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A jury found four former Commonwealth Edison executives and lobbyists guilty of bribery-related charges Tuesday as part of an eight-year conspiracy scheme centered around former Democratic Illinois House Speaker Michael Madigan. In the highest-profile corruption case in Illinois in more than a decade, the jury convicted the defendants on all counts. "We're tired of political corruption," juror Amanda Schnitker Sayers said after the verdict. "We're hoping this is a first step." The Chicago veterinarian put the blame on Madigan. "He really did cause this all to happen," she said. Although Madigan wasn't on trial, the longest-serving state legislative leader in...

The most Chicago thing ever happened 20 years ago — an airport was bulldozed overnight Then-Mayor Richard M. Daley boldly showed how he ran the city the night he ordered the destruction of Meigs Field on Northerly Island. When the sun came up over Chicago on March 31, 2003, it shone down on six large Xs that were bulldozed overnight into the runway of a small downtown airport. Under the cover of darkness, then-Mayor Richard M. Daley made it clear who ran the city when he ordered the destruction of Meigs Field on Northerly Island without alerting the City Council,...

I was in third grade. Happy to be a Friday and looking forward to drawing and coloring instead of catechism class after lunch.

For decades, Illinois House speaker Michael Madigan dominated the state’s political system, corrupting it to his own ends. What should we make of his ouster? The Chicago machine turned out some of the most notorious names in American public corruption, including Anton Cermak, Richard J. Daley, and Ed Kelly. The machine also turned out Mike Madigan, who ruled over Illinois politics for 50 years, 36 of which he spent calling the shots as House speaker. Most people thought Madigan would only leave office in handcuffs or a casket. Most people were wrong. For the first time since 1970, “the Velvet...

A great-grandson of Mayor Richard J. Daley has called out several members of his extended family, accusing them of being “committed to white supremacy” in an open letter published last week. In “A Letter to My Cousins,” published Wednesday in South Side Weekly, Bobby Vanecko calls his great-grandfather a “horribly racist mayor” and points to great-uncle Richard M. Daley’s involvement “in covering up evidence of Chicago police torture.” Vanecko says his political family member’s support for racist policies can be traced back to Richard J. Daley, who ruled over the city from 1955 until his death in 1976 and resisted...

Obama, Hu toast 'strategic mutual trust' at state dinnerBy Christina Wilkie - 01/19/11 10:30 PM ET President Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao toasted U.S. and Chinese collaboration and mutual interests on Wednesday night at a festive state dinner for 225 guests at the White House. Their toasts marked the high point of an evening notable for its strict adherence to the protocol and symbolism valued in Chinese culture, but which, at the same time, managed to fulfill the Chinese delegation's request for a thoroughly American dinner party. Guests dined on a meal of pear salad, lobster, ribeye steak and...

If there ever was any hope that five Chicago city workers pension funds would make any money by investing $68 million with then-Mayor Richard M. Daley’s nephew and one of his key political supporters, it didn’t last long. Only months after the deals were made a dozen years ago, problems began to emerge. The nephew, Robert G. Vanecko, and his partner Allison S. Davis, a developer who gave campaign money to Daley and was appointed by the mayor to the Chicago Plan Commission, started investing in a series of property deals that, by the time the last of them are...

A dozen years ago, five financially strapped city of Chicago pension funds invested $68 million in a shaky real estate deal put together by a former boss of President Barack Obama and a nephew of Mayor Richard M. Daley. It was a high-risk investment. Allison S. Davis — a longtime Daley ally who once headed a small Chicago law firm that gave Obama his first job out of Harvard Law School — and Daley nephew Robert G. Vanecko even warned in the prospectus that the pension funds could lose their entire investments. But, with Daley in office and three top...

Vanecko and Davis. Their firm made millions in fees even as retirement plans for teachers, cops, other Chicago city workers suffered big losses. A dozen years ago, five financially strapped city of Chicago pension funds invested $68 million in a shaky real estate deal put together by a former boss of resident Barack Obama and a nephew of Mayor Richard M. Daley. It was a high-risk investment. Allison S. Davis — who once headed a small Chicago law firm that gave Obama his first job out of Harvard Law School — and Daley nephew Robert G. Vanecko even warned in...

At the woman’s feet, detectives found a curled strand of telephone wire. Draped over her right hand was a different kind of wire: thin and brown. The same brown wire was wrapped around each armrest of a wooden chair next to her. The following day, July 24, a pathologist in the Cook County medical examiner’s office noticed something else that had been obscured by rotting skin: a thin gag tied around the corpse’s mouth. Thanks to some still-visible tattoos, detectives soon identified this unfortunate woman: Tiara Groves, a 20-year-old from Austin. She was last seen walking alone in the wee...

From the Investigative Project on Terrorism:Previously on the IPT blog we stressed the need for the Defense Department's Islamic Chaplaincy program to adopt a stricter vetting process, citing historically radical imams who have served in the program. Now the same can be said for the chaplaincy program for the Illinois State Police. The Mosque Foundation website reports that Sheikh Kifah Mustapha recently completed a four day training session in Springfield, Illinois to become the first certified Muslim chaplain for the Illinois State Police. Mustapha's name appears on a list of unindicted co-conspirators in the Holy Land Foundation (HLF) Hamas financing...

I'd like to crowdsource this with some FR sleuths / weaponized autism / centipedes.... With whom did Robert Creamer meet at the White House aside from Obama? He met with both POTUS and FLOTUS according to the visitor’s log: https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/disclosures/visitor-records Others he visited: Kristin Sheehy. Sheehy , Kristin J. Employee $55,000.00 Per Annum EXECUTIVE ASSISTANT TO THE DEPUTY CHIEF OF STAFF FOR OPERATIONS http://www.realclearpolitics.com/politics_nation/RCPWHSalaries09.pdf James Messina is the Deputy Chief of Staff for Operations ****** Miti Sathe Miti Sathe is a Democratic Party activist who works for Blue Engine Message & Media, a political consulting firm, and serves as the...

If for nothing else, Jodi Kantor’s The Obamas will be remembered for an anecdote from 2010. After he spent hours disputing an allegation in the French media that Michelle Obama thought life in the White House was “hell,” press secretary Robert Gibbs encountered senior adviser Valerie Jarrett. She told him the first lady was unhappy with his work. Gibbs exploded in a rage, informing Jarrett that she didn’t “know what the f— you’re talking about” and that if Mrs. Obama was displeased, well, “f— her too.” Subsequent relations between the senior adviser and press secretary were strained. Gibbs told Kantor...

Sounds about right to me... "...Mayor Richard J. Daley later told reporters that he had ordered police "to shoot to kill any arsonist or anyone with a Molotov cocktail in his hand . . . and . . . to shoot to maim or cripple anyone looting any stores in our city."

Former Chicago Mayor Richard M. Daley, one of his top aides and others in Daley’s Chicago Police Department knew “shortly after the incident” that the mayor’s nephew was involved in the drunken confrontation that led to David Koschman’s death — even though police reports say detectives didn’t learn of the nephew’s involvement until 18 days later.

A week ago, William Daley -- son of one mayor of Chicago, brother of another, chairman of Bill Clinton's presidential campaign, former secretary of commerce, and onetime chief of staff for Barack Obama -- pulled out of the Illinois gubernatorial race.There has been a fair amount of comment from those inclined to handicap that race -- with most observers following the ChicagoSun-Times in supposing Pat Quinn, the current governor, a very lucky man.Jason Riley , who writes for The Wall Street Journal, suspects that there is more to the story than meets the eye: My sources say that Mr. Daley's...

Former White House chief of staff William Daley abruptly dropped out of the race for Illinois governor Monday, signaling he wasn't sure he wanted to devote time to a long, hard campaign followed by at least four years in office. The decision leaves Gov. Pat Quinn without a prominent challenger in the Democratic primary next March, unless another candidate makes a late entry into the race. Daley spokesman Peter Giangreco confirmed that the son of late Mayor Richard J. Daley and brother of former Mayor Richard M. Daley was ending what many had believed would be a serious challenge to...

House Judiciary Committee Chairman Lamar Smith, R-Texas, told President Obama Thursday he’d like to interview seven current and former administration officials who may know something about a spate of national security leaks. The request follows suggestions by lawmakers a day earlier that they’re interested in potentially pursuing a congressional investigation into the leaks, on top of the Department of Justice-led probe. “Concern about these leaks knows no party line. When national security secrets leak and become public knowledge, our people and our national interests are jeopardized. And when our enemies know our secrets, American lives are threatened,” Smith said in...

The nephew of former Chicago Mayor Richard Daley was indicted Monday for involuntary manslaughter in the 2004 death of a 21-year-old man outside a Chicago bar, and a grand jury is continuing its inquiry into whether authorities covered up or impeded an investigation of a relative of the city's most powerful man. Richard Vanecko, 38, was indicted by a Cook County special grand jury in the death of David Koschman of Mount Prospect. Koschman died days after he fell and struck his head during a fight with Vanecko outside a bar in Chicago's Gold Coast neighborhood.

As a young single woman, Michelle Robinson was a fixture in the home of civil rights leader Jesse Jackson, who along with Rev. Jeremiah Wright “arranged” her marriage to Barack Obama, according to sources in Chicago who know the couple. Jackson’s daughter, Santita, is still one of Michelle’s best friends. “It all relates back to Trinity and to the Jesse Jackson orbit of blacks here in Chicago who gave Obama legitimacy and helped him establish his identity as a black man,” Robyn explained. “The political left wanted to push a black to the presidency, and the key operatives in the...