Posted on 12/19/2008 12:25:19 AM PST by hoosiermama
Edited on 02/09/2012 7:04:21 AM PST by Admin Moderator. [history]
Thanks. No, I didn’t know.
"I got a call from Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich the other day. The first thing I said to him was, "You know, this call is probably being taped." Blagojevich said he had read my column in The Chronicle last week, in which I raised questions about the "pay to play" charges being leveled against him in connection with his pending appointment of someone to fill Barack Obama's now-empty U.S. Senate seat. I think he liked how I raised questions about the timing and manner of U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald's decision to charge him over what appears to be little more than loose conversations he had with his staff. He laughed, we talked, and all in all he seemed in pretty good spirits for a guy looking at federal charges. I wouldn't bet on him stepping aside anytime soon. If anything, his hand is getting stronger by the day. I can't go into details, but my impression is that the whole mess started because the governor had been considering appointing a political rival, Illinois Attorney General Lisa Madigan, to the Senate so she wouldn't be able to run against him when he went up for re-election in 2010. Apparently, Obama's people weren't happy about the idea of Madigan coming to Washington, and there were some pretty heated conversations between Blagojevich and Obama chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, which I understand will burn your ears off.
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2008/12/21/BAG314QRPO.DTL http://strata-sphere.com/blog/index.php/archives/7428
Reinforces my opinion that this has been a charade and/or the next act is now being choreographed.
Instead of protecting BO with the early arrest,I think it more likely Fitz was protecting his mole from an illegal involvement. Rahm-E or jjj or someone not identified on tape? Maybe not even the ones released.
Morning news
Reporting from Chicago — A key figure in Illinois Gov. Rod R. Blagojevich’s alleged scheme to sell a U.S. Senate seat has sought immunity from federal authorities in return for his cooperation.
Businessman and political fundraiser Raghuveer P. Nayak is Individual D in the federal complaint, sources said. Individual D was being squeezed by the governor for campaign cash, according to prosecutors, in order to appoint Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-Ill.) to the Senate seat vacated by President-elect Barack Obama.
......
A 54-year-old millionaire who made his fortune in medical businesses, he was little-known outside Chicago’s close-knit Indian community
.......
Federal and state election reports show that Nayak, his wife and his businesses for the last decade have donated more than $779,000 and raised hundreds of thousands more for candidates ranging from the Cook County circuit court clerk to Obama.
He has contributed primarily to Democrats but also to Republicans.
From: HIndustan TImes
http://209.85.173.132/search?q=cache:hryyrH4guy0J:www.hindustantimes.com/redir.aspx%3FID%3D7db3baeb-b6a4-4c29-a3c3-22ebbe75b8ef+Raghuveer+P.+Nayak+%3D+REAL+ESTATE&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=30&gl=us
...Nayak and Jesse Jackson Jr’s brother Jonathan have known each other for a long time and even went into business together some years ago.
Among others named in the report are pharmacist Harish Bhatt and brothers Rajinder Bedi and Jatinder Bedi.
Rajinder is managing director for the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity’s Office of Trade and Investment, overseeing offices around the world. Jatinder is editor of the Chicago-based Indian paper, Indian Reporter.
FOlks to keep an eye on
From:
Imad Almanaseer, former member of Illinois Health Facility Planning Board; joined in scheme to exchange construction approvals for donations to Blagojevich and others; testified under immunity against Rezko.
Ali Ata, Chicago businessman who bought a seat as head of the state Capital Development Board seat with contributions to Blagojevich through fundraiser Antoin Rezko; testified against Tony Rezko and has offered evidence against Blagojevich.
Thomas Beck, former member of Illinois Health Facility Planning Board; joined in scheme to exchange construction approvals for donations to Blagojevich and others; testified under immunity against Rezko.
Patti Blagojevich, the governor’s wife. (Tribune news profile)
Rod Blagojevich, governor of Illinois.
Daniel W. Cain, FBI Special Agent and affiant in the criminal complaint.
Joseph Cari,major Democratic fundraiser who participated in Rezko-Blagojevich scheme; offered evidence against Rezko and Blagojevich as part of plea deal.
William Cellini,Republican businessman who with Levine exercised control over Illinois Teachers Retirement System; secretly organized major donations to Blagojevich as part of the price to keep influence over the board; is described, though not charged, with abetting some of Levine’s, Rezko’s and Blagojevich’s corrupt schemes.
Kelly Glynn, former Friends of Blagojevich finance director.
John Harris, Blagojevich’s chief of staff.
James F. Holderman, chief judge of U.S. District Court in Chicago who authorized Blagojevich eavesdropping in the governor’s campaign office and on his home phone. Holderman is a former federal prosecutor who joined in U.S. Attorney James R. Thompson’s campaign against corrupt Chicago politicians in the 1980s.
Chris Kelly, a principal campaign fundraiser for Blagojevich.
Matthew F. Kennelly, acting chief judge of U.S. District Court in Chicago who re-authorized wiretapping of Blagojevich’s home phone.
Stuart Levine, described in complaint as “a member of the board of trustees of the Teachers Retirement System and the Illinois Health Facilities Planning Board” who joined in the Blagojevich-Rezko shakedown scheme.
Steven Loren, outside counsel to the Illinois Teachers Retirement System; testified against Rezko under plea deal.
John McCormick, Chicago Tribune deputy editorial page editor.
Michael T. Mason, U.S. Magistrate Judge to whom complaint was sworn.
Lon Monk, lobbyist and former Blagojevich chief of staff.
Antoin (Tony) Rezko, Democratic fundraiser convicted of shaking down individuals and companies doing business with the state.
Thomas Rosenberg, one of the owners of Capri Capital, a real-estate investment firm that Rezko, Levine, Cellini et al. allegedly targeted in an extortion scheme (they are said to have demanded bribes and contributions to Friends of Blagojevich in exchange for approving a Teachers Retirement System investment with Capri).
Dr. Robert Weinstein, “a co-schemer in Levine’s criminal activities,” according to the complaint.
DOes seem that Blago and OB are too good of friends...WOuld one set the othr up?
From:
http://www.blacklegalissues.com/Article_Details.ASPX?ARTCLID=afcec76f2a&cat=Politics
About all Blagojevich and Obama shared was searing ambition, which is what occasionally brought them together. Obama recognized that a Democratic governor could help him pass legislation and build his résumé in anticipation of a U.S. Senate run, so he helped Blagojevich’s campaign as an informal adviser. Once Blagojevich was elected, he and Obama formed an awkward, arranged marriage: Obama passed a steady succession of legislation and built his reputation as a power player in Springfield; Blagojevich signed the bills and took the center seat at celebratory news conferences.
It worked just fine, Springfield politicians said, until Obama started to eclipse Blagojevich as the rising star in Illinois politics. Blagojevich never endorsed Obama in his U.S. Senate bid in 2004, and he expressed a preference for two other Democratic candidates. On the campaign trail, Obama sometimes made a point to highlight his distance from Blagojevich and the rest of the administration. “Nobody sent me,” he often told his crowds.
Here’s some interesting information that goes along with
Rod Blagojevich’s serbian, Orthodox roots.
From:
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2008/jun/22/greater-albania-is-no-model/
If “success” means the destruction of 300 Serbian Orthodox churches and monasteries; if “success” means ethnic cleansing of over 250,000 Serbs from their ancestral homes, all under the noses of the NATO-led Kosovo Force (KFOR); if it means the final eradication of Serbia’s culture, language and religion in Kosovo; if it means handing Kosovo’s government over to war criminals
Comment on you tube Make one wonder why poster has that opinion:
“Rod Blagojevich is much bigger threat to USA, than any Muslim will ever be.”
Yet, the media just can’t seem to get enough of rubbing everyone’s nose in Rod Blagojevich’s “ethnic roots” — even going so far as to publish quotes from the Blagojevic family in Europe for their reaction to the cousin that they’ve never met, and quoting headlines from German and Soros owned newspapers from Eastern Europe.
Others went to his local boyhood church for reactions from parishioners. Rod Blagojevich is 52 years old and hasn’t gone there in 30 years. What’s this got to do with anything?
Rod Blagojevich told us how irrelevant his ethnic roots were a few years ago on Jay Leno, when he refused to say anything other than that they were “Eastern European”. So why does the media think that they are going to find something relevant to the corruption story in Blagojevich’s ancestry?
Rod Blagojevich’s “ethnicity” is American and his religion is “corrupt politician”. That should have been plain for all to see when back in 1999, he supported the twisted and corrupt NATO Bombing of Yugoslavia, using the same hateful anti-Serb rhetoric as the rest of his twisted fellow corrupt politicians.
Follow up on Cooley from (say it ain’t so Bo):
Following up on mob-lawyer-turned-undercover-informant Robert Cooley’s explosive allegations that Rod Blagojevich “was a bookmaker on the North Side who regularly paid the Chicago mob to operate” before going into politics, the FBI agent “who supervised Cooley’s undercover work in the late 1980’s confirms that federal officials were informed back then about Blagojevich’s alleged bookmaking and mob payoffs”:
On Thursday, former FBI official Jim Wagner confirms that . . . Cooley indeed informed the bureau about Blagojevich’s alleged bookmaking business. But Mr. Wagner says in the 1980’s, FBI agents had never heard of Blagojevich. Wagner was Cooley’s “handler” for the FBI at the time, supervising his undercover that resulted in two dozen successful prosecutions for public corruption.
For whatever it’s worth, Robert “Bobby the Boxer” Abbinanti, the convicted mob collector to whom Blagojevich allegedly paid street tax, denies Cooley’s allegations:
Mr. Abbinanti denied having been Blagojevich’s mob handler 25 years ago. Abbinanti admits having run outfit gambling rackets with Marco “The Mover” D’amico and that he was convicted with top mob gambling bosses for which he spent six years in the federal penitentiary. “I don’t know what Rod Blagojevich did or has done but I do know one thing. I never met the man. I never spoke to the man. I never had any business — personal or in any way with him and you know what, it’s just an injustice,” said Abbinanti.
Cooley previously represented Abbinanti.
Meanwhile, Chris Kelly, Blagojevich’s former campaign manager, top fundraiser and close friend, has agreed to plead guilty to tax fraud for failing to report $1.3 million in income from sports betting.
Pong:
From
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/columnists/chi-kass-bd-deadmeatdec21,0,2882820.column
...Obama selected outgoing Illinois U.S. Rep. Ray LaHood (R-Combine) for the post of secretary of transportation, putting LaHood in charge of Obama’s planned trillion-dollar public works bonanza being sold as a jobs bill.
...What Obama forgot to mention is that with LaHood in charge of the roads, they’ll lead to one place:
Bill Cellini.
Republican money man Cellini is not only the Chicago political connection to machine Democrats and Mayor Richard Daley’s City Hall—and a Blagojevich fundraiser—he’s also the boss of the Illinois Asphalt Pavement Association.
...
Singing in the key of “B”:
A federal grand jury today indicted longtime Republican power broker William Cellini in the Operation Board Games investigation of corruption in state government.
Cellini was charged with conspiring with others to force a real estate investment firm headed by Hollywood producer Thomas Rosenberg to raise or donate substantial political contributions for Gov. Rod Blagojevich. The governor is not charged with wrongdoing.
The four-count indictment charged Cellini, 73, with conspiracy to commit mail fraud, extortion conspiracy, attempted extortion and soliciting a bribe.
To start out lets get on with Sen. Barack Obama (D-IL) smiling his way to the nomination, if only he could shake the pesky associations with the Chicago Mob, its ties to the Democratic Machine and the relationship with one Antoin “Tony” Rezko. It is not everyday that one gets to see a Presidential candidate appear on the witness list of reputed mobster, and we might even get to hear the money exchanges between said mobster, Tony Rezko, Michelle Obama’s interest in the neighbor’s yard, and a bit of funding coming from the mobster’s friend, Nadhmi Auchi, to help pay for the deal so that Mrs. Obama could have some ‘gardening space’ which would, more or less, include a whole lot next door. A lot owned by the Rezkos. Yes, all sorts of graft, corruption and cash moving around between foreign financiers, local Syrian born mobsters and a Presidential candidate will make one wonder just what the hell is going on. All of this because the friendly financier wanted to be the ‘Donald Trump’ of Iraqi origin in Chi-town, via land deals featuring lots in upscale areas… or soon to be upscale, at least. And a few folks realized it wouldn’t look good to have a Presidential candidate of the ‘new and clean’ variety get a bit dirtied knowing these sorts of folks, so better to just forget it all, hmmm?
More on Albanian mob
While some media reports noted this provocative passage, missed in the coverage was exactly which countries the U.S. spy agencies were talking about. PaperTrail consulted organized crime experts close to the U.S. government, who were all too happy to name names. Topping the list of potential Mafia states: Moldova, that ex-Soviet cauldron of crime and corruption, and the Balkan nations of Albania and its newly-founded neighbor Kosovo, known for their ruthless drug trafficking syndicates.
“Well, it wouldn’t make sense if Team Obama was being pressured by a crooked governor to pay something for a candidate they preferred. But it does make sense if Team Obama is the one that was applying the pressure. If it is true that Team Obama was in contact with Team Blagojevich to pressure Blagojevich to dump his own preference and defer to Team Obama’s directives the whole thing turns around.”
Makes sense to me
This SCOTUS case/ law passed by congress may be relavant:
From:
http://www.thechicagosyndicate.com/2008_06_08_archive.html
In the case decided unanimously, Justice Clarence Thomas wrote that a money laundering case against a man headed to Mexico with $81,000 in cash cannot be proven merely by showing that the funds were concealed in a secret compartment of a car.
Instead, the court said that prosecutors must show that the purpose of transporting funds in a money laundering case was to conceal their ownership, source or control.
In passing the money laundering law, Congress intended to fill a gap in law enforcement by preventing the concealment and reinvestment of money derived from criminal activity.
the Balkan nations of Albania and its newly-founded neighbor Kosovo, known for their ruthless drug trafficking syndicates
Hmmmm
Makes a person wonder who has the drug concession business in
Chicago...Illinois....Mid West?
Real Estate, banking, Money laundry?
Peanuts! Popcorn! COCAINE?
Now who would have previous connections to THAT business?
Another reason to have ties with Albania:
Notice the second link.....
Albania - A Tax Havens country
From:
http://www.zimbio.com/Prime+Minister+Sali+Berisha/articles/5/Albania+A+Tax+Havens+country
Who got it from
www.offshorebank.com
As of January 1st, 2008, Albania implemented the 10% flat tax system, one of the lowest in Europe,” Albanian Prime Minister Sali Berisha told a business community meeting in late March. Corporate taxes, currently at 20%, are to be slashed in half. Social security contributions from businesses will likewise be capped at 10%. The government of Albenia will widen the taxable base and simplify tax administration, while also making Albania an easier place to invest.
OCF BM
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