"Sell my Senate seat on Ebay. I was not here. We did not speak."
Posted on 12/09/2008 7:17:45 PM PST by 2ndDivisionVet
I do not for a moment believe that President-Elect Barack Obama was directly involved in the corrupt behavior for which Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich was arrested this morning. I even think it’s possible that he didn’t have first-hand knowledge of Gov. Blagojevich’s corrupt behavior. I find it very difficult to believe that he hadn’t heard of it from people who had reason to know.
Jake Tapper outlines a timeline of Obama support for Blagojevich (and vice versa):
According to Rep. Rahm Emanuel, D-Ill., Mr. Obama’s incoming White House chief of staff, Emanuel, then-state senator Obama, a third Blagojevich aide, and Blagojevich’s campaign co-chair, David Wilhelm, were the top strategists of Blagojevich’s 2002 gubernatorial victory.
Emanuel told the New Yorker earlier this year that he and Obama “participated in a small group that met weekly when Rod was running for governor. We basically laid out the general election, Barack and I and these two.”
Wilhelm said that Emanuel had overstated Obama’s role. “There was an advisory council that was inclusive of Rahm and Barack but not limited to them,” Wilhelm said, and he disputed the notion that Obama was “an architect or one of the principal strategists.”
(An Obama Transition Team aide emails to note that Emanuel later changed his recollection of this story to Rich Miller’s “CAPITOL FAX,” saying, “David [Wilhelm] and I have worked together on campaigns for decades. Like always, he’s right and I’m wrong.”)
Either way, others now around Obama were less enthusiastic about Blagojevich at the time, namely David Axelrod, Obama’s senior campaign adviser who will soon be a senior adviser at the White House.
Axelrod had worked for Blagojevich in his past races for the House, but he declined to work on his gubernatorial run.
“He had been my client and I had a very good relationship with him, but I didn’t sign on to the governor’s race,” Axelrod told the New Yorker. “Obviously he won, but I had concerns about it…I was concerned about whether he was ready for that. Not so much for the race but for governing. I was concerned about some of the folks — I was concerned about how the race was being approached.”
On the Chicago TV show “Public Affairs with Jeff Berkowitz” on June 27, 2002, state Sen. Obama said, “Right now, my main focus is to make sure that we elect Rod Blagojevich as Governor, we…”
“You working hard for Rod?” interrupted Berkowitz.
“You betcha,” said Obama.
“Hot Rod?” asked the host.
“That’s exactly right,” Obama said.
In 2004, then-Gov. Blagojevich enthusiastically endorsed Obama for the Senate seat after he won the nomination, and Obama endorsed Blagojevich for his 2006 re-election race in early 2005.
In the Summer of 2006, then-U.S. Sen. Obama backed Blagojevich even though there were serious questions at the time about Blago’s hiring practices.
The period in question is the period between Blagojevich’s election in 2002 and his re-election bid in 2006. There are only a limited number of likely possibilities. That Rod Blagojevich didn’t begin his corrupt activities until after 2006 stretches credulity. Perhaps Barack Obama genuinely did not know what Rod Blagojevich was about. That would demonstrate a stunning naïveté or willful ignorance, neither admission reflecting particularly well on the President-Elect. Childlike innocence is a wonderful thing but not in the President of the United States.
It may be that an ambitious young Barack Obama was willing to overlook his fellow partisan’s corruption under the principle “he’s a sonuvabitch but he’s our sonuvabitch”, not a particularly attractive viewpoint, especially for a post-partisan candidate running on a reform ticket.
Or it may be that he didn’t care—just business as usual in Illinois politics. So much for the reform candidate.
Note that I think all of these alternatives are venial sins rather than mortal ones.
If, indeed, he did know about it, I don’t believe that maintaining a highminded silence is President-Elect Barack Obama’s best strategy for dealing with it. I think he has a rare, brief opportunity to harness this incident to a good purpose. Americans believe in second chances, in second births. President-Elect Obama should acknowledge that he was aware of what was going on but had no real evidence and, consequently, couldn’t step forward and he should condemn this kind of corruption in no uncertain terms. No mincing words. No decorous silence.
If he fails to do this, at the best he’ll have missed an opportunity. At the worst it will dog him through his presidency.
Certainly we haven’t impeached one before he’s sworn in!
"Sell my Senate seat on Ebay. I was not here. We did not speak."
“This isn’t the Governor Rod Blagojevich that I knew.”
The bad associations continue. Unless the Fairness Doctrine is enacted, Obama will find himself in the spotlight too. Narcissists with no sense of right and wrong have a hard time avoiding being caught when they mainly dwell in “wrong”.
Barry is playing the role of Kevin Cosntner in The Untouchables. Fitting for a Chicago politician
Don’t worry, this is all a plot so that we don’t mind when Reverend Wright says the prayer at the inaugaration. We’ll all look at him and say, “hey, remember when we thought the Reverend was the craziest crony in Obama’s closet?”
I believe Obozo is screwed & right up to the wall.
Right now,Axelrod’s latest statement on “mis-spoke”is an indicator of the level of denial involved in this mess.
Obama knows more than he is letting on. he’s not going to come marching out and declare total innocence.He’s playing this as he has played the other situations that have plagued him thru-out his campaign but THIS time the teflon he is using has worn extremely thin and is truly stretched beyond limit(see Ax’s “mis-spoke)It is just a matter of time before the Electoral College gets together there will be new information on the depth of Obama’s involvement along with the 8mil contribution to Children’s Hospital of CHicago and the more than hefty raise Michelle Obama reveived to the tune of about 368,000approx.Michelle is involved in this,too,you’ll find other players of whom Valerie Jarrett(she has her own corruption problems from Chicago)who as of the past few weeks after being interviewed on television has been mysteriously missing from the public eye.Keep an eye out for Jesse Jackson,Jr.,too.
Did she disappear after she claimed on a Sunday talk show that Obama was ready to Rule?
Blago is getting thrown under the Campaign Bus.
Pray for W and Our Troops
“Blagojevich enthusiastically endorsed Obama for the Senate”
How much did osama obama pay for this endorsement?
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