has had to confess to the dreaded lobbying sin, too:
For Tom Daschle, life out of the Senate has been lucrative. In addition to his work as an adviser to a Washington law firm and as chairman of the board for a private equity firm, Daschle has been paid $195,000 to give speeches to health care industry groups — the very sector President Obama has designated him to overhaul.
While it is common for former lawmakers to engage in paid speaking and lobbying, the fees Daschle received and his work as a special policy adviser to health care clients with the lobbying and law firm Alston & Bird raise fresh questions about his nomination to be Health and Human Services secretary, a selection already thrown off track by revelations that he amended his tax returns on Jan. 2 to pay the IRS roughly $140,000 in back taxes and interest.
Hey, it’s not like Little Lord Wannabe’s doing any Blago-type pay-to-play shenanigans with Senate seats, or nothin’. Is he supposed to know that sometimes the people you appoint for all the right reasons have skeletons in their closets, like trying to abolish the very department you seek to have them head? These things are simply not his fault! It’s just that painting rainbows on graffiti filled alley walls is hard.
Nope. Though some folks would have you believe that, President Black Obama’s closest aides were not subpoenaed; the Cabbage Patch Weeble, impeached Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich’s records regarding any conversations, papers, etc., he had concerning the Dynamic Duo were, on December 8. The next day, Blags was arrested, according to the media for trying to sell the only clean politician in Illinois state’s history’s curiously vacated Senate seat, the one that home girl Valerie Jarrett didn’t want, anyway, no matter what newly appointed White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel said. Then, Pope President proclaimed Blagojevich guilty and his buddies not, and passed sentence that Hot Rod should save the state time and money and take the “Frankie Five Angels” option and kill himself, politically speaking, and resign. Blago said, “Fuck you, and the unicorn you rode in on, Bozo Bitch.” Blaggy probably took that position because, even though a lot of his troubles arise from his relationship with Antonin Rezko, the slumlord never helped himbuy a house or housing project.
Back to the subpoenas. U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, who first pronounced judgment on Blagojevich in the press conference announcing his arrest, by matter-of-factly stating that he had Blags arrested to stop a criminal from committing worse crimes, obviously didn’t have enough to indict the obviously guilty Cabbage Patch Weeble, because he didn’t. He issued a 78 page complaint, arrested the guy, let him go on paltry bail, then asked for a 90 day extension to make his case, even with all the subpoenas, wiretapped conversations and new witnesses. However, once St. Pat got the hot little Axelfuck/Slumlady docs in his hand, and listened to the tapes, he hauled Jarrett, her buddy Rahm Emanuel, and her boss, Mr. Clean in for questioning, even though His Holiness had by now, officially cleared himself and annointed his staff with holy water.
By this point, the Axelrove Astroturfing was in full swing, with the press not only convicting Blago, but aiding and abetting the Illinois Congress in trying to kick him out of office on any number of grounds, most notably his demonstrable madness, caused by his Bob Big Boy hair growing inward as thickly as it does outwardly. Cabbage Patch said, “Suck my nuts, you ninnies, I ain’t going nowhere,” and appointed Roland Burris to Obuhbuh’s curiously vacated Senate seat to prove it. Once the Astroturf Army picked their jaws up off the floor, they used them to flap incessantly that Blag’s “audacity” proved his insanity as surely as Obuyme’s proved his divinity. It was on.
Since then, Blagojevich has prevailed, primarily because the political machinations of the media-enabled U.S. show government had no legal authority that would trump a sitting governor, so, we now move to the next phase, where the media-enabled political machinations of the Illinois show government rule. While CPW (Cabbage Patch Weeble) mounts his own media blitz protesting his kangaroo court “hanging” (he couldn’t use “lynching“, he’s white) the pissed off pols in the Land of Lincoln gleefully admit that they have the power to remove him from office based on unproven allegations against him because they’re not a court of law, but a Clinton impeachment-inspired political process (kangaroo court.)
But lawmakers quickly defended the process of a Democratic legislature ousting a two-term Democratic governor, noting Blagojevich’s complaints were an attempt to confuse the public by injecting criminal trial rights into an impeachment process that is purely political.
All the while, the ‘Turfers “report” the “important” facts against CPW, like the fact that his protestations “prove” his desperation, implying guilt, even though, any fool could see that anyone similarly ostracized and castigated, guilty or innocent, would likely run screaming, “Hey, listen to my side, you sanctimonious pricks!” to anybody who would listen. It’s not like lynch mobs are always right:
While Illinois history provides little guide to a Senate trial and conviction of a governor, the last impeachment in the nation’s history—the 1988 conviction and removal of controversial Arizona Gov. Evan Mecham—illustrates some things that could happen.
Mecham unsuccessfully fought to delay his impeachment trial until after his federal trial on corruption charges. Though he was removed from office, the Arizona Senate failed to muster the votes necessary to give Mecham the political death penalty and Mecham, who was acquitted of the corruption counts, lost races for governor in 1990 and U.S. senator two years later.
*UPDATE: According to the Chicago Tribune, Blagojevich had some intriguing things to say in his 2-part NBC interview with Amy Robach. While most news outlets are focusing on Blago’s statements regarding his reflections upon Ghandi, Dr. King, and Mandela, it seems the transcript reveals he made other statements worthy of note:
Maintaining his innocence in his interview with NBC, portions of which were aired Sunday and others to be aired Monday, Blagojevich said that upon his Dec. 9 arrest at his Northwest Side home, “I thought about Mandela, Dr. King, Gandhi and trying to put some perspective in all of this.”
At the same time, Blagojevich said “some national figures like Harry Reid,” the U.S. Senate majority leader from Nevada, “are frankly covering their own backside” by asking him to step down because of their discussions with him over the Senate seat vacated by President Barack Obama. Blagojevich is accused of trying to peddle the seat for an Obama administration post, a high-paying job or other favors.
“And for me to just quit because some cackling politicians want to get me out of the way because there’s a whole bunch of things they don’t want known about them and conversations they may have had with me ….. would be to disgrace my children when I know I’ve done nothing wrong,” Blagojevich said in a transcript of the interview.
UPDATE II: John Kass of the Chicago Tribune has more here about the real reason for Blago’s lawyer, Ed Genson’s bailing out, among other things.
The Illinois committee’s report points out that Blagojevich does not need to be found guilty of a crime for the House to impeach him.
”It would, in fact, be unreasonable to limit impeachable offenses to criminal conduct,” the report says. ”An impeachment inquiry is not a criminal proceeding and its purpose is not punitive. Rather, impeachment is a remedial proceeding to protect the public from an officer who has abused his position of trust.”
Proof? We don’t need no stinkin’ proof. Somebody said, a U.S. Attorney, no less, on TV, for Goodness sakes, that the guy was on a crime spree, because, he said, he heard somebody say to somebody else on the phone that he was gonna, and, then he said the governor said if they didn’t do what he wanted, bleep ‘em. What kind of way is that for a Governor to talk, huh? Mother bleeper? We never liked him, anyway. He tried to get flu vaccines delivered to Illinois during a shortage. What kind of slimy, lowdown crook would do something like that? And the casinos he ripped off for the horse race guys are taking bets on jail time. Are you kidding me? He must be guilty, I saw it on TV. He shoulda had the decency to resign. He knows Rezko, you know?
Whoever thought maneuvering Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich into a position that allowed U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald to officially criminalize machine politics-as-usual for political advantage has got to be the biggest neophyte yahoo rube to come down the pike since…Barack Obama. Let’s review. Barack Obama, the only African American in the Senate for two years, mysteriously generates enough money and clout to mount a successful run for the presidency out of a political environment so corrupt that “Lincoln would roll over in his grave,” how? By being an all-around, all-American, above-board, swell, good guy, of course. Sure.
Surrounded by his personal band of proselytizing disciples; Rahmbo the Emanuel, Valerie Magdalene, King David of the Astroturf, Antonin of Houses, and Jon, the Groper of Graven Images, to name a few, the Obamessiah scampered above the sewer waters of Illinois corruption as if they were a North Side private gymnasium treadmill. As a fisher of men, He was often unfortunately touched, but not tainted by, the activities of the unworthy among those He assembled and attempted to make pure, as has been dutifully chronicled by the mainstream media Keepers of the Holy Book of the Obamessiah. However, Barack remains the Reformer, bathed in the Light.
Clean, bright and articulate by resume, the recent machinations by the Combine Machine of the Obacrats are threatening to reveal enough cracks in the Obamirror of Righteousness to expose His Holy Stupid-as-a-Stumpness in a nationally broadcast Naivete Scene. Did it never occur to the No Drama Obama crew that manipulating a fellow player not of their clique into a corner carried risks?
When one of their number, Antonin of Houses, stumbled and fell by the wayside, the Obasciples simply stepped gingerly, single-file around him, leaving him where he lay, disavowing him three times as they boarded the Obabus he rolled under when they continued confidently on their preordained journey to the Promised Land. The Obamessiah did not lay hands upon him, nor did He absolve him of his sin; He simply denied knowledge of him as He brushed His Holy shoulders and allowed Himself to be driven on. This was a Holy boo-boo.
For Antonin of Houses had special knowledge of Valerie Magdalene and the Obamessiah, and Antonin was pisseth.
Fast forward to the twenty-first century post-election ensconcement of the Obamessiah as President-In-Training Wheels. Having written and disseminated his own Holy backstory to the Chroniclers, and having consumed their regurgitated praise to his overfill, the Obamesiah, drunk with his own Obamessiah-ness by proxy, allowed Himself to believe He, Jr. Father, Knew Best. Thus began the chess match, whereby playing unopposed, the Obamessiah cleverly checkmated Himownself.
Seeing a way to eliminate his only real threat to absolute power in His own backyard, Barack of Hyde Park decided to continue to attempt to appear to levitate above the machinations of His betrayed Obasciple of the Houses, and the locust-and-honey-eating way clearer, the crude Rod the Blagojevich, while shining His Holy Light upon their common evangelical activities, forgetting He too, was bathed in His Own Light. Thus, He Screweth Himself.
Okay, enough of the Obamessiah allegory; it’s not only making me nauseous, I’m not nearly as good at it as John, South of Melrose over on Liberal Rapture or Gerald Baker; plus I need to be free to call bullshit without all this pseudo-Christian baggage. So, let’s get back to brass tacks, shall we?
The fact remains that Obama screwed the pooch when he tried to play innocent while pointing the finger at Blagojevich. Everybody in Illinois knew Blags was under investigation, he even hinted at the worst kept secret in politics the day before he was arrested. Everybody also knew that even with Rezko’s making like a canary, Fitzgerald didn’t have enough to indict. He still doesn’t. But when the president-elect bats his exaggeratedly wide-open eyes and tilts his head in your direction when somebody else calls you a crook, people sit up and take notice.
Obama and company knew that if they dangled the vacant Senate seat plum just right while they dropped unsubtle hints that Fitzgerald was sure to pick up, the investigation against Blags was sure to intensify. However, methinks they underestimated the existing intensity of the ongoing investigation. Thinking that the tentacles would subsequently stretch out in all directions, they never considered that they already did, that it wasn’t just one Blagojevich phone that was tapped, and that more of their pre-cleanup involvement was already caught on tape.
Now, the smartest president in the room and his gang have been interviewed in a pay-to-play scam and have proclaimed their innocence, just like Blagojevich, just like Bill Richardson. Though Blago has been arrested, before his alleged crime could criminally implicate anybody else, he hasn’t been indicted, he was released on a paltry bond, and he remains free to exercise his duties as governor. And, now that he has done just that, the Obacrats, who for their own nefarious reasons, swept Obama to power, are desperate to get Blags to nullify himself, since they know they have no legal, or moral, authority to do so. They also know now that Blagojevich knows it, too; by making the appointment, the Obacrats are not only rendered impotent, they’ve handcuffed and prevented themselves from exercising any power they might once have wielded. For, even if they impeach Blago, or he now resigns, there’s nothing that would make Roland Burris’ appointment to the Senate retroactively invalid. From Politico:
The Democrats’ preferred solution to the Burris problem is for the Illinois Legislature to impeach Blagojevich, paving the way for Democratic Lt. Gov. Pat Quinn to take his place and appoint someone other than Burris to Obama’s vacant seat. But even that could create a legal headache, legal observers say, since the Burris appointment would still be pending.
“Even if Blagojevich is impeached, that doesn’t undo all the actions he has taken as governor,” said Andrew Raucci, a former chief justice for the Illinois Court of Claims and now a Chicago-based attorney.
Democrats say that if Burris hasn’t been seated by the time Quinn takes over, he could name someone else to the seat by rescinding Burris’ certification papers.
Burris was having none of it. At a news conference at Chicago’s Midway Airport, the former Illinois attorney general testily said to reporters, “Why don’t you all understand that what has been done here is legal? I am the junior senator from Illinois, and I wish my colleagues in the press would recognize that. All the drama — I guess it keeps you all in a job.”
And, to make bad matters worse, not only is Burris adamant that he is the junior senator from Illinois no matter what ticky-tack maneuvers the Obacrats try to pull, the criminalization of day to day political manipulation makes every satellite in the Oba-universe vulnerable. Just ask Bill Richardson.
A local Chicago ABC News affiliate is reporting that Jesse Jackson, Jr., “Candidate Number 5” in the Rod Blagojevich “Senate seat sale” scandal, not only once blew the whistle on “Hot Rod,” he also received a “courtesy call” from the Feds before Blago’s arrest in the scheme. Since we have no information as to whether the terms, “watch your ass,” or, “you owe us big time,” were used, we have no way of knowing the nature of the Feebie’s “heads up.” However, given that Jackson served as Obama’s national campaign co-chair, the story is being presented by the media outlet in the best possible light. Otherwise, the blowback from Jackson’s possible complicity in the scam might blow back on The Chosen One, and we mustn’t have that.
Jackson has been fighting for his reputation since the federal complaint revealed his supporters were willing to raise money for the governor, if Jackson was appointed to the Senate.
The new information appears to support Jackson’s claim that he was not involved in a scheme to buy a U.S. Senate seat.
ABC7 has learned that since late last summer, the congressman has worked with federal prosecutors, informing on an alleged Blagojevich administration scheme two and half years earlier.
The meeting in June of 2006 at a Gold Coast hotel included Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr. and Blagojevich fundraiser Antoin “Tony” Rezko.
So, basically, the Feds have been on to Jackson for some time, one way or another. We don’t know the nature of these “interviews,” who initiated them, and/or whether Jackson’s “cooperation” was entirely voluntary. All we know from the article is that there have been multiple contacts:
Then last summer, weeks after Rezko was found guilty of un-related corruption, the U.S. Attorney’s Office interviewed the congressman as a possible witness against the governor in the Peotone matter.
And sources tell ABC7 that Jackson has been in regular contact with the feds and has told the government that in 2003 Blagojevich denied the congressman’s wife Sandi an appointment as Illinois lottery director because Jackson would not donate $25,000 to the governor’s campaign fund.
The article concludes, however, by pointing out that Jackson supporters might want to hold off on finagling the U.S. Attorney into publicly clearing their guy:
Jackson supporters ABC7 talked to on Monday want the U.S. attorney to give the congressman a clean bill of health so to speak.
In1998, then U.S. Attorney Scott Lassar did that for Republican gubernatorial candidate George Ryan. Ryan was eventually convicted of corruption and now sits in a federal prison.
At the very least, we now know for sure that Jackson had first hand knowledge that Blago was open to bribery.
On Tuesday, when the news of Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich’s arrest broke, U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald declared that it was “a sad day for Illinois government” and that Blagojevich had “taken us to a truly new low.” But, was it really? From the New York Times transcript of the press conference, Fitgerald said:
Governor Blagojevich has been arrested in the middle of what we can only describe as a political corruption crime spree. We acted to stop that crime spree.
The most appalling conduct Governor Blagojevich engaged in, according to the complaint filed today or unsealed today, is that he attempted to sell a Senate seat, the Senate seat he had the sole right to under Illinois to appoint to replace President-elect Obama.
Attempting to sell a Senate seat, an attempt that was thwarted by Fitzgerald, by the way, constitutes a “crime spree” that would make “Lincoln turn over in his grave?” Fitzgerald’s justification makes no sense at all. If Blago had indeed appointed someone to Obama’s seat in a “pay for play” scheme, Fitz would have netted 2 big fish dead to rights, since the payee/selectee would be guilty as sin, too. Nope, there’s more to this story than meets the eye.
What we also know is that some of these schemes went pretty far and some did not go far at all. But they had discussions about what they would do, who they would approach and how they would phrase it.
And we need to do the investigation, now that the investigation is overt, to find out from other people what happened, what they were told, how explicitly, what they understood, and what happened.
“I should make clear, the complaint makes no allegations about the president-elect whatsoever,” Fitzgerald said. “We make no allegations that he’s aware of anything, and that’s as simply as I can put it. . . .
“There’s no reference in the complaint to any conversations involving the president-elect or indicating that the president-elect was aware of it. And that’s all I can say.”
Note he said “complaint,” not “investigation.” And, that’s all I can say.
In an apparent attempt to avoid answering potentially embarassing questions about his relationship with Senate seat salesman Rod Blagojevich, President-elect-to-be Barack Obama announced his new Secretary of Housing and Urban Development, Shaun Donovan, at the crack of dawn, without fanfare. From Politico:
In a twist on his use of new media to make news, President-elect Barack Obama used his weekly radio address this morning to announce his pick to head the Department of Housing and Urban Development.
Obama appointed New York City Commissioner of Housing, Preservation and Development Shaun Donovan to the post, a move his transition apparently leaked last night to The New York Times. The paper has been a strong backer of Mayor Bloomberg and of his housing plans.
The announcement came in a radio and video address released on Saturday morning at 6 a.m., leaving no opportunity for reporters to ask questions, as they typically can when Cabinet announcements and other large initiatives are announced.
Unlike the last announcement of the appointment of Tom Daschle as head of Health and Human Services when Obama was peppered with questions about Blagobitching, today’s appointment came with no opportunity to pursue the matter. Coincidence? Sure.
Why are the Keepers of the Book of Barack, aka the mainstream media, pushing the “Blago’s batshit” story line as quasi-fact? Who does it benefit? If the embattled governor was making such claims, or acting in a manner as if he wanted people to think he’s nuts, it might be more understandable, even though, if that was the case, chances are the Barackomaniacs would reject such assertions as Blago’s pitiful attempts to exonerate himself. They would use his statements as evidence of his criminality just as they use his alleged criminality as evidence of his madness. Why?
The only person or persons likely to benefit from smearing Blagojevich’s mental state are those likely to be smeared by Blago’s potential allegations against them. Therefore, only those fearing implication would make finger twisting motions around their ears when Blago’s name is mentioned. Like Candidate Number 5, Jesse Jackson Jr. And, nobody from Team O is challenging the assertion, either. In fact, Obama’s “mentor,” Abner (we don’t want nobody nobody sent) Mikva, is one of the main pushers. In Jake Tapper’s column, Mikva comments on Blago’s stated desire to run for the presidency in 2016:
“It’s just such a bizarre state of mind, that Gov. Blagojevich had to be in to even think this was possible,” former Democratic Congressman and Judge Abner Mikva told ABC News.
Mikva used the word “delusional” to describe the governor.
The Chicago Sun-Times puts forth the theory that Blagojevich’s choice of hairdo is indicative of his mental deficiency:
Gov. Blagojevich’s glossy locks — perfectly sculpted in rain or snow — may be an indication of a sickness beneath his scalp, said one local psychologist.
“It’s all part of managing his image, managing his image of being without a blemish, without a flaw,” said Scott Ambers, who has practiced clinical psychology in the city for more than two decades.
A February, 2008 Chicago Magazine article specualted that Barack Obama was driving Blago nuts:
Some people think that the governor’s behavior has turned more erratic in the past few years. One reason, they suspect, could be Barack Obama’s extraordinary rise. “Obama’s ascendancy had a significant impact on this guy,” says a Democratic lawmaker from Chicago. “Here’s a lifelong plan that’s been unfolding better than anyone could ever script—an unremarkable state’s attorney becomes an unremarkable state representative, becomes an unremarkable congressman, becomes an unlikely governor. My God, everything’s falling into place! All of a sudden the proverbial skinny guy with the funny name starts making some headway, decides to run for U.S. senator, wins the primary, then gets tapped to do the keynote speech [at the Democratic National Convention]. Knocks the fucking thing out of the park. So now when political people coast to coast talk about Illinois, they talk about Barack Obama. They don’t give a fuck about Rod Blagojevich.” (Blagojevich, like nearly every other Democratic elected official in the state, endorsed Obama in the presidential primary.)
An emotional Congressman Jesse Jackson Jr. touched off a surreal hugfest among bickering top Illinois Democrats meeting at a convention delegation breakfast, all in the name of party unity and Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential bid. Here’s the tale of the tape:
*Jackson summons state Sen. Debbie Halvorson, who’s running for Congress. The two have feuded over control of a third airport in the south suburbs. They embrace.
*“Who else out here been mad at me I ain’t figured out yet?” Jackson asks. Without skipping a beat, Mayor Daley jumps out of his seat and hugs his critic who contemplated a run against him for mayor. In tears, Jackson says, “I’ve been trying to get to know Mayor Daley for 14 years.”
*But Jackson is “not going to be satisfied” until he sees Gov. Rod Blagojevich give House Speaker Michael Madigan a hug. The bad blood between the two is legendary and has ground state government to a halt.
*Sporting a smile from ear to ear, Madigan walks across the makeshift stage and hugs Blagojevich, who then turns and hugs Jackson.
Chicago Tribune reporter John Kaas suggests everybdy’s setting Blago up for a “Frank Pentangeli“-type Godfather-style, “keep your mouth shut for the good of the family” scenario. But that would mean that Blags has something very incriminating to say about somebody who doesn’t want whatever it is to be believed. Whatever. The bottom line is, Rod Blagojevich’s mental health is more of a convenient excuse for his enemies than it is for him.
The Obamessiah already walks on water, and if the mainstream media has it’s way, after Blagogate blows over, if it does, the Teflon TelePrompTer Reader will probably ascend to Washington in a golden chariot on Inauguration Day. What else would be left? According to the keepers of the Book of Barack, he is above the corruption that taints every other denizen of the city from which he hails, he has no peer, he is immaculate.
“I have never spoken to the governor on this subject,” Obama said Thursday, announcing his picks for top aides on health care issues. “I’m confident that no representatives of mine would have any part of any deals related to this seat. I think the materials released by the U.S. attorney reflect that fact.”
And yet, the Blagorezkobama ties have been bandied about for a long time. Jan. 9, 2008:
With Antoin “Tony” Rezko’s federal corruption trial looming, Gov. Rod Blagojevich on Tuesday tried to deflect the heat he’s been getting over his former adviser and top fundraiser by pointing out he’s not the only politician who has received help from Rezko.
Blagojevich ticked off a list of elected officials who also have ties to the indicted developer. While not naming them, he made reference to everyone from Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama to House Speaker Michael Madigan, his political nemesis, and Madigan’s daughter, Atty. Gen. Lisa Madigan.
The Washington Post points out that the Senate seat sale is no the only issue currently under investigation:
A footnote to the 76-page criminal complaint and affidavit charging Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich (D) with soliciting bribes confirms what has long been rumored — that a former longtime friend and fundraiser for President-elect Barack Obama is talking to federal prosecutors in hopes of a reduced sentence.
Antoin “Tony” Rezko’s offer to provide authorities with evidence of others’ wrongdoing is “not complete,” and prosecutors are working to corroborate the claims he has made so far, the footnote said.
The Los Angeles Times tells us that, for some strange reason, Rezko’s sentencing date has been extended, even though he has recently requested otherwise:
Now, why would a judge extend the period before sentencing when the convicted prisoner expressed a desire to get on with prison? Without a new briefs deadline, the expedited Jan. 6 sentencing could now be pushed back further.
Because Rezko, in the hopes of reducing his sentence, is singing in his cell about Blagojevich and maybe others. He’s not done with his song repertoire and the feds haven’t fully checked out his information to determine how grateful to be in sentence-seeking.
So, maybe, just maybe, Obama is not lying about his involvement, or lack thereof, in the Senate seat sale, though Truthteller over at No Quarter makes a pretty darned good case that he is. Be that as it may, perhaps the reason Patrick Fitzgerald prevented Blago from actually committing the crime before King Obama’s coronation has more to do with things he is involved with. Could Blago’s pittance of bail in a rather ambiguous case, coupled with Rezko’s finding his singing voice have anything to do with the Obama house deal, or the kinds of things Evelyn Pringle outlined months ago and were regularly featured on The Real Barack Obama website and referenced on Cannonfire?
At any rate, it probably doesn’t matter if Fitzgerald is trying to flip Blago to corroborate something Rezko has against Obie. No matter what might turn up, the Obamessiah will simply rise above it. He and the keepers of the Book of Barack will see to it.
Barack Hussein Obama is calling for “Hot” Rod Blagojevich’s resignation. No surprise there. Perpetually “under investigation,” Blago has been arrested for trying to sell Obama’s curiously prematurely vacant Senate seat, after all. But, aside from the apparent, yet unexplained, sense of urgency that compelled the President-elect to give up his Senate earlier than any of his predecessors, many things in this “Keystone Cops Goes Soprano” drama make no sense. Why only $4,500 bail for crimes that would make “Lincoln roll over in his grave?” Isn’t that a little low?
Blagojevich was charged with two counts: conspiracy to commit fraud, which carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison, and solicitation to commit bribery, which is punishable by up 10 years. He was released on his own recognizance.
Hmmmm…take a guy out of his house at 6:30 in the morning then let him go on his own recognizance for chump change and his passport. Okay, moving on. Nah, let’s back up. What if this whole thing is not really about Blago bullying ‘Bama’s Boyz? What if it’s about some of the other stuff mentioned in the complaint…like, say, Tony Rezko? I mean, Rezko suddenly did push for a sentencing date on Nov. 29th, after getting it delayed in early October. Why? Was he through singing? According to the Weekly Standard, Rezko’s the reason his partner in crime got arrested:
In the run-up to election day we heard a great deal about Tony Rezko, and how his criminal associations reflected poorly on Obama. Little did we suspect then that the biggest crook Rezko knows is the governor of Illinois. With the arrest of Governor Blagojevich this morning, it becomes clear that Tony Rezko played a significant role in putting him in jail. Rezko’s name appears 170 times in the criminal complaint against Blagojevich and Harris, and the FBI states early on (page 11) that he was cooperating with the investigation.
Now, we all know about Obama’s “boneheaded” house purchase with the “guy who isn’t the guy he thought he knew,” but what if that guy, and the other, Blago guy, think they know Obama pretty darned well? Could it be in their best interests to tell whatever they might know about the fella who likes to keep them at arm’s distance in return for leniency? It’s a thought.
And, oh, by the way, when Rezko was arrested for wire fraud, money laundering, bribery and attempted extortion, he was originally released on 2 million dollars bond, which was revoked. He was re-arrested, then re-released for 8 million smackers.
The election of Barack Obama as president just might be the funniest tragedy-in-the-making in world history. As I watch the mainstream media cheerleaders who worked so diligently to elect him, (some pseudo/quasi “journalists” even seeing it as their job to help him) now watching him be exactly as he’s always been, and asking themselves, “my God, what have we done?” I can’t help but laugh. Whaddaya mean, “what have you done?” You’ve encouraged the majority of the voting public, as well as (let you tell it) the entire freaking world to elect a guy you studiously avoided finding anything out about. And, not only that, you didn’t let anybody else find anything out about him, either. He certainly wasn’t telling, and you guys in the MSM weren’t even curious about that.
There was a time when the surest way to get the media and press to investigate a guy was for that guy to act like he was hiding something. The only thing more certain to get their attention was for a guy to issue a “catch me if you can, na nanna na na,” challenge. Obama did both repeatedly, simply saying, “I’m not telling you anything,” whenever he was asked a question he didn’t like. Of course, he never said it directly, he usually just whined, “can’t I eat my waffle?” or “c’mon guys, I a’reddy answered like, what, eight questions?” and left. And our previously, notoriously nosy press corps said, “okay, everybody, he said, no,” and left, too. That was usually it. Oh, until the official Obama Denial Team issued an official Obama denial. Then that was really it.
“He says he’s not a Muslim, he just doesn’t listen in churches he’s not really interested in, unless going to them can advance his career.” “He said he doesn’t have any records from the Illinois senate.” “He said his dad was a British subject, but he’s a natural born citizen.” “He told us he went to Columbia, he got into Harvard, he must be smart. We don’t need to see his transcripts.” On and on it went, every question answered in the press with “The Obama Camp Issues A Denial, That’s Good Enough For Us!” headlines. “Of course he doesn’t ‘pal around with‘ terrorists who just happen to live down the block and used to work with him a lot. He’s only eight years old, and they’re not terrorists anymore, and anyway, he’s got a lot of friends, so what?” “What’s it to you if he wrote letters for a guy who’s going to jail and let people freeze in houses our guy helped him buy? Yeah, they had a deal on his own house but, gee whiz, it’s no big deal.” “He answered eight questions and now lookit, his waffle’s cold! See what you did?” I’ve heard of “Big Brother” but this kind of over-protective, surrogate parent role for the media is a little much, even for Orwell.
Now, this stellar press/media industry is amazed that people don’t trust them anymore. Go figure. Even people who allowed themselves to be brainwashed by the bullshit they spewed resent them. And now, these brilliant wordsmiths, pundits, analysts, commentators and investigators seem bewitched, bothered and befuddled by their own bullshit.
Funny as hell.
Here’s a newsflash fuh ya. You shamelessly promoted a hologram of a Pet Rock/Mr. Potato Head. He’s admitted to being a “Rorschach test” and a “blank screen,” and you guys projected constantly shifting images of everybody from Ghandi to Elvis to Martin Luther King to JFK/Lincoln/Roosevelt/God to Kermit the Frog and Norman Rockwell’s granny on him and pretended there was a “there there.” Well, there, there, honey, there ain’t no “there.” And those of you who are my age and older, the boomers, are the worst. You guys should really know better. What you thought was a toy when you were five and later realized was just a potato, what you marveled at as a brilliant marketing ploy when you were a teenager, knowing all along when you weren’t stoned that this new “toy” selling like hotcakes was just a rock in a box, was re-packaged and reissued in Barack Obama, and you fell for it again.
He’s not even a real rock or a potato, he just “evokes the wondrous spirit of an innocent child playing with one.” Or some other such heart-tugging, hackneyed, platitudinous nonsense. And you bought it. Hook, line and sinker. I “can’t believe you ate the whole thing!” Shoulda called Mikey, he not only hates everything, at least he wasn’t stupid. Now, you and all the other duped and deluded denizens of their own imaginary mental dungeons are trying mighty hard not to look as silly as you feel. Progressives, bullybloggerboyz, op-ed columnists and, funniest yet, the conservatives who fell so hard for the snow job that they abandoned their own selves to vote for “hopey, happy, joy, joy,” are all suddenly consumed with “who is this guy” questions they feel compelled to share with us all, assuming we all now feel their self-induced pain.
“No Drama Obama?” What a curious handle to bestow upon a professional TelePrompTer reader so obviously type-cast to play a real-life Matt Santos in the current installment of the reality show called “American Presidential Politics” that he should be a card carrying member of the Screen Actor’s Guild and be forced to show it to the country on You Tube along with the vault copy of his birth certificate before inauguration day. Are you kidding me? Barack Obama’s presidential campaign was one drama after another, yet there’s this larger-than-life myth of a seamless, leak-free campaign run with military precision, conceived of, and directed by, the greatest political general ever, Barack Obama. Puhleeze. The Telegraph is the latest media outlet taking that erroneous theme and running it ragged, quoting yet another source not close to anybody involved in anything:
Most shocking to Mr Obama’s team is the loss of discipline and control that they have experienced since coming to Washington.
The President-elect’s campaign was tightly controlled, with very few uncoordinated leaks. The candidate was known as “No Drama Obama.” David Corn, Washington Bureau Chief of the left of centre magazine Mother Jones, summed up the problem: “The presidential transition of no-drama Obama became infected by the never-ending soap opera of the Clintons. And it really is time to turn that programme off.”
No leaks? NAFTA-gate? The HuffPo “race memo?” Or, were those “coordinated leaks?” No drama? Can you say “Bill Ayers?” “Jeremiah Wright?” “Monster? “ “The Rezko he didn’t know?” “Illegal immigrant auntie?” Nothing soap operatic about “Bitter-gate,” right? What is wrong with people that they think they can just push a blatant, outright, bold-faced lie far enough, and long enough that it becomes an accepted truth? Maybe the most tightly controlled, well run, internet-savvy gaffe machine political campaign in history has conveniently forgotten about a little-known invention called “Google.” Which would be bad news to one of his biggest legitimate donors.
As we all know, Barack and Michelle Obama live in the neighborhood surrounding the University of Chicago, Hyde Park. So does Bill Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn, Louis Farrakhan (who thinks Obama is the Messiah,) Tony Rezko (when he’s not in jail,) Jesse Jackson, and on Obama’s block, James and Barbara Bowman, Valerie Jarrett’s parents, in the home in which they raised their family after returning to this country from London. Ms. Jarrett herself now lives just a few blocks away.
Why is this important? Well, there’s an old saying, “tell me who you are by the company you keep.” And while our new president-elect and King of All Media certainly “keeps company” with lots of people who don’t live in and around Hyde Park, and conversely, is not likely to spend time with most of the denizens of the area, given that it’s an oasis of wealthy academia surrounded by, shall we say, less well funded, much less intellectually curious people, some of those Hyde Park dwellers who are in Obama’s inner circle have often proven problematic in the past, and likely, will continue to do so.
Take for example, “unrepentant terrorist,” (say it with me) William Ayers. Obama has continuously tried to distance himself from the radical professor with the now famous “just a guy in my neighborhood” line, even though, from all indications, the two are quite close. During the campaign, Ayers obediently kept his mouth shut and did not contradict Obama’s characterization of their relationship. After the election, however, Ayers has crawled out of hiding, and yet, in his attempts to corroborate his “neighbor’s” assertions, has let a little too much truth slip out. Or, so says the Chicago Tribune. In a new afterword to the re-issue of his book, “Fugitive Days, which he will promote on “Good Morning America” Friday, Ayers writes:
“[W]e had served together on the board of a foundation, knew one another as neighbors and family friends, held an initial fund-raiser at my house, where I’d made a small donation to his earliest political campaign.”
Uh-oh. “Family friends?” Ooops? Or is Ayers just an egomaniac incapable of keeping quiet about anything?
Then, there’s Valerie Jarrett, Obama’s extremely close adviser and very close personal friend to the Obama family. Jarrett, who has been rumored to be a potential replacement for Obama in the Senate, though she says she’s not interested, has more plausibly been said to be in line for a cabinet appointment, possibly in the Department of Housing and Urban Development, or Department of Transportation. With her background, with the Chicago Transit Authority, and as CEO of Habitat Company, which develops “mixed income housing,” such specualtion is not surprising. But it’s the Habitat association that could do her in. Habitat’s goal of eliminating public housing projects by developing privately owned housing projects for government assisted and other low-income families, hasn’t proven to be an overwhelming success. With the involvement of folks like Allison Davis and Tony Rezco and questions surrounding Obama’s assistace in acquiring subsidies for the developers, Jarrett’s background just might not be much of an asset. And now, Judicial Watch is sniffing around. From Standard Newswire:
Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, announced today that it has obtained documents linking Valerie Jarrett, an advisor to Barack Obama and the co-chairman of the President-Elect’s transition team, to a series of real estate scandals, including several housing projects operated by convicted felon and Obama fundraiser/friend Antoin “Tony” Rezko.
According to the documents obtained by Judicial Watch from the Illinois Secretary of State, Valerie Jarrett served as a board member for several organizations that provided funding and support for Chicago housing projects operated by real estate developers and Obama financial backers Rezko and Allison Davis. (Davis is also Obama’s former boss.) Jarrett was a member of the Board of Directors for the Woodlawn Preservation and Investment Corporation along with several Davis and Rezko associates, as well as the Fund for Community Redevelopment and Revitalization, an organization that worked with Rezko and Davis.
(According to press reports, housing projects operated by Davis and Rezko have been substandard and beset with code violations. The Chicago Sun Times reported that one Rezko-managed housing project was “riddled with problems — including squalid living conditions…lack of heat, squatters and drug dealers.”)
As Chief Executive Officer of the Habitat Company Jarrett also managed a controversial housing project located in Obama’s former state senate district called Grove Parc Plaza. According to the Boston Globe the housing complex was considered “uninhabitable by unfixed problems, such as collapsed roofs and fire damage…In 2006, federal inspectors graded the condition of the complex an 11 on a 100-point scale – a score so bad the buildings now face demolition.” Ms. Jarrett refused to comment to the Globe on the conditions of the complex.
“Like Barack Obama, Valerie Jarrett is a product of the corrupt Chicago political machine. And it is no stretch to say that she was a slumlord,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “We have real concerns about Jarrett’s ethics. Washington already has plenty of corruption. We don’t need to import more of it from Chicago.”
Characterized as “the other side of Barack Obama’s brain” by CBS News, Jarrett first met the Obamas seventeen years ago when she offered Michelle Obama a job. While speculation has arisen that Jarrett could take Obama’s place in the U.S. Senate, the New York Times reported that it is more likely she will become a senior White House adviser, thus continuing her long record of being an important influence and mentor to Barack and Michelle Obama.
So, while Mr. Obama awaits his coronation inauguration, which is supposedly going to be witnessed by a million people live, (yeah, right, they said the same thing about the election night Grant Park celebration, turned out to be about 100,000) it might well be safe to bet that getting out of his old neighborhood can’t come fast enough.
Barack Obama is, by his own admission, the most clueless man the American public has been acquainted with since Hogan’s Heroes’ Sgt. Schultz never saw contraband being smuggled in and out of Nazi Germany through a tunnel under a POW camp on that old TV show. Obama “didn’t know” William Ayers was a terrorist, he “didn’t know” Tony Rezko was indictable, he “didn’t know” Rev. Jeremiah Wright preached sermons not exactly embraceable by most American Christians. He “knew nuttink!” Now, according to his campaign surrogates, he “didn’t know” his aunt was living illegally in the United States, but as far as he’s concerned, she can just crawl right under the bus with the rest of ‘em. From Politico:
Barack Obama did not know a relative was living in the United States illegally for the past nearly four years prior to today’s Associated Press report, “but obviously believes that any and all appropriate laws be followed,” the campaign said Saturday in a statement.
The Democratic nominee last heard from Zeituni Onyango, who attended his swearing-in ceremony to the U.S. Senate in 2005 and is a half-sister of Obama’s late father, two years ago, when she called to say she was in Boston, the campaign said. Campaign officials said they did not assist her in getting a tourist visa and had not known that she was living in America.
Obama, who also has a tendency to point fingers like a little boy caught arm-deep in the cookie jar insisting upon blaming his imaginary friend, also says “the Republicans did it!” Since Obama never says anything Axelrod didn’t say first, we can treat any statements from either as interchangeable:
“The American people are pretty sensible,” said Obama chief strategist David Axelrod, “and I think they are pretty suspicious of things that are dumped in the marketplace 72 hours before a campaign, so I am not concerned about that.”
Asked whether he was suggesting there were political motives from a Republican administration, Axelrod said: “I am not saying anything at this point.”
Seems like a strange reaction from a group who “benefited” from leaks about “Joe the Plumber” traced back to Obama supporter, Helen Jones-Kelley, who according to the Las Vegas Examiner, now seems to be lying and pointing fingers herself:
The Ohio employee who ran a child support check on Joe the Plumber says a supervisor told her the man contacted the social services agency about his case.
Niekamp told The Columbus Dispatch she is unfamiliar with any policy in which the records of the newly famous are checked.
That sounds like Camp O, alright. First, deny, then blame somebody, anybody, else. If that doesn’t work, just stop talking about it, like Obama surrogate Robert Gibbs is now trying to do about “Auntie-gate:”
Senior strategist Robert Gibbs shut down any line of questioning Thursday when news broke about Obama’s relative, telling reporters, “I’m not going to get into it.”
Now that the Ashley Todd story has been disproved, Obama supporters seem to be celebrating anew, curiously rationalizing not only that, since this story about a mythical Obama supporter is false, all stories about Obama must be similarly false, and that if any blame is to be assigned, it’s to John McCain. On some planet, in some universe far, far away, that might make sense, but where I sit, it’s pretty ridiculous, so I’ll leave that alone.
Instead, I’ll ask the question that has intrigued me for a long time, but doesn’t seem to bother people who follow Barack Obama at all. What if all, or any, of the allegations that have been made against the Senator turn out to be true? It’s possible, none of them have actually been factually proven to be wrong, rather, the available facts have been spun to Obama’s advantage. This, in itself, is curious.
It seems that nowadays “rumor” and “conspiracy theory” are negative characterizations about anything potentially affecting Barack Obama. Yet, the truth is, all conspiracy theories are based on rumor until they’re proven. Watergate was a rumor, Monica Lewinski was a rumor, John Edwards’ affair was a rumor. Once the facts were revealed, a conspiracy to cover-up the truth became obvious. That’s where the word “cover-up” came from.
But, all rumors about Barack Obama are “evil lies” designed to derail the noble aspirations of a near-saintly, yet, simultaneously, traditionally oppressed, black man. What the fuck? We know for a fact that he is a liar. Every step of the Rev. Wright way, Obama lied. He never told any more truth than he needed to to get away with his lie, in fact, he even gave a forty-five minute national speech designed to make every American citizen complicit in his lies; but those devoted to him still see no problem. And that wasn’t the end of his lying. It wasn’t until Rev. Wright told one unforgivably inconvenient truth about him that Obama stopped lying and admitted that Rev. Wright didn’t mean that much to him, after all. Because you see, the biggest lie, and the one Rev. Wright objected to, was that Jeremiah Wright was ever really important to Obama.
“He’s a politician.”
That was Jeremiah Wright’s sin; telling the world that Obama was not “more than a politician” to him. Did Wright ever refer to Obama as a “devout Christian” or a “cherished member” of his “flock”? Why did he make such a big deal about classifying him by his job description and not by his status in Wright’s church? On March 27, 2008, Huffington Post did post a March 11, 2007, letter from Wright to the New York Times claiming that he had indeed said those things about Obama in an interview, but the NYT writer chose not to use those quotes. You would think that by that time, Wright’s support of Obama would be so well established, HuffPo wouldn’t need to post a year-old letter to illustrate it.
“Ya better watch him.”
Every black person who has spent any time in a black church has heard a black preacher utter those words as a warning against everything from Mr. High Cholesterol Foods, to Mr. Street-Slick Hustler, to the Devil himself. “He’s gon’ getcha, if ya don’t wach out. Watch ‘im.” That’s what Rev. Wright’s comments to the National Press Club sounded like to me:
Politicians say what they say and do what they do based on electability, based on sound bites, based on polls, Huffington, whoever’s doing the polls. Preachers say what they say because they’re pastors. They have a different person to whom they’re accountable.
As I said, whether he gets elected or not, I’m still going to have to be answerable to God November 5th and January 21st. That’s what I mean. I do what pastors do. He does what politicians do.
“Watch ‘im.”
But this isn’t about Jeremiah Wright, or about the persistent “Muslim” rumors, this is about Barack Obama being a liar. Who cares if he is a Muslim, but why would he lie about it? There’s no record of his being baptized, since leaving his church in return for Hillary Clinton’s Michigan votes he hasn’t joined another, there’s enough evidence of his being enrolled in Indonesian schools as “Muslim,” he’s the one who said the Muslim call to prayer was “one of the prettiest sounds on Earth,” and his Freudian, “my Muslim faith” slip is enough to give one pause. Given that he is a liar, why is the media so reluctant to investigate any of this fully? On Oct. 20, Newsmax reported that their investigation indicates the “smears” Camp O is so dedicated to fighting, are largely based on fact. Of course, the Obots will dismiss such an article out of hand since it’s Newsmax, and unflattering. However, if you’re convinced there’s nothing to the “smears” why object to having them fully, instead of superficially, investigated, and thus, exposed as the lies you believe them to be?
What accounts for the media’s reluctance to investigate Obama fairly? Journalist Michael S. Malone admits to being “ashamed” to even call himself a journalist anymore due to the one-sided, biased coverage of this year’s election:
The traditional media is playing a very, very dangerous game. With its readers, with the Constitution, and with its own fate.
The sheer bias in the print and television coverage of this election campaign is not just bewildering, but appalling. And over the last few months I’ve found myself slowly moving from shaking my head at the obvious one-sided reporting, to actually shouting at the screen of my television and my laptop computer.
But worst of all, for the last couple weeks, I’ve begun — for the first time in my adult life — to be embarrassed to admit what I do for a living. A few days ago, when asked by a new acquaintance what I did for a living, I replied that I was “a writer”, because I couldn’t bring myself to admit to a stranger that I’m a journalist.
Many people will attribute everything to race. Some will chalk it up to the partisanship of the “liberal media.” I think the Obama campaign’s successful “Messiah-zation” of the candidate is the more likely reason.
A Light Will Shine Down
A website called Obamamessiah chronicles the many times early in the primaries that Obama used a variation of the “light will shine down” “joke” in his stump speech. Every time he made the statement, it was reported, sometimes mockingly, sometimes admiringly, but always reinforcing the “Messiah” narrative. On January 9, 2008, The Washington Post ran this quote:
“I am going to try to be so persuasive, so that those of you who are still wavering…will suddenly come to the conclusion — a light beam will shine through — will light you up — and you will experience an epiphany — I have to vote for Barack!”
“A light will shine”…”epiphany?” Can anyone argue that this was not deliberately messianic? “If you believe,” “this is the moment,” “yes we can,” “hope,” deliberately oft-repeated in sermons disguised as speeches, these phrases plant specific seeds in the minds of those receptive to serving as vessels. They’re even more scary if the candidate really believes them, himself. At a fundraiser in May, 2007, MensVogue reported this quote:
When Morgan Freeman comes over to greet Obama, the senator begins bowing down both hands in worship. “This guy was president before I was,” says Obama, referring to Freeman’s turn in Deep Impact and, clearly, getting a little ahead of his own bio. Next, a nod to Bruce Almighty: “This guy was God before I was.” (Okay, more than a little ahead.)
Once the “messiah” seed takes root, criticism becomes unacceptable. “Don’t Swiftboat me,” becomes “Don’t Swiftboat Jesus.” While some dismiss such observations as over-reactions to what they consider to be obvious jokes, the reality is a little more complex.
“Many a true word spoken in a joke.”
My mother liked to speak in homespun, old school idioms like that. Though she was very young when I was born, she embraced the traditions passed down from generation-to-generation of African American women known as “mother wit,” kind of a cross between common sense and women’s intuition. Another favorite saying of hers was, “Child, don’t be no fool.” When acolytes are commonly described as “KoolAid drinkers,” the messianic, cult-like status of the one being served is no longer in question. Believers were so convinced of Jim Jones’ godliness, they followed him to a foreign country to their deaths. No amount of pleading admonitions by fearful loved ones deterred these true believers, true faith trumps common sense.
In the case of Barack Obama, his god-like, rock star (same thing) status has insulated him from scrutiny. That is the purpose. Dubious associations, legitimate criticisms, in-your-face flaws and weaknesses are not only forgiven, but defended, due to the flat out refusal of the faithful worshippers to entertain such heresy against their god. “There are none so blind as those who will not see,” is a particularly apt description of Obama followers; it’s not really Biblical, either.
Therefore, when it comes to Tony Rezko and Obama’s proven lies about their “boneheaded” realtionship, and William Ayers, and Obama’s obvious lies about their relationship, Obots don’t see. Videos like this one, might as well not exist:
When it comes to the fact that Obama refuses to show his true birth certificate, even to a judge, preferring to offer the less official Certification of Live Birth, which contains much less information and may be forged, devout Obamabots question the legitimacy of those making the request. Why? Why not show the original document, easily obtainable from the State of Hawaii Bureau of Vital Statistics, and be done with it? If he is indeed the son of Frank Marshall Davis, why not say so. What difference does it make if Andy Martin is a kook? And how does attacking a website like African Press International’s claims of a phone call from Michelle Obama alluding to her husband’s adoptive status mitigate against the truth? Even if it’s a hoax, that doesn’t answer the basic citizenship questions at the heart of all the allegations.
The bottom line is, if Barack Obama is elected November 4, he will not get a record contract, he will become President of the United States. Any of the allegations against, and questions surrounding, Senator Obama would be enough to get him kicked off American Idol; should our standards for the highest office in the land be less? This is not a reality show, this is reality. If any or all of the “smears” turn out to be facts, how will those who blindly vote for him justify their devotion? Maybe before we cast our votes in “solidarity” to “the brother,” or in “hope” for a “better future,” maybe we should honestly assess who Barack Obama is today, and was yesterday. Because if any of the “smears” are true, what happens after he is elected will be on your heads.
Who’s Kenny Smith? Well, according to John McCain, he’s “unethical.” And, according to John, so is Alison Davis and Tony Rezko. What’s more, they’re all friends of Obama who got beau coup de bucks, and Johnny’s “gonna stop ‘em.”
On Sept. 26, The New York Post reported that the Illinois Attorney General was investigating the Obama/Smith connection:
The Illinois attorney general is looking into a $100,000 state grant for a never-built botanic garden that then-state Sen. Barack Obama gave to a group led by a former campaign volunteer, officials said yesterday.
The inquiry by Attorney General Lisa Madigan came after a Chicago Sun-Times story about the $100,000 member-item grant that Obama steered toward a group run by campaign volunteer Kenny Smith to help a blighted neighborhood.
The garden was never built, and the AG’s Office is looking into how the Chicago Better Housing Association, a nonprofit run by Smith, spent its money.
In June 2007, The Chicago Sun-Times reported that Obama once helped Rezko get 14 million dollars from Illinois taxpayers. Alison Davis got some moolah, too:
As a state senator, Barack Obama wrote letters to city and state officials supporting his political patron Tony Rezko’s successful bid to get more than $14 million from taxpayers to build apartments for senior citizens.
The deal included $855,000 in development fees for Rezko and his partner, Allison S. Davis, Obama’s former boss, according to records from the project, which was four blocks outside Obama’s state Senate district.
Obama’s letters, written nearly nine years ago, for the first time show the Democratic presidential hopeful did a political favor for Rezko — a longtime friend, campaign fund-raiser and client of the law firm where Obama worked — who was indicted last fall on federal charges that accuse him of demanding kickbacks from companies seeking state business under Gov. Blagojevich.
Which means, Obama lied both to the Chicago Tribune, whom he told, “I’ve never done any favors for him,” and to the American people when he denied working with Rezko during an early primary debate.
Clinton: …I was fighting against those ideas when you were practicing law and representing your contributor, Rezko, in his slum landlord business in inner city Chicago. …
CNN’s Wolf Blitzer: Senator Clinton made a serious allegation that you worked for a slumlord. And I wonder if you want to respond.
Obama: I’m happy to respond. Here’s what happened: I was an associate at a law firm that represented a church group that had partnered with this individual to do a project and I did about five hours worth of work on this joint project. That’s what she’s referring to.
Uh, not quite, Barocco. GOP.com lays out the whole house of cards; not a race one in the deck. Looks like maybe Obama walked into a trap when he so vigorously decried the “guilt-by-association” attacks during the debate with his predictable “I was only eight years old” stock answer to the William Ayers question.
The Washington Times ran an article on the sixth of this month detailing the Alison Davis deal:
Sen. Barack Obama, who vows to change Washington by trimming wasteful spending and disclosing special-interest requests, wrote the Bush administration last year to seek a multimillion-dollar federal grant for a Chicago housing project that is behind schedule and whose development team includes a longtime political supporter.
Mr. Obama’s letter, however, was never disclosed publicly. In fact, the letter was ghostwritten for him by a consultant for the Chicago Housing Authority, which wanted the money – a practice ethics watchdogs have frequently criticized.
edit
The Bush administration obliged Mr. Obama’s request, awarding a $20 million competitive grant last month from the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). It called the project a “shining example” of urban revitalization. The Washington Times learned of the letter from Republican operatives.
As Mr. Obama campaigns for president as an agent of change who promises to clean up Washington’s money game, his role in the Stateway project raises questions about the appearance of a conflict of interest and whether he has been participating in the very system he criticizes, watchdogs say.
edit
But complicating the picture, one of developers for the Stateway Project is a firm headed by Allison S. Davis, one of Mr. Obama’s early mentors and a longtime political supporter. A founding partner at the firm where Mr. Obama practiced law, Mr. Davis and his family have given the senator from Illinois tens of thousands of dollars in political contributions over the years.
Aides to Mr. Obama said he did not know of Mr. Davis’ involvement in the Stateway project when he sent the letter. They noted that none of the HUD money will flow to Mr. Davis or his business. They also said other lawmakers – including fellow Illinois Democrats Sen. Richard J. Durbin and Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley – sent similar letters to HUD.
“Guilt by association,” or just guilt?
Is McCain merely taking cheap shots in the dark or putting the pieces of a puzzle together? And will it stick? Like his strategist, Nicole Walker said, when it comes to Obama and the press, “it’s like running against God.”
Wow! 3 out of 4 of the ladies of The View (Joy Behar was not there, Sheri Shepherd was) think the Ayers-Obama connection is A-Okay. I mean, he’s not a terrorist now, for Goodness’ sakes, sheeesh! But, in this article I found from January 27, of this year, a website called Working Life, published by the Labor Research Association, takes psychic exception to Whoopi, Inc. There’s lots of good stuff there, most of which we already know, but it lays things out before Rezko was convicted, and months before this current Ayers stuff has fit the fan.
But behind the story, the federal case against Rezko is based on a detailed picture of the web of influence Rezko and his cohorts exerted over state agencies managing Illinois’ financial assets. Barack Obama’s political career was spun out in tandem with this Rezko apparatus, particularly through Rezko’s partner and Obama’s former boss, Allison S. Davis.
Start with U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald’s December 21, 2007 proffer in the Rezko case, with its charges of extortion and kickbacks taken in 2004 from the Illinois Teachers’ Retirement System: $10,000 from this crime was channeled to a “political candidate” not named by the prosecutor. The fact that Rezko was on the finance committee of Obama’s campaign for U.S. Senate, and the other facts in the case, make it clear that Barack Obama was the candidate in question.
Though Ayers is not mentioned by name, the “Hyde Park Mafia” is:
The “Hyde Park Mafia” purportedly backing Obama’s rise was centered in the University’s campaign for school reform, along the lines of the Ford Foundation and British efforts to corral American slum residents into blind, self-defeating local politics.
This pdf report on The University of Chicago website, (U of C is in Hyde Park) concerning the first three years of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, entitled “Improving Chicago Schools,” does acknowledge “Bill Ayers” as a founding member. The connections between Ayers, Rezko and Obama have been explored in many places, notably Evelyn Pringle’s Board Games, which have been summarized here and here, among lots of others.
Is Tony Rezko singing for his supper? Maybe. AP-Yahoo News is reporting that the convicted Chicago fundraiser and Obama “pal” (don’t tell Sarah Palin! Shhhhh) has had his sentencing delayed, usually a sign that a felon is giving somebody up.
Federal prosecutors moved Monday to delay indefinitely the sentencing of convicted fundraiser Antoin “Tony” Rezko, sending their strongest hint yet that he is ready to spill his political secrets.
The filing asks for a postponement while prosecutors and defense attorneys “engage in discussions that could affect their sentencing postures.”
Rezko has donated to Obama’s political campaigns in the past, supposedly Obama has returned all donations for his presidential run:
Obama’s campaign says it has sent to charity $159,000 traceable to Rezko’s past fundraising.
Notice the use of the word, “traceable?” While Obama has admitted his real estate dealings with Rezko were “boneheaded,” it seems Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich is the big fish in prosecutors’ sights. But, one can hope.
This is the Spokesmodel-in-Chief’s 100 Day Ain’t I Great? speech before his third Fuck It, Why Not? press conference. His subliminal thoughts are italicized. The regular type represents his WORM (What Obama Really Meant).
This is the original, pre-Fabreau-ized, pre-Axelrod-approved draft of President Black Obama’s “give up da nukes” 
Why is Barack Obama 
As we, the people, try to figure out exactly where President Black Obama might be going with his 
Poor President Black Obama. Life as leader of the free world must be so very much different than he thought it would be back in the days when he read about it in the news and decided that gosh darnit, things needed to change. I mean, how was he to know that getting people to give up old ways that worked fine for them all their lives 
Nope. Though 
Whoever thought maneuvering Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich into a position that allowed U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald to officially criminalize machine politics-as-usual for political advantage has got to be the biggest neophyte yahoo rube to come down the pike since…Barack Obama. Let’s review. Barack Obama, the only African American in the Senate for two years, mysteriously generates enough money and clout to mount a successful run for the presidency out of a political environment so corrupt that “Lincoln would roll over in his grave,” how? By being an all-around, all-American, above-board, swell, good guy, of course. Sure.
A local Chicago 
On Tuesday, when the news of Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich’s arrest broke, U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald declared that it was “a sad day for Illinois government” and that Blagojevich had “taken us to a truly new low.” But, was it really? From the 
In an apparent attempt to avoid 
Why are the Keepers of the Book of Barack, aka the mainstream media, pushing the “Blago’s batshit” story line as quasi-fact? Who does it benefit? If the embattled governor was making such claims, or acting in a manner as if he wanted people to think he’s nuts, it might be more understandable, even though, if that was the case, chances are the Barackomaniacs would reject such assertions as Blago’s pitiful attempts to exonerate himself. They would use his statements as evidence of his criminality just as they use his alleged criminality as evidence of his madness. Why?
The Obamessiah already walks on water, and if the mainstream media has it’s way, after 
Barack Hussein Obama
“No Drama Obama?” What a curious handle to bestow upon a professional TelePrompTer reader so obviously type-cast to play a real-life 
