Listen to the video in its entirety because Matthews describes further how VERY near he was to where that bomb went off. And Ayers (of course, this was not discussed today) is a free man solely because his attorneys managed to prove the FBI improperly conducted wiretaps. (I have MUCH MORE TO SAY about this below, and ask you to read along and then share YOUR reactions and add your own knowledge and your own impressions of what occurred, shamefully, on MSNBC.)

I can only imagine what Concerned Mother would have to say about this travesty.

It is unconscionable to me that we and the MSM constantly RAGE about O.J. Simpson, who murdered two people, but not reject Barack Obama, a presidential candidate, now president-elect, who has associated freely and over a long time with a man who could have killed dozens and dozens of people.

On his remarkable radio show a few weeks ago, Nocturnal Warrior made a brilliant point about PEBO’s selection of numerous former Clinton White House and cabinet members. Warrior said that PEBO has to select such people because he has almost no FRIENDS or LONGTIME ASSOCIATES to appoint to any serious jobs in his administration. This is a situation that has NEVER occurred in the history of the presidency of the United States. Heretofore, every U.S. president has had a rich collection of friends, associates, and allies from whom he could select many qualified for high-ranking administration positions. But not Barack Obama. You faithful readers of No Quarter know of many of Obama’s real longtime associates: Jeremiah Wright, Tony Rezko, Father Michael Pfleger, William Ayers, Allison and Cullen Davis, Penny Pritzker, Bernardine Dohrn, and on and on, only a very, very few of them suited for any respectable position at any level in an administration. (I’ve clicked several Categories to provide you with a list.) And now, this week, we learn more about other Obama longtime associates like Rod Bagojevich and his wife.

William Ayers’ Crimes, and Additional Perspective History

The SOLE reason no one died is because Ayers et al. were piss-poor bomb makers. What is the sentence range these days for an attempt to commit murder? And don’t forget all the other bombs that nearly killed many others. Including the judge, his wife, and his children — while they slept — simply because that judge was doing his job: Handling the trial of a Black Panther. I’m not generally in favor of the death penalty, but Ayers’ and the Weather Underground’s attempts, repeatedly, to kill as many people as possible in the Capitol, the Pentagon, police stations, and a judge’s home are the works of people so dangerous that those people should never be freed, and may be eligible to be charged with a capital offense.

Ayers has famously said, “Free as a bird, guilty as hell, ain’t America great.” (From Larry Johnson’s must-read article, “A Statement by a Retired FBI Agent Re William Ayers.”)

Dear readers, please understand this: All that, to Matthews, is just some history. It has some import to Matthews, given that he might have been blown up himself, but apparently not much since the conversation flows easily and reasonably amicably, and Matthews, at the end of the interview, gladly flogs Ayers’ book. THEN, after this interview, Matthews has his panel on. Matthews asks Joan Walsh, Salon‘s editor, why Ayers — who appeared today to be “confessional” in his tone — didn’t do that during the campaign. Ms. Walsh LAUGHS with a SMIRK on her face, and says, “I think he wanted to stay out of it entirely, and not dignify what the McCain campaign and others were doing.”

Thank you, Ms. Walsh. We now know who the real criminals are. Shame on you, John McCain. Shame on you, Sarah Palin.

Ms. Walsh, please share your opinions with John Murtagh. Well, of course. That’s unfair. You don’t know who John Murtagh is.

Uppity Woman can tell you, in her story, “When This Man Was 9 Years Old, Ayers Bombed His Home.”

If I may, I will contrast the actions of William Ayers and the rest of the sociopathic members of the Weather Underground to the actions of a man who — unless you’re my age and you closely followed anti-war activities during the Vietnam War — you’ve probably NEVER heard of, and will not hear of in the MSM.

After all, he didn’t make bombs. He didn’t befriend a future president and excite the easily excitable rightwing. He simply did the hard work of truly changing history and he paid the price that true, albeit boring, heroes do, in anonymity.

His name is David Harris.

He was the resident counselor in the boys’ dormitory across the street from my girls’ dorm. Many of us sat at his feet as he modestly told us his stories about traveling to the South in summers past to try to help black people get the right to vote. He also shared with us the music he’d learned about in the South — the blues. He told us about Muddy Waters and more. We were entranced. With him, with his stories and the very REAL danger he was in during those summers when white racists wanted to kill him and every white college kid who dared to fight for blacks’ right to vote.

He ran for student body president and I worked on his campaign. He ran on the sole condition that, if elected, he would not serve. He won in a landslide. And did not serve.

Then his draft number came up. (My memory is vague these days, but I believe he tried all the normal routes available back then, such as conscientious objector status, and so on. All of those routes failed.)

So he went to prison. Leavenworth. About seven years ago, I did a search on him, curious what his life had been like. I discovered that he had written a book about his time in Leavenworth, along with his then-wife Joan Baez. I bought the book, and read it. It was a heart-wrenching account. I had no idea that being an inmate in Leavenworth was such a horrific, maddening, insane experience.

It is a simple story, really.

He refused to fight for a war he did not believe was right.

The U.S. government tried him and sentenced him to prison.

He served roughly three years, as I recall.

You may disagree with his decision, but he decided to take the punishment like a man.

He had a father who, as I remember it, was an attorney in Fresno, California. His father surely had some means, but not enough to prevent his son from going to prison.

Bill Ayers had a father who was Chairman of Commonwealth Edison and a mover/shaker in Chicago politics, the arts and education. His father had the means to hire a cadre of attorneys who successfully prevented his son from spending a single day in prison.

David Harris did not build bombs.

He tried to help blacks in the South get to vote, at great risk to his own life.

He helped educate and watched over younger students attending the university, which was often a tedious task, listening to those 18-year-olds’ angst and fear and uncertainty and their various problems with and anxieties about their classes.

He helped the students with the difficult reading for the required freshman class, The History of Western Civilization, because he had read all of those works, including all of Plato, Socrates, and more, and he could — and did — explain those works to those anxious students. He spoke with them patiently and kindly and always very softly.

He was a hulk of a man with broad thick shoulders and a large angular head and a blond mustache but he was, as they say, a gentle giant.

He did not teach the younger students to build bombs or burn down buildings.

He taught the students about giving black people the right to vote and about the blues and about philosophy and about literature and about political thinking and about peaceful protest and about Martin Luther King and Gandhi.

He marched and sang folk songs with his wife, who bore their son.

What a dull man.

Doubtless, Chris Matthews will never invite David Harris for a feature interview.

If only he’d built bombs and then buddied up with a future president, he’d be a sought-after guest.

At least he has an entry in Wikipedia.

:::::::::::

Via Google News results:

Matthews to Ayers: ‘I Agitate My Way, You Agitate Your Way‘ – NewsBusters

Chris Matthews invited on Bill Ayers on Wednesday night’s “Hardball,” and actually confronted him about his bombing of Capitol Hill during his days as a member of the ’60s terrorist group Weather Underground, as the former Capitol Hill police officer emotionally observed: “I was a Capitol policeman at the time, so I was one of the guys that could have been killed obviously at the time you put that, your guys put that bomb in there. So I have a little personal interest. It wasn’t just vandalism. To me it was life-threatening to the guys I worked with. And there were some pretty good guys working there.”

However Matthews, who paradoxically may not even be alive to conduct this interview today if the Weather Underground’s bombs were more devastating, devoted most of the interview tossing softballs Ayers’ way, as the two often agreed with each other on Barack Obama and Iraq policy as the “Hardball” host pointed out they only really differed on how to spread their points of view: “Well, Mr. Ayers, with all due respect, you agitate your way, I agitate my way.

Matthews, who back in October dismissed Sarah Palin’s mention of Ayers, as “the politics of distraction,” began the interview by setting up Ayers to play down any association he had with Obama: …

READ ALL: Matthews to Ayers: ‘I Agitate My Way, You Agitate Your Way‘ — NewsBusters

AND READ MORE of NoQuarter’s treasure trove of materials on the bombings conducted by William Ayers.

Senator Barack Obama returns to his boorish behavior by flipping off Senator John McCain while obstensibly praising him at an event. As in past instances where he’s done this to Senator Hillary Clinton, the crowd gets it, even if the media chooses to ignore it.

Obama is a repeat offender.

Here he does the same to Senator Hillary Clinton on April 17, 2008:

Here he uses a derogatory gesture by brushing off Clinton in the manner of Jay-z:

Larry Johnson, among others at NoQuarter, has written at length on this. See his article, “When Obama Does It Repeatedly It Is a Strategy [Updated],” from September 11, 2008.

Here, Barack Obama talks about Senator Clinton “periodically” feeling down (sexist bastard):

And here’s another presidential moment for Senator Barack Obama. Further, note carefully that this is the music and content that Obama feels is appropriate for his own three-year-old daughter.

For more on this, see Larry Johnson’s article, “Obama, You Are Ludicrous,” from August 2, 2008.

On August 1, 2008, Uppity Woman, wrote “Doesn’t This New Obama Rap Crap Make You Feel So Proud?,” About Obama’s ties to his “genius friend” Ludacris:

:::::::::::::::

BELOW, IN FULL, THE BEST STORY WE EVER PUBLISHED on the reprehensible Jay-Z incident:

A whole lot of fuss has been made about Obama’s possible flipping of the middle finger to Hillary in response to his treatment during Wednesday’s debate as something less than Baby Jesus. If he in fact intended to flip her off, his gesture marks a new low in a campaign that was supposedly predicated on high-mindedness.

Obama’s invocation of Jay-Z’s defiant “Dirt Off Your Shoulder” battle anthem during the same speech adds evidence to the claim that he gave Hillary the finger.

To see Obama brush his shoulders off, go to 2:25 of this video clip.

Obama’s gesture prompted a mash-up video that made the Jay-Z/Obama connection explicit. Ari Melber, the other Obamabot named Ari at The Nation, posted the video on The Nation’s website, noting, “Obama really is a Jay-Z fan, too. When asked which hip hop artists he likes in a recent interview, he said, ‘lately I’ve been listening to a lot of Jay-Z — this new American Gangster album.’”

Spencer Ackerman, another young white male media Obamaton, called Obama’s gesture “perhaps the coolest subliminal cultural reference in the history of American politics.”

So what is the hype about? What did Jay-Z actually say that captivated Barack Obama?

Here is the hook and first verse to the new theme song of Obama ’08:

[Chorus: Jay-Z]
If you feelin’ like a pimp nigga, go and brush your shoulders off
Ladies is pimps too, go and brush your shoulders off
Niggaz is crazy baby, don’t forget that boy told you
Get, that, dirt off your shoulder

[Verse One]
I probably owe it to y’all, probably to be locked by the force
Tryin to hustle some things, that go with the Porsche
Feelin no remorse, feelin like my hand was forced
Middle finger to the law, nigga grippin ma balls
Stab the ladies they love me, from the bleachers they screamin
All the ballers is bouncin, they like the way I be leanin
All the rappers be hatin, off the track that I’m makin
But all the hustlers they love it just to see one of us make it
Came from the bottom the bottom, to the Top of the Pops
Nigga London, Japan and I’m straight off the block
Like a running back, get it man, I’m straight off the block
I can run it back nigga cause I’m straight with the Roc
=

Obama hasn’t flipped a “middle finga to the law” but to Hillary instead (his godfather Tony Rezko and possible financial angel Nadmi Auchi were the ones flicking off the law). He got his clock cleaned in a debate about his closest associates, his domestic policy proposals and national security credentials, but after a quick, not-so-subliminal reference to Jay-Hova, Obama’s back to “feelin’ like a pimp.”

But don’t blame Obama if you don’t like his reaction. He’s never responsible. George Stephanopoulos and ABC forced him to behave like a wannabe American gangster.

ABC News’ Matthew Jaffe Reports:

As Election Day looms just over two weeks away, Sen. Joe Biden, D-Del., said Saturday that with Republicans firing “vicious” and “dangerous” attacks at Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., voters are “having a difficult time” opting for the man who would become the nation’s first African American president.

Vicious and dangerous attacks? McCain/Palin are asking Obama to answer legitimate policy questions in re his revealing statement to Joe the Plumber that he wants to “spread the wealth around” and what that really means for Joe and Jane taxpayer.

They want Obama to explain to the American people why he launched his political career in the living room of unrepentant terrorist Bill Ayers. They want him to acknowledge his role in our economic mess as he was one of the people who “voted present” on stronger regulations re Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. They want to know the extent of Obama’s ties with ACORN – and it has already been proven that there are many.

What is vicious and dangerous about that? Sounds perfectly reasonable to me. These are questions any other candidate would have to answer. But, in another effort to change the subject, here is Joe-the-Senator at his finest:

“Undecided people are having a difficult time just culturally making the change, making the move for the first African American president in the history of the United States of America,” the Democratic vice-presidential nominee said at a San Francisco fundraiser Saturday evening. “So we need to respond. We need to respond at the moment, immediately, not wait, not hang around, not assume any of this won’t stick.”

Culturally? What is Biden trying to say here? Perhaps he is playing the race card just like Senator Obama did a couple of months ago when he said ‘I know I don’t look like the face of most of the guys you see on the dollar bill.’

Culturally? Is Biden implying that those who haven’t yet bowed before the messiah are racist? Oh, no he didn’t! Ironic he made these comments at – you guessed it – another San Francisco fundraiser. Oh, this is too good to be true. Say it ain’t so, Joe!

Did he really open his big fat yaw before the hoi polloi in San Francisco at a fund raiser – the same way Obama did when he made his infamous ‘bitter voter’ comments back in April? Did Vice Presidential nominee Joe Biden really infer that undecided voters are having trouble voting for Obama because they are having trouble ‘seeing’ a bi-racial man in the White House?

Yep. Joe played the race card yet again. Tell me Senator Biden, did you have an indoctrination session at Camp Obama and did they use the Alinsky method in training you how to employ the race card as an argument to buffer any and all legitimate questions about your unqualified and dissembling candidate?

“You see these vicious attacks on Barack’s character,” Biden told supporters. “I mean, this is dangerous stuff these guys are doing. This stuff is on the edge. It’s on the edge. You know, there’s some folks out there in the community nationwide that aren’t as stable as others. It’s a very small minority. But having these rallies where people are showing up saying, you know, the things they’re saying – I don’t even want to repeat them — it’s not a healthy thing.”

Biden cited automated GOP calls describing Obama as having “worked closely” with “domestic terrorist Bill Ayers”.

He did work closely with Ayers. This is the truth. They have known each other for years. They have served on boards together. Obama profited by his association with Ayers, repeatedly. Hello. These are legitimate concerns.

He doesn’t want to repeat the “things they are saying?” Repeat what? Senator Biden, I am calling you out on the carpet and I dare you to look me in the eye and say this same crap. The FBI already debunked the nonsense that anyone called Obama a terrorist – they were calling Ayers a terrorist – which admittedly, he is – and an unrepentant one at that.

But Joe doesn’t have a problem with people walking around threatening violence against Sarah Palin or wearing T-shirts that say “Sarah Palin is a c*nt.” Nor does the Obama campaign have problem with their supporters in Florida calling a twelve year old child a racist for wearing a Sarah Palin T-Shirt.

Is that not dangerous, Joe? I guess you “don’t want to repeat” those comments either huh, Joe? Is that not a healthy thing?

Let’s pretend for the sake of argument, I am an undecided voter. Here is a sampling of a few of my concerns:

• His voting record – 130 present votes and 6 ‘wrong’ votes in the IL State Senate. His lack of moral courage and skipping out on or capitulating on important votes in the U.S. Senate. FISA chief among them.
• His daily playing of the race card to advantage himself.
• His 20 years of nefarious, crooked, and divisive business and personal associations with Rezko, Wright, Ayers, Auchi, Khalidi, Al Mansour, Pritzker, Jarrett, Pfleger, Meeks and more.
• His major policy reversals on critical issues, i.e., FISA, Israel, don’t ask don’t tell, public financing, NAFTA, Iraq, women’s rights, gun control; touting Bush’s faith based initiatives, and wanting to keep Blackwater going.
• His desire to spread the wealth around with economic policies that do not work.
• His illegal activities to win the primary, including over 2,000 documented instances of caucus fraud and blocking re-votes in MI and FL.
• His receiving huge contributions from Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the organizations at the center of our current economic mess.
• His lack of any governing, or executive experience and his lack of knowledge on critical issues of domestic and foreign policy – as he has demonstrated repeatedly on the campaign trail. Russia’s recent aggression on Georgia comes to mind.
• The fact that you can never get a straight answer from him on any of his policies or associations – just more double talk and distraction.

These are just a few questions that might be giving people pause at the voting booth. Please tell me – someone, anyone – what does that have to do with “cultural” predisposition; or more accurately, race bias?

Biden hit the Bay Area for three fundraisers Saturday, helping rake in an estimated $2.2 million for the campaign. At his second event of the day, in Piedmont, Biden predicted that the ticket will experience a drop in polls this week.

“Mark my words, you’re going to see these polls drop this week,” Biden forecasted. “We got a bump. We’re going to be in good shape. You’re going to see them drop. There’s nothing automatic about this at all.”

Obviously, Biden knows that Obama’s gaffe with Joe the plumber hurt them; rightfully so. And by gaffe I mean, Obama had a rare unscripted moment without his teleprompter and he told the truth for once about his policies and his attitudes. And for that he is now going to pay a legitimate price. So, once again, they are trying to distract the voters.

Joe the Plumber is certainly paying a price – Obama showed up on Joe’s front lawn at a campaign stop. Joe asked a simple question and for that his entire life has been invaded and turned up side down. Not only has Obama belittled Joe the Plumber, but the media is out for blood. And Joe-everyman-working-guy-coal-miner-six-term-Senator-elitist-Biden has derided him as well. Shame on him. Shame on them all.

Make no mistake – these attacks on Joe everyman are also costing the elitists Obama/Biden in the polls. To reassure their rich donors, Biden said:

“It costs tens of millions of dollars to do this. And that’s our secret weapon. That is our equalizer to when anybody talks about the Bradley effect. This is the ultimate equalizer.”

That is very much in evidence – in this no lose year for Democrats, Obama is spending obscene amounts of money saturating the TV market to “counteract the Bradley effect.” He does not dare to tell the truth to their rich donors. It is not the Bradley effect people are having a problem with – it is the Obama effect – the effect of a dishonest, secretive, inexperienced man taking office at one of the most difficult junctures in our recent history. But Biden boasted that Obama has the capacity to withstand GOP attacks and win the White House.

“Barack Obama communicates an absolute sense and certainty that is the most typical American instinct that there is,” Biden said. …”That’s why he touched those people helping feed us tonight.”

Elitist! Is Biden referring to the folks serving him his expensive 5-course dinner? How nice of Biden to refer to the people waiting tables at this expensive fundraiser. How does he know Obama has touched them – did he ever ask?? I doubt it. Elitists of all stripes have a bad habit of being encapsulated in their rarified air, so sure they know what is best for everyone else.

And here is the icing on the cake from Biden:

“I never thought I could be part of it – a part of seeing to it that we for the first and significant, fundamentally significant way, put a lot of that past behind us and began to unite the nation.”

Imagine trying to ‘guilt’ the American people into electing someone who is completely unqualified and unreliable as Commander in Chief. Obama has never stood up to his party. He has never expended any political capital on a tough vote. He has never done anything but move with the prevailing wind.

How can we rely on him when our backs are to the wall? Isn’t it possible that we are worried about whether this man can and will protect us and have our best interests at heart? He has shown no need thus far to come clean and answer the questions burning in the minds of many Americans. Why should we trust him if he clearly does not trust us?

If this is the way that Obama/Biden and the svengali race-baiting David Axelrod are uniting the nation, by inferring that anyone not voting for Obama is a racist, then I will pass on their kind of unity.

Senator Biden is indeed the gift that keeps on giving. I am sure John McCain hopes that both he and Obama will keep showing their true nature to the American people. It’s a winning strategy – for the Republicans.

Once again, in closing, I must say, shame on you, Senator Biden.

Shame on you.

Yes, it is true, in the conversation Charlie Gibson of ABC (“American Barack Broadcasting,” as my aunt says) with Barack Obama the other day, Obama threw down a challenge to John McCain. In this interview, which was VERY different from the interview with Palin, by the way (this one, they were practically playing Barry White and using mood lighting), Obama said this:

Yeah, right. McCain is afraid to confront Obama face to face. Now, you know damn well what would have happened if McCain HAD brought this up – Obama would have whined and cried that it wasn’t the issue they were supposed to be discussing, and besides that, McCain was involved in the Keating 5. And honestly, I think that is the only reason he is making this challenge, so he can throw that in McCain’s face. Never mind that McCain was exonerated – we all know facts don’t matter to Obama and his minions as his response to Gibson made quite clear.

(As to the Ayers component, Larry Johnson had an excellent piece on this exchange, “When It Comes to Ayers, It Is Participation That Matters“, which I recommend to you.)

But it is this claim of cowardice with which Obama and his camp are painting McCain that is just startling to me, and it is not confined to a discussion of Ayers. My sister sent me an article recently from Rolling Stone by Tim Dickinson claiming the Bush and McCain families are very much alike. Oh, please, spare me. One of the issues he raised in this article was about the Forrestal Explosion, of which I knew nothing, I have to admit. My sister added this little tidbit when I responded that they were nothing alike:

We’re talking about Johnny. Those were NOT “his men” in the POW camp and he DID abandon the men who were fighting the fire that HIS plane caused. Hell, he could at least have used a fire extinquisher (sic)!

I hadn’t the FOGGIEST about what she was talking until I saw John McCain’s biography on bio.com. I realized as I watched the ACTUAL footage from the plane to what she must have been referring. It seems that Obama’s pawns are spreading this vicious lie all around the Internet community that McCain caused the devastating explosion on the Forrestal aircraft carrier by “wet-starting” his plane, a hot dog stunt to mess around with a flight deck crewman. And that he was such a coward, he didn’t even bother to help anyone else on the aircraft carrier, so says the Democratic Underground anyway.

Wow. Aren’t these the SAME people who were livid (myself included) about the Swiftboating of John Kerry’s military service, and his heroics during the Vietnam war? Aren’t these the very same people who decried tactics of blatant lies, of character assassination, and now are engaging in those very same tactics? (Well, and why not – now voter fraud is perfectly acceptable to these folks, too, so why am I surprised??)

So, having seen this, I wrote back to my sister:

The other day, were you talking about when McCain’s plane blew up on the flight deck? I just saw the actual footage from that event on tv and realized that must have been about what you were talking. In case it was, what happened was a missile fired accidentally from another plane across the flight deck, and hit McCain’s plane in the fuselage right after he had started his pre-flight check. He had started the engine, but once he got hit, he turned it off. He dropped and rolled through the burning jet fuel (over 400 gal)from his plane. He saw the pilot next to him try to do the same thing, but failed. He got up to run to him, and as soon as he stood up, there was another explosion, which knocked him back 10 ft. After that, other missiles started exploding. It was the worst disaster outside of war, with 134 crew dying. It took 36 hrs to get the fire under control. One fire extinguisher was not going to do it, and he was lucky to get out of there alive (as it was, he was hit by shrapnel). It was in no way, shape, or form, his fault, nor was there anything he could do to help anyone, as is clear from the flight video.

She claimed she was being rhetorical (uh huh) about the fire extinguisher, and said the least he could have done was stayed to help instead of watching on closed circuit tv (the claim from the Rolling Stones article). Yeah, what a freaking coward – he jumps from a burning plane into burning jet fuel, tries to help another pilot, gets blown back by an explosion from which he took shrapnel, and the wimp turned tail and ran. How dare he! Obama would NEVER have done anything like that, I am CERTAIN. And I am certain of that because Obama did not spend 22 years of his life in military service to our country, and has not exhibited anything close to the intestinal fortitude that McCain has demonstrated over his long career in service to this country.

Once again, don’t take my word for all of this. Here is the actual video footage from the Forrestal aircraft carrier (and this accident completely changed standard operating procedures by the Navy on aircraft carriers). The first thing you should notice is that McCain’s jet tail is pointed OVER the deck toward the ocean, thus debunking the whole “wet-start started this whole thing!” claim. Here it is:

Here is eyewitness testimony about the fire on the Forrestal:

Finally, this is one made in response to the vicious smears by Obama supporters on this tragic accident:

Now shut the hell up. Or, as I said to my sister:

It sure would be nice if you bothered to look into the character of Obama, and the FACTS about him, as much as you are willing to listen to innuendo, rumor, and bald-faced lies about McCain and Palin. Obama has a HISTORY of unsavory characters as CLOSE friends/colleagues/bosses in his life, INCLUDING A MAN WHO BOMBED THE PENTAGON AND THE CAPITOL BUILDING, who said after 9/11 he wished they had done MORE!!!!!! How about Tony Rezko (convicted)? Auchi? Blogajevich (under investigation)? Wright? Meeks? Kilpatrick (convicted)? Clark (under investigation)? Farrakhan?? The people who got Obama into Harvard? Being a card-carrying member of the New Party wing of the Dem. Socialist Party, a group that endorsed him for his first run (in which he got EVERYONE thrown off the ballot)? *

And you are going to focus on a bogus claim that McCain didn’t do anything after his PLANE got shot by a missile and burst into flame???? A man who gave 22 yrs of his life in military service to this country?? HOLY SHIT.

Obama has done next to NOTHING in his life but be associated with the kinds of people mentioned above, and organizations like ACORN, which is under investigation in TEN (make that thirteen now) states for voter registration fraud. He has funneled money through them, has given them money this year, which his campaign admitted, and tried to get them to receive a HUGE chunk of the bailout repayment (which fortunately the Senate didn’t agree to). But hey – don’t worry about voter fraud. It’s already happened this year and too many people were willing to look the other way.

All I know is if Hillary or John or ANYONE had just ONE of those kinds of associates in their closet that Obama has in plain sight, they would have been drummed out already, but clearly, the FACTS about Obama mean nothing to his followers (I might add, my sister kept bringing up the Keating 5 – I told her that John Glenn was also one of the Keating 5, and is now campaigning for Obama, but that is okay, of course. No matter how many times I told her McCain AND Glenn were exonerated, she continued to maintain McCain was guilty. Sigh.). You’ll just listen to his (plagiarized) speeches, stolen policies, and bask in the shine of The One. (Oh – and now he is MAD at McCain for taking Hillary’s mortgage policy, and giving her CREDIT for it, because he was going to claim it for his OWN. And since McCain beat him to it, he is now claiming it won’t work. Gimme a break – at least McCain gives credit where credit is due – Obama just thinks every idea someone else has is due him and takes it without remorse.)

Whatever. If you care more about attacking other people based on lies rather than actually looking at your candidate, his character, his lack of judgment, his lack of qualifications, and his nefarious friends, there is nothing I can say that will change that.

True that. But it doesn’t mean that we can stop fighting the good fight, and getting this information out there. Fight on we must, good people. For our country, for voter rights, to combat voter fraud, and to keep the biggest fraud who has ever run for president out of the White House. To restore our honor and our integrity. Fight on!

* Each of these claims has been covered in full at No Quarter, so I am not going to add in links for every single one. Alert readers alreayd know these facts anyway.

The Republican National Committee has released this Internet-only ad highlighting Obama’s questionable past associations — at BarackBook.com. The ad is a 75 second spot.

From my blog, By The Fault.

In mid-June, Truthteller and I did an hour-long radio show on the highly disturbing story of Rezko and Obama’s long relationships, and the impoverished people of Chicago who suffered because Obama was more interested in making big deals for his rich benefactors than in truly helping the poor get beter housing. Listen to the archive of our show, just as timely today as it was in June. It’s also vital to read these two articles on Obama’s entanglements with these corrupt and unconscionably cruel men: “The Blood Money of Barack Obama’s Money Men” and the Boston Globe‘s “Grim proving ground for Obama’s housing policy.”

Also in June, in “The Epistolary Rezko,” Truthteller undertook the daunting task of compiling ALL of the posts at No Quarter — and there have been dozens of them! — on Tony Rezko and Obama’s other questionable associations with various characters in the Chicago Machine:

No Quarter dossier on Obama and Rezko:

• The Tipping Point?
• Barack, The Truth Ain’t A Smear
• Patrick Fitzgerald Issues Obama A Warning
• What Hypocrite Obama Should Have Discussion during His Wesleyan Commencement Address
• Barack Obama’s Candidacy as a Take on The Picture of Dorian Gray
• A Majority of One: On Losing the Democratic Base
• Ok, So Tell Us What IS Allowed
• Two Lone Voices Speak for Millions of Us
• What’ll Be Left of the Democratic Party
• It Ain’t Over: Obama MAY Have to Pay the Piper After All
• Obama to Donate Contribution from Rezko’s Iraqi Friend
• Be My Friend, Godfather
• Jaws V, Starring Barack Obama
• The Chicago Three: Obama, Ayers & Rezko
• Charlie Gibson, Will You Ask Barack about Nadhmi Auchi?
• Saddam Hussein, Barack Hussein Obama’s Hidden Real Estate Partner?
• Barack “I-Didn’t-Know” Obama
• Those Who Haunt Him
• Hillary’s Campaign Comes out Swinging
• “Nobie and Obama”
• Authorization to Use Misleading Falsehoods
• What We’ve Noticed about the Speech
• This Is for Main Street (And for the Forgotten People Barack Obama Doesn’t Know)
• Michelle Obama: “Give Us Something Here”
• Rezko Muckrakers Alert!
• The Forgotten People
• Irrefutable Proof That Obama’s Own District Was Home to 11 Rezko Foreclosed Properties
• Speak the Truth, Fallout Be Damned
• The Rezko Saga: Two Videos
• Get Your Daily Rezko Dose Here
• The Media’s Panderbears, Part I
• Sunday Scoops: Rezko-gate and Adviser-gate
• Obama’s Prime-Slime Advisors
• Good Morning, Barack! (Rezko Got Jobs for Your Staffers? Do Tell.)
• Today’s Rezko Trial Scoops (And Prosecutors on $20K Kickback to Obama)
• ABC News: Rezko $50 Million in Debt
• 312.321.2417
• (Pants on Fire!) Lynn Sweet: Obama and His Taking Questions on Rezko
• Rezko Trial: Obama May Be Witness
• Obama’s Judgment on the Eve of Judgment Day
• Truthtelling from Lanny Davis (What about “Iron My Shirt?”)
• Experience, and Experiences (of the Rezko Sort)
• No He Can’t Because Yes They Will
• More Questions on Rezko
• “Obama Bagman” in Jail
• Democratic Death Wish
• How to Buy A Mansion You Can’t Afford
• Will Rezko Blow Up Obama?
• It is “Possible” Obama Was Aware of Rezko’s Financial and Legal Woes
• 20-Year Associate of Obama Arrested
• Look before You Leap: Obama’s Mobbed-Up Allies
• Politics Is A Blood Sport
• BREAKING: ABC News Reports $100,000 from Rezko That Obama Hasn’t Returned
• CNN on Rezko and Obama: This Is Obama’s “Slumwater”
• FACT CHECK: Obama, His Contributor Rezko, The Slum Landlord Business
• A Dope with Hope?
• Obama/Rezko: It Comes down to Judgment
• Didn’t Obama Watch The Firm
• Steve Clemons on Tonight’s Debate
• Patrick Fitzgerald Ties Obama to Rezko Indictments
• All in for Hillary
• Obama, His Lobbyists and His Cronies

RezkoWatch contains even more information on Obama’s deep and problematic ties to convicted slumlord and notorious political fixer Antoin “Tony” Rezko.

So you thought the problem of Barack and Michelle Obamas’ 2005 mansion purchase was dead and buried.

Well, not any more.

A reader of my website who is a tax accountant of many years, one who specializes in criminal matters, says he believes the Obamas have a tax problem.

Simply put, the allocation of purchase price between the Obamas’ lot and the lot next door, which were both owned by the same couple and had long been sold together, makes no sense unless the amount paid for the lot adjoining the Obamas’ by the wife of now convicted political fixer Tony Rezko was specifically meant as a favor to the Obamas so that they could afford their mansion.

If so, the difference between what Ms. Rezko paid for the side lot and what it was actually worth would be construed by the IRS as income to the Obamas.  After looking at the Obamas’ tax return for 2005, my source was able to say that in his opinion they did not declare any such income, and therefore did not pay taxes on it.

Barack Obama once called the house purchase a boneheaded mistake, but my source believes it is worse than that.

Much worse. If Barack Obama were to attain the White House, this problem could be devastating for the Democratic Party, says my source.

That is why he wants this information made public now.

Here are the specifics.

On June 15, 2005 , Barack and Michelle Obama bought a landmark mansion on Chicago’s South Side for $1.65 million.

The lot next door was sold the same day for $625,000 to Rita Rezko, wife of Antoin “Tony” Rezko.

Tony Rezko was at that time under investigation for fraud and influence peddling, for which he was eventually convicted.

The specifics of these sale transactions were reported by the Chicago Tribune in an article published November 1, 2006 .

The information on the sale is also available online at the website of the Cook County Recorder of Deeds.

According to the Tribune, the Obamas’ price was “some $300,000 less than the asking price.”

The Rezko property, the article said, was purchased for “the full … asking price.”

That means the previous owners were paid $2.275 million for the two properties.

It is reasonable to assume, then, that when the previous owners listed the properties for sale, their asking price for the two was $2. 575 million or thereabouts.

How that total amount became the two amounts is what is at issue here.

Obama claimed in a long interview with Chicago media on March 14, 2008, as Tony Rezko was about to go to trial, that the sellers had tried to sell the house and adjoining lot together, but were not receiving offers as a result of the high price.

The sellers, he said, had already listed the properties separately by the time he and Michelle became serious about making an offer, and that the house, along with its lot, was listed for $1.9 million.

I understand from knowledgeable sources

that the multiple listing service for the area may have the records to confirm this assertion, but I do not have access to those kinds of records.

Archpundit, an Illinois  blogger and strong Obama supporter, somehow obtained access to 94 pages of related documents (pdf) he posted earlier this year, which contain documentation of the $1.9 million listing in January of 2005.  No earlier listings were printed.

Taking Obama at his word, we are led to believe that the sellers are the ones who allocated the $2.5 million or so that they wanted, in total, between the two properties. Since we do not have access to the original calculation and who made it, we can only try to determine if the allocation made at the time was reasonable.

Intrinsic Value

An empty lot only has value to a developer, or a developer’s wife, if he can build on it and sell for a profit.

Could the Rezkos have done that?

The Obamas’ house is in is an official landmark district, and I learned from a Senior Permit Reviewer at the Landmarks Division of the Chicago Department of Planning and Development that any construction in that district must be approved by the Commission on Chicago Landmarks.

She said the Commission makes sure that the construction conforms to the look and feel of the neighboring structures.

That means, for the district in question, that the structure could not be a high rise.

A one-unit home is a possibility, but would have to be very expensive in order to ensure a profit.

A small condominium building or several town houses might be a possibility, given the proper zoning, but they would also have to be expensive.

Of course, expensive is the norm for that neighborhood.

I am not an expert on real estate development, but it does seem that there might be potential for some profit in building on the empty lot bought by Rita Rezko.

The property, after 1,500 square feet was sold to the Obamas (see below), has changed hands twice since Rita Rezko bought it. According to the Cook County Recorder’s website, Rita Rezko sold the property on 12/28/06 for $575,000 to 5050 S Greenwood LLC.

Bloomberg reported on February 18, 2008 that the buyer’s name was Michael Sreenan.

5050 S Greenwood LLC sold the property to John D. and Marjorie S. Poulos on 3/17/08 for $675,000.

I do not know these people, nor do I know their relationship, if any, to the Rezkos.

If they do have business or personal relationships with Tony Rezko, these would not be the kind of arm’s length transactions that would ensure a market price for the property.

Comparison of Naked Land Values

It is common in the real estate industry to separate the house vs. land value from a total purchase price by assuming that 75% of the price is attributable to the house and 25% to the land.

And 25% of the $1.65 million that the Obamas paid for their house and land is $412,500.

By this test, the Rezko property should have been priced at less than that amount, as it had less square footage.   Instead, Rita Rezko paid one and a half times as much.

Assessment Associated with a Subsequent Transaction

Again from the 11/1/06  Tribune article (and also from the Recorder’s Office’s online records), we know that on January 11, 2006  the Obamas bought a strip of the Rezko lot that adjoined their property.

As the Tribune describes the transaction,

Using a standard formula, Obama’s appraiser estimated the 1,500-square-foot portion at a market value of $40,500.

But Obama felt it would be fair to pay the Rezkos $104,500, or a sixth of their original $625,000 purchase price, because he was acquiring a sixth of their land.

If an assessor valued 1/6 of the property at $40,500, wouldn’t that mean the market value assessment of the whole Rezko property at that time would be $40,500 x 6 = $243,000? Admittedly, the valuation of a strip of land may be lower because it is such a small portion of a property, but could that possibility account for the huge difference between the two values?The Times of London created a handy graphic to help visualize the properties and the transactions (extracted from this pdf file): 

Relative Assessed Values

The Cook County Assessor’s website shows only the current assessed values of the two properties, but by a call to the office I was able to find out the 2005 assessments for tax purposes. Be aware that assessed values for taxes in Chicago  are not anywhere near the market value.

I am only concerned here with the relative values, which should give us some indication whether the allocation of purchase prices between the two properties might have been reasonable.

The allocation between the two properties at the time of the listing was about 75% for the house and its lot ($1.9 million), and 25% for the adjoining lot ($625,000). That is very much out of kilter from the allocation above, based on assessed values.

What the Obamas Could Afford

At the time, the Obamas’ finances were good, but not good enough to buy a $2.5 million mansion.

The 11/1/06  Tribune article reports that the Obamas obtained a $1.32 million mortgage on their property (the information is also available on the Recorder’s Office website).

That means their down payment was $330,000 ($1.65 million – $1.32 million).

A venerable institution like the Northern Trust, which lent the Obamas the money, would never have engaged in any of the risky practices that later caused the housing market crash.

Therefore, they would have applied a formula to determine what the Obamas could afford to pay for their home, based primarily on the size of the down payment.

Apparently, the magic number turned out to be $1.65 million.

The Obamas wanted the mansion.

But the sellers, as we saw, wanted more for the two lots than the Obamas could afford or were willing to pay.

Who Determined the Relative Prices and How?

According to Obama’s 3/16/08 Chicago  media interview, he played no part in the determination of the properties’ prices.

The sellers have refused to speak to the media.

A member of the Obama campaign spoke with the husband of the couple, and exchanged emails, portions of which were shared with a Bloomberg reporter, who wrote on February 18, 2008,

The e-mail says that the sellers “did not offer or give the Obamas a ‘discount’ on the house price on the basis of or in relation to the price offered and accepted on the lot.” It also says that “in the course of the negotiation over the sales price,” Obama and his wife, Michelle, “made several offers until the one accepted at $1.65 million, and that this was the best offer [the sellers] received on the house.”…

The e-mail between [the seller] and the campaign adviser also says that the sellers had “stipulated that the closing dates for the two properties were to be the same.”

But no statement has been made public by the sellers about how the price allocation between the two properties was made, or when, or whether anyone influenced that calculation.Obama seems to believe that what he said at his 3/16/08 press conference with Chicago media is all he ever has to say on this subject.Neither of the Rezkos has spoken publicly about these land deals. But Tony Rezko was convicted in early June of 2008 for fraud and influence peddling by the office of U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald.

Presumably, that office is now negotiating with Rezko as to whether he will testify against any of his cohorts and any other information he can provide for further investigations by that office.Barack Obama has not been implicated in any of the wrongdoing for which Rezko was convicted, but might Rezko be tempted to reveal his side of this transaction? He was an experienced developer.

He was broke, $50 million in debt, and living on borrowed money at the time of the 2005 purchase, according to ABC News’ The Blotter on March 5, 2008. According to the article, Rita Rezko made only $37,500 per year, six months after the purchase and,

Rezko’s bleak financial picture raises the question of how the Rezkos were able to buy a vacant lot adjoining the home of Sen. Barack Obama in 2005, at a time Rezko says he was already in deep debt…

How were the Rezkos able to make the down payment, and qualify for the loan, on the lot?

The same story may give us a clue:

[Rezko] said he had an ongoing relationship with Nadhmi Auchi, a London-based Iraqi billionaire convicted on French fraud charges, who Rezko described as a close friend and business associate.

Did the “ongoing relationship” between Rezko and the Iraqi-born Auchi involve money changing hands prior to the purchase of the lot next to the Obamas?

It did in 2007, according to now retired Sun-Times columnist Robert Novak.

On February 28, 2008 Novak reported that Rezko “got $3.5 million from Auchi’s company in April 2007.”

In other words, did foreign money enable a U.S. Senator to buy his mansion?There could also be Senate ethical considerations for Senator Obama, if he did not disclose a benefit to him, as required by Chapter 5 of the Senate Ethics Manual (pdf).Judicial Watch has already filed ethics complaints over the house purchase, in regard to what it considers preferential treatment for Obama in obtaining the mortgage on the property.

From the press release:

Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes government corruption, announced today [date not given] that it has filed separate complaints with the Federal Election Commission (FEC) and the U.S. Senate Ethics Committee against Senator Barack Obama for allegedly accepting a below-market rate mortgage loan in 2005 not available to the general consumer.

Patrick Fitzgerald sent a former Illinois governor to prison.

He brought down the top aide of a sitting vice president of the United States.

He continues to investigate Rezko and his partners’ actions to determine if there were more illegalities, especially whether the sitting Illinois governor could be involved. He may be interested in what Rezko has to say about this property purchase next door to a U.S. Senator, now a presidential candidate.

And Rezko may be willing to talk, in exchange for a more lenient sentence, scheduled to be handed down on September 3, 2008.

BarackBook

The Republican National Committee (RNC) today launched a new Web site, BarackBook.

The site parodies the social networking website FaceBook and Obama’s own website. BarackBook highlights some of Barack Obama’s notable associations throughout stages of his career, including his relationships with Tony Rezko, Nadhmi Auchi, and Alexi Giannoulias.

Leveraging the popularity of social networking sites, BarackBook allows voters to explore Obama’s connections with these individuals as well as their connections to one another using video and news articles.

From my blog, By The Fault.

• Our TexasDarlin pointed out the favorable treatment the Obamas received compared to the “neglected slums” of their impoverished neighbors in unimaginably horrific “public” housing that Obama helped privatize so that his rich longtime buddies — like Tony Rezko and Allison Davis — could scoop up tens of millions of dollars of taxpayers’ money while the properties were left in such disrepair that many became uninhabitable.
• LisaB addressed the mysterious payments of property taxes for the Obamas.
• Now, Flopping Aces resurrects the mystery of Iraqi billionaire Nadhmi Auchi who helped an in-debt Tony Rezko (in exchange for what?) around the time Rezko somehow managed to help the Obamas buy their mansion:
  

  While there is no evidence that the bank in question had a program like Countrywide did, it sure does smell like political favoritism. Not as big of a deal as Johnson’s, Dodd’s, and Conrad’s, but you combine that with Tony Rezko’s involvement in the house deal when Rezko did not have the money to buy the property (at which point Iraqi financier Auchi comes in) and you get a fishy smell.

Ah. Nadhmi Auchi. Flopping Aces, a few months ago, reported:

Who is Auchi? He is an associate of Saddam’s who gave Rezko some big bucks and soon after receiving those big bucks Rezko helped Obama purchase a new home by buying the empty lot next to it at the same time. Auchi was convicted of fraud in France and was banned from entering the US in 2005. …

How in debt is Tony Rezko? During his federal trial, in March 2008, it was reported he is $50 million in debt. In fact, ABC News used this headline, which I cited in my story, “ABC News: Rezko $50 million in debt [Updated x3]“:

Rezko In Debt $50 Million; How Did He Afford Obama Lot?
Court Transcript Says Rezko Depends on Family Handouts of $7,500 a Month

In the same story, I wrote:

[F]rom the ABC News summary: Rezko “told the judge he had no current source of income, saying his last business deal involving a proposed power plant in Iraq had been cancelled.” That venture involved convicted Iraqi billionaire Nadhmi Auchi. See Larry Johnson’s story, “Will Rezko Blow Up Obama?“

Of course, the Rezko scandal hasn’t derailed Obama, so protected by the media. If the Clintons were similarly indebted to an indicted (and now convicted) slumlord who bilked taxpayers out of hundreds of millions of dollars, you’d hear the story ad nauseum.

Here’s more from my March story that owed much to ABC investigative reporter Brian Ross’s digging — including the laughable purchase of the adjacent lot by Mrs. Rezko, who had no financial means and obviously couldn’t rely on her heavily in-debt husband — which begs the QUESTION: Who supplied the money that enabled the Rezkos to make possible the purchase of the Obamas’ $1.6 million mansion?

Rezko’s bleak financial picture raises the question of how the Rezkos were able to buy a vacant lot adjoining the home of Sen. Barack Obama in 2005, at a time Rezko says he was already in deep debt.

Rezko also reveals in the testimony, before Judge Amy St. Eve on Jan. 16, 2007, that he already knew he was under federal investigation at the time of the land purchase and had hired a criminal defense attorney to deal with the “feds.”

Obama says he sought Rezko’s help because the house he wanted to buy in Chicago’s Hyde Park came with an adjoining lot the seller wanted to sell at the same time.

Unable to afford it himself, Obama says Mrs. Rezko bought it for $625,000, and then later sold a strip of the lot back to Obama so he would have a larger yard. Obama says he paid Mrs. Rezko a fair market price. …

Here’s a bit more from the ABC News story:

… Mrs. Rezko makes $37,500 a year.

[...]

According to the transcript, Mrs. Rezko sold the vacant lot a few weeks before the hearing, with all proceeds going to pay previous debts.

Asked how he was able to pay his lawyer, Joseph Duffy, Rezko said family and some unnamed “friends” were paying his legal bills.

Duffy told the judge, “Mr. Rezko has not provided us any money since his indictment.”

Rezko told the judge he had no current source of income, saying his last business deal involving a proposed power plant in Iraq had been cancelled.

He said he had an ongoing relationship with Nadhmi Auchi, a London-based Iraqi billionaire convicted on French fraud charges, who Rezko described as a close friend and business associate. …

Okay, you “professional” journalists — like Politico’s Ben Smith who calls the Washington Post story “padded” and is done with it:

– Tell me how the Rezkos got the money to enable the Obamas to buy the mansion they couldn’t afford.

– Tell me that Nadhmi Auchi’s money didn’t give the Rezkos the funds they needed to buy the vacant lot required for the Obamas to close the sale on the mansion.

– Tell me what Nadhmi Auchi got out of helping Tony Rezko. Billionaires don’t get that rich by helping desperate businessmen who are under federal indictment and facing long prison sentences.

– Tell me that major Obama campaign contributor Susan Crown, on the Board of Directors of Northern Trust mortgage company since 1997, didn’t make a phone call or two to make sure the Obamas got a favorable mortgage loan.

– Tell me why Barack Obama promised Maytag workers he’d fight for their jobs and took their hard-earned money for his campaign, then turned around and got a big donation from Maytag board member Lester Crown (as well as his family and friends), but never said a word to Crown about saving those workers’ jobs?

And, while we’re at it:

– Tell me why state senator puppetmaster Emil Jones put Barack Obama on the state senate pensions committee for three months, during which time that committee defeated an effort to consolidate state pensions? At the same time that Tony Rezko was fighting the consolidation because it would have defeated his schemes for dipping into individual minority-owned pension management companies.

Dear readers, if you want to know more about Nadhmi Auchi and Tony Rezko, click here. We’ve been on these stories since last year.

Again: If Nadhmi Auchi were involved with Hillary Clinton, every American would know his name and his sordid dealings with Saddam Hussein, his conviction in France, and his billionaire status.

But it’s rare that a journalist gets to write about stories like these, let alone get any prominent coverage of his or her story.

We may not find out until Rezko’s trial starts on 25 February. Imagine this nightmare scenario. Obama nails down the Democratic nomination for President on Super Tuesday. But then comes the Rezko trial and we learn Obama was doing favors to get an Iraqi felon a visa to the United States. You know, he is just helping out one of his major fund raisers. Will his story line about a new day in Washington still sound plausible? Will folks still believe he’s serious about not being beholden to “special interests?”

I don’t begrudge Obama trying to help out a buddy. I just wish he’d cut the holier than thou act. He’s playing the Washington game like many others. In this case, however, he may get dirtied up. And in that case he could take the Democrats with him.

A passport for Nadhmi Auchi, the Iraqi billionaire who infused Rezko’s bank account with millions of dollars of cash before the bankrupt Rezko helped Obama purchase the Kenwood mansion he and Michelle could not afford in 2005, may not be the favor that will sink Barack Obama and the Democratic Party he is now corrupting. But some favor involving Obama and Rezko will. I quote a paragraph of the column John Kass of the Chicago Tribune published today:

The last thing Sen. Barack Obama and Gov. Rod Blagojevich needed was that letter written by convicted Illinois influence peddler Tony Rezko promising he’d never rat out his pals.

The imprisoned political fixer insisted that federal prosecutors are squeezing him, according to an exclusive Tribune report written by federal courts reporter Jeff Coen for Thursday’s paper.

“They are pressuring me to tell them the ‘wrong’ things that I supposedly know about Governor Blagojevich and Senator Obama,” the fundraiser (and Obama’s personal real estate fairy) wrote in a letter to U.S. District Judge Amy St. Eve.

“I have never been a party to any wrongdoing that involved the Governor or the Senator,” Rezko argued. “I will never fabricate lies about anyone else for selfish purposes. I will take whatever comes my way, but I will never hurt innocent people.”

Amen, Tony. But those who say nothing don’t brag. They shut up.

Yet those who promise to say nothing, and promise it loudly, often have much to say later, in a calm and rational voice, meekly from the witness box.

Kass is probably correct, for Kass has witnessed mobster after mobster and criminal politician after criminal politician expose their allies in the courtrooms in the den of crime, corruption, machine politics and fraud that is inner city Chicago. Kass also makes the following observation, which casts the sanctimonious letter Rezko and his attorneys submitted to Judge St. Eve on 9 JUN in a relief one can only describe as perspicuous and palpable:

They all want the same thing—to make sure their loved ones are well cared for on the outside. It could be that Rezko, who mentioned his sons in the letter, cares more about them and his wife, Rita, than he does about his political buddies. Hence, the implied threat to the senator and the governor. That could be a problem for both Obama and Blagojevich, but mostly, I think, for Blagojevich, if Rezko—convicted of more than a dozen corruption counts—begins to squeak.

Unlike Kass, I do believe this can also be a problem for Obama. As I wrote yesterday,

2005 is the year Rezko helped Obama purchase the mansion in the Kenwood neighborhood in inner city Chicago. And 2003 is the year Rezko held a fundraiser for US Senate candidate Barack Obama at his posh home in Wilmette, Illinois. Another event of significance in 2003 is Illinois Governor Blagojevich’s appointment of Rezko to the Board that oversees the $30 billlion dollar teachers’ pension fund. This is the same year during which Barack Obama was appointed to the Illinois state Senate Committee on Pensions and Investments by his friend and mentor state Senator Emil Jones. According to the Superseding Indictment filed by Fitzgerald in December 2006, Obama’s appointment to this state Senate committee coincided with Rezko’s attempts to leverage his influence with “high-ranking State of Illinois officials” to oppose a pension consolidation plan that would complicate the efforts of Rezko and Levine to defraud investment firms and the pensions funds of Illinois. Notice also how Obama sat on the state Senate Pensions and Investments Board when Rezko funneled money he defrauded from an investment firm that sought access to the Illinois pensions fund to Obama through Joseph Aramanda, whose son worked as an intern in Obama’s US Senate office in 2005, the year Rezko advised and assisted the Obamas when they purchased the Kenwood mansion they could not afford.

The information I provide is in no way exhaustive, as Rezko and Obama have been buttressing each other as they climbed the political, social and financial ladders of crime infested inner city Chicago since the early 1990s. Just view the information compiled by the Chicago Triubne:

Rezko, I guess, will “blow up” Barack Obama. Sitting in his cell with Rita, the boys and his dead mother in Hillside, Illinois, on his mind, he is ready to talk. Although his letter was addressed to Judge St. Eve, its intended recipients are Barack Obama and Rod Blagojevich.

Will Antoin “Tony” Rezko blow up Barack Obama and the Democratic Party? I believe Patrick Fitzgerald has the answer:

U.S. Attorney Patrick J. Fitzgerald said the verdict represented “an antidote to the poison of corruption” that trial testimony alleged included the fixing of state boards that controlled a $40 billion pension fund and made major decisions about million-dollar hospital construction.

He expressed hope it would have an effect on Illinois politicians.

“If morals don’t get to them, I hope the fear of going to jail does,” Fitzgerald told reporters.

It is only a matter of time until Rezko’s song and dance blows the lid off of the fraud.

No Quarter dossier on Obama and Rezko:

• The Epistolary Rezko
• The Tipping Point?
• Barack, The Truth Ain’t A Smear
• Patrick Fitzgerald Issues Obama A Warning
• What Hypocrite Obama Should Have Discussion during His Wesleyan Commencement Address
• Barack Obama’s Candidacy as a Take on The Picture of Dorian Gray
• A Majority of One: On Losing the Democratic Base
• Ok, So Tell Us What IS Allowed
• Two Lone Voices Speak for Millions of Us
• What’ll Be Left of the Democratic Party
• It Ain’t Over: Obama MAY Have to Pay the Piper After All
• Obama to Donate Contribution from Rezko’s Iraqi Friend
• Be My Friend, Godfather
• Jaws V, Starring Barack Obama
• The Chicago Three: Obama, Ayers & Rezko
• Charlie Gibson, Will You Ask Barack about Nadhmi Auchi?
• Saddam Hussein, Barack Hussein Obama’s Hidden Real Estate Partner?
• Barack “I-Didn’t-Know” Obama
• Those Who Haunt Him
• Hillary’s Campaign Comes out Swinging
• “Nobie and Obama”
• Authorization to Use Misleading Falsehoods
• What We’ve Noticed about the Speech
• This Is for Main Street (And for the Forgotten People Barack Obama Doesn’t Know)
• Michelle Obama: “Give Us Something Here”
• Rezko Muckrakers Alert!
• The Forgotten People
• Irrefutable Proof That Obama’s Own District Was Home to 11 Rezko Foreclosed Properties
• Speak the Truth, Fallout Be Damned
• The Rezko Saga: Two Videos
• Get Your Daily Rezko Dose Here
• The Media’s Panderbears, Part I
• Sunday Scoops: Rezko-gate and Adviser-gate
• Obama’s Prime-Slime Advisors
• Good Morning, Barack! (Rezko Got Jobs for Your Staffers? Do Tell.)
• Today’s Rezko Trial Scoops (And Prosecutors on $20K Kickback to Obama)
• ABC News: Rezko $50 Million in Debt
• 312.321.2417
• (Pants on Fire!) Lynn Sweet: Obama and His Taking Questions on Rezko
• Rezko Trial: Obama May Be Witness
• Obama’s Judgment on the Eve of Judgment Day
• Truthtelling from Lanny Davis (What about “Iron My Shirt?”)
• Experience, and Experiences (of the Rezko Sort)
• No He Can’t Because Yes They Will
• More Questions on Rezko
• “Obama Bagman” in Jail
• Democratic Death Wish
• How to Buy A Mansion You Can’t Afford
• Will Rezko Blow Up Obama?
• It is “Possible” Obama Was Aware of Rezko’s Financial and Legal Woes
• 20-Year Associate of Obama Arrested
• Look before You Leap: Obama’s Mobbed-Up Allies
• Politics Is A Blood Sport
• BREAKING: ABC News Reports $100,000 from Rezko That Obama Hasn’t Returned
• CNN on Rezko and Obama: This Is Obama’s “Slumwater”
• FACT CHECK: Obama, His Contributor Rezko, The Slum Landlord Business
• A Dope with Hope?
• Obama/Rezko: It Comes down to Judgment
• Didn’t Obama Watch The Firm
• Steve Clemons on Tonight’s Debate
• Patrick Fitzgerald Ties Obama to Rezko Indictments
• All in for Hillary
• Obama, His Lobbyists and His Cronies

RezkoWatch contains even more information on Obama’s deep and problematic ties to convicted slumlord and notorious political fixer Antoin “Tony” Rezko.

MIDDLETOWN, Conn. (AP) – Filling in for Sen. Edward M. Kennedy and tying himself to the family’s legacy, Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama urged college graduates Sunday to “make us believe again” by dedicating themselves to public service….

Only briefly did Obama veer into campaign territory, rattling off a list of education changes he promised to make as president. The rest of the 25-minute speech urged students to focus on more than “the big house and the nice suits and all the other things that our money culture says you should buy.”

The rest of the 25-minute speech should have been dedicated to urging students to focus on “the big house and the nice suits and all the other things that our money culture says you should buy,” for this is the life Barack Obama actually pursued. Indeed, Obama should have offered Wesleyan students instructions on how to find and secure political and financial godfathers in the mold of Antoin “Tony” Rezko. After all, this is how Obama climbed the political, social and financial ladders of Chicago, Illinois.

Very brief chronology of the Obamas’ questionable purchase of the Kenwood mansion with indicted slumlord and notorious political fixer Antoin “Tony” Rezko:

• At the same time, Rita Rezko buys the garden plot, 5046 South Greenwood Avenue,for the asking price of $625,000
• June 15, 2005: Barack Obama and his wife Michelle buy 5050 South Greenwood Avenue in Kenwood, Chicago, for $1.65 million – $300,000 less than asking price
• January 2006: Mrs. Rezko sells a 10ft strip of garden to the Obamas for $104,500
• December 28, 2006: Mrs Rezko sells remainder of garden plot to a lawyer who works for her husband’s business for $575,000
• Metal fence and trees prevent access to garden plot
• Only way into garden plot is through the Obamas’ front gate

No Quarter dossier on Barack Obama and Antoin “Tony” Rezko:

• Barack Obama’s Candidacy as a Take on The Picture of Dorian Gray
• A Majority of One: On Losing the Democratic Base
• Ok, So Tell Us What IS Allowed
• Two Lone Voices Speak for Millions of Us
• What’ll Be Left of the Democratic Party
• It Ain’t Over: Obama MAY Have to Pay the Piper After All
• Obama to Donate Contribution from Rezko’s Iraqi Friend
• Be My Friend, Godfather
• Jaws V, Starring Barack Obama
• The Chicago Three: Obama, Ayers & Rezko
• Charlie Gibson, Will You Ask Barack about Nadhmi Auchi?
• Saddam Hussein, Barack Hussein Obama’s Hidden Real Estate Partner?
• Barack “I-Didn’t-Know” Obama
• Those Who Haunt Him
• Hillary’s Campaign Comes out Swinging
• “Nobie and Obama”
• Authorization to Use Misleading Falsehoods
• What We’ve Noticed about the Speech
• This Is for Main Street (And for the Forgotten People Barack Obama Doesn’t Know)
• Michelle Obama: “Give Us Something Here”
• Rezko Muckrakers Alert!
• The Forgotten People
• Irrefutable Proof That Obama’s Own District Was Home to 11 Rezko Foreclosed Properties
• Speak the Truth, Fallout Be Damned
• The Rezko Saga: Two Videos
• Get Your Daily Rezko Dose Here
• The Media’s Panderbears, Part I
• Sunday Scoops: Rezko-gate and Adviser-gate
• Obama’s Prime-Slime Advisors
• Good Morning, Barack! (Rezko Got Jobs for Your Staffers? Do Tell.)
• Today’s Rezko Trial Scoops (And Prosecutors on $20K Kickback to Obama)
• ABC News: Rezko $50 Million in Debt
• 312.321.2417
• (Pants on Fire!) Lynn Sweet: Obama and His Taking Questions on Rezko
• Rezko Trial: Obama May Be Witness
• Obama’s Judgment on the Eve of Judgment Day
• Truthtelling from Lanny Davis (What about “Iron My Shirt?”)
• Experience, and Experiences (of the Rezko Sort)
• No He Can’t Because Yes They Will
• More Questions on Rezko
• “Obama Bagman” in Jail
• Democratic Death Wish
• How to Buy A Mansion You Can’t Afford
• Will Rezko Blow Up Obama?
• It is “Possible” Obama Was Aware of Rezko’s Financial and Legal Woes
• 20-Year Associate of Obama Arrested
• Look before You Leap: Obama’s Mobbed-Up Allies
• Politics Is A Blood Sport
• BREAKING: ABC News Reports $100,000 from Rezko That Obama Hasn’t Returned
• CNN on Rezko and Obama: This Is Obama’s “Slumwater”
• FACT CHECK: Obama, His Contributor Rezko, The Slum Landlord Business
• A Dope with Hope?
• Obama/Rezko: It Comes down to Judgment
• Didn’t Obama Watch The Firm
• Steve Clemons on Tonight’s Debate
• Patrick Fitzgerald Ties Obama to Rezko Indictments
• All in for Hillary
• Obama, His Lobbyists and His Cronies

Also visit RezkoWatch for more information on Obama’s deep and problematic ties with indicted slumlord and notorious political fixer Antoin “Tony” Rezko.

Because, as Donna Brazile infamously said, “we don’t have to just rely on white blue-collar voters and Hispanics..” (TRANSLATION: They’re a bunch of racists anyway, so screw them.)

Here’s what Donna wrote in an e-mail yesterday to an understandably unhappy Hillary supporter (the rest of her nasty e-mail is below):

Message to the base: stay home.

Good luck with that coalition, Donna, Barack, San Francisco Nancy, and Howard. Because, while we won’t stay home, you elitists, we’ll all be writing in “Hillary Clinton” on our ballots — if she’s not the nominee. As Pagan Power wrote so powerfully yesterday in her important essay, “I Call A Spade a Spade“:

It is as if race can only be seen as a detrimental factor if white people use it to form their opinions and cast their votes. A full 87% of blacks in Ohio supported Obama for the nomination but what made the headlines were those 20% of Ohioans polled that considered race in their decision. The 87% black vote we are supposed to ignore or somehow gloss over. And that appears to be exactly what Donna Brazile and the DNC expect us to do. [...]

What started out as a race of ideas has become a race about race…

Donna Brazile, the one that started the race war against Bill Clinton has concluded that blue collar white voters are part of the past and no longer a necessary part of the Democratic coalition which she sees as blacks, young people and overeducated whites (no offense to Uppity Woman).

You’ve heard all about the meltdown that Donna Brazile had a couple nights ago on CNN. Here’s the transcript and the video, thanks to V. BELOW, is another one of Miss Donna’s infamous e-mails — followed by a few frank thoughts of my own.

UPDATE BELOW THE FOLD:

Isn’t this lovely?! A diary at MyDD, “1% Clinton Dead Enders Not Welcomed With Me.” This diary singles out Alegre, Larry and me as “dead enders.” I’m honored. And this is so amusing:

The 1% Clinton Dead Enders, yes you ______, Susan and Larry, are NOT WELCOME in the Democratic Party. Your constant lying, swiftboating, and disingenuousness has been thoroughly exposed for several months (and you helped your preferred candidate lose because of it) and you bitter Kool Aid Cultists can go hide in a basement with Taylor Marsh. …

_____________________________________

Here’s some of the transcript from Donna’s nasty meltdown:

BEGALA: We cannot win with egg heads. We cannot win with egg heads and African-Americans. OK, that is the Dukakis Coalition, which carried ten states and gave us four years of the first George Bush.

President Clinton — reached across to get a whole lot of Republicans and Independents to come. I think Senator Obama and Senator Clinton both have that capacity. They both have a unique ability – well it’s not unique if they both have it. They both have a remarkable ability to reach out to those working-class white folks and Latinos.

Senator Clinton has proven it; Barack has not yet, but he can. And I certainly hope he is not shutting the door on expanding the party.
. . .
BRAZILE: Well, Lou, I have worked on a lot of Democratic campaigns, and I respect Paul. But, Paul, you’re looking at the old coalition. A new Democratic coalition is younger. It is more urban, as well as suburban, and we don’t have to just rely on white blue-collar voters and Hispanics. We need to look at the Democratic Party, expand the party, expand the base and not throw out the baby with the bathwater.

BEGALA: We cannot win with egg heads. We cannot win with egg heads and African-Americans. OK, that is the Dukakis Coalition, which carried ten states and gave us four years of the first George Bush.

President Clinton — reached across to get a whole lot of Republicans and Independents to come. I think Senator Obama and Senator Clinton both have that capacity. They both have a unique ability – well it’s not unique if they both have it. They both have a remarkable ability to reach out to those working-class white folks and Latinos. Senator Clinton has proven it; Barack has not yet, but he can. And I certainly hope he is not shutting the door on expanding the party.

. . .

BRAZILE: Well, Lou, I have worked on a lot of Democratic campaigns, and I respect Paul. But, Paul, you’re looking at the old coalition. A new Democratic coalition is younger. It is more urban, as well as suburban, and we don’t have to just rely on white blue-collar voters and Hispanics. We need to look at the Democratic Party, expand the party, expand the base and not throw out the baby with the bathwater.

:::::::::

EARLY MORNING THOUGHTS (before the caffeine has had its fully desired effect):

I feel trapped.

My usual hang-outs on the ‘net are gone. The days of the orange place and of my first-thing-every-morning reading of Josh Marshall’s Talking Points Memo are behind me.

In those places, I’m one of two things:

1) I’m not a good Democrat, whatever that is — and which I never particularly cared about being anyway, and/or

2) I am a loathsome racist.

Excuse me for daring to say that I’ve NEVER understood the need for unquestioning party loyalty.

Time was, at least in Washington state where I grew up, that we had as many fine Republican elected officials as Democrats. And I voted for people in either party, because I felt one or the other was the better candidate.

But since those days, it is NOT just the Republican party that has been seized by a rigid ideology of the far-right religious nutjobs.

The Democratic party has been partly seized by intense pressure from the far left, from the likes of MoveOn and CodePink (which was once a beautifully creative anti-war group but is now a parody of itself) to the legends-in-their-own-minds like Kos.

Worst of all, the Democratic party — over and over and over — lets itself be seized by the “darling” of the moment.

From Jimmy Carter to Michael Dukakis and now Barack Obama.

I’ve said this before, but I’ll be a broken record about it. I sat with my jaw on the floor in 2004 when at my local caucus, the pro-John Kerry people said, over and over, that the whole reason for supporting Kerry was because he was the “electable candidate.”

I was for Howard Dean at the time — forgive me for that — but John Edwards was then, and was again this time ’round, my strong second choice.

Edwards had both electability and the obvious traits to BE a president.

But John Kerry was seen, back then, as ELECTABLE? These days, that’s seen clearly as the joke it is.

But that’s the message that the DNC and its partner the MSM put out, and the SHEEP in the Democratic party followed along, uttering the argument they’d been spoon-fed.

As I sat there that day, in an uncomfortably small chair in an elementary school, I wondered if these people EVER had an original thought. Or if they just went along with what the evening news TOLD them to think.

I’m getting lost in a rush of memories here. Mostly memories of frustration and bewilderment.

All I do know is that the Democratic party, once again, is about to nominate a man who:

1) is not experienced enough to be president; and

2) is not presidential timber.

Some people have what it takes to be president. They have grit, toughness, determination, and the ability to make tough decisions. I see none of that in Barack Obama.

I see all of that in Hillary Clinton.

For months now, I’ve jokingly said to pals that I’m looking hard for video of Barack Obama in bed in a threesome with Tony Rezko and his wife.

I’m only half joking. I pray there is such damaging information out there somewhere.

Because apparently — and astonishingly — all the information we have on Obama already, including all of his extremely disturbing relationships with the likes of Jeremiah Wright, Bill Ayers, Bernardine Dorhn, Nadhmi Auchi, and on and on, do not cause a blip of concern for the Democratic elite establishment.

But do the Republicans ever know that all of that matters. It’s going to be bloody. And November, if Obama is the nominee, will be a humiliating experience for the Democrats.

But, then, the Democrats seem to seek humiliation. They’re attracted to seizing defeat from the jaws of victory.

Because they’re so self-absorbed with satisfying their own pyschological, elitist cravings that they cannot see that a STRONG, EXPERIENCED candidate is who is needed to 1) win, and 2) be a great president.

So, yeah, loyalty to the Democratic party doesn’t mean much to me.

NOW it’s time for some more coffee.

And it’s time to thank all of you for being here.

We’re growing a great family here at No Quarter. Each of you is making a big contribution, in all of your writings and your comments, to making sense out of this insane, confusing mess.

Together, we’ll stay strong and keep fighting for what is right. And for what is needed: Which is a president who CAN do the job and who CAN improve the lot of all Americans in this country and who CAN restore our standing around the world.

AND HERE’s THE FROSTING ON THE CAKE — another one of Miss Donna Brazile’s nasty e-mails:

From: Donna Brazile
Subject: RE: Switching to Republican Party – I’m a Hillary supporter
Date: May 7, 2008 7:48 PM

Honestly, this is the 9th email today, so I believe you’re ready to not only destroy Roe versus Wade, voting rights, civil liberties and civil rights. Perhaps adding trillions more to the deficits through non stop tax cuts to the wealthy and 100 more years in Iraq.

Yes, please join Rush and McCain asap. The train has left. Catch it.

Please don’t send these emails to working people like myself. Notice you sent it to my campus address. I am a working class person. Can you find someone who drinks latte?

Message to the base: stay home.

What i want to know: HOW MUCH MONEY does the Democratic party pay this idiot? How many dollars of the donations from struggling blue-collar loyal Democrats does this woman seize and spend on her wardrobe, her coif, her lattes, her lavish lifestyle?

She’s not worth one penny. And she needs to be gone. Like yesterday.

Just who is this Auchi character, and does it really matter that Obama gave toasts to him at a party?

Yes, it matters a lot.

First, it matters because, once again, Obama did an “Alberto Gonzales” on us.  He couldn’t recall attending a party given in Auchi’s honor at the home of Tony Rezko in April of 2004, nor does he recall making “a few toasts.” (“Which is it? Obamarama . . .,” Chicago Sun-Times, April 16, 2008)

Once again, Obama refuses to share his history with the American public.  That bothers me.

But, back to the question… why should I care about Auchi?

I begin with the Wikipedia entry entry on this man.

“Nadhmi Auchi was charged along with Saddam Hussein for conspiring to assassinate Iraqi President Abdul-Karim Qasim in 1959.”

“Mr. Auchi is a business partner of Syrian-born businessman Antoin “Tony” Rezko, who has supported US Presidential candidate Barack Obama financially since his first run for the Illinois state senate in 1996.”

According to an article at Raw Story — “Firm linked to Obama patron scrubs ’04 visit from website“:

“Auchi, a native of Iraq who lives in Great Britain, has a colorful past of his own. The businessman set up a variety of deals with Saddam Hussein’s regime prior to the 1991 Gulf War, and was one of the largest private shareholders in BNP Paribas, the bank that trafficked most of the funds involved in the UN Oil-For-Food scandal. He also admitted taking kickbacks from the French petroleum company TotalFinaElf in the 1990s (Auchi later sued Elf for entangling him in their criminal activities, according to Forbes).”

See also:

• “The Food for Oil Connection, it’s Tony again!,” Democrats.org, March 12, 2008
• “Oil scandal billionaire tells French court of bribes,” The Guardian, London, May 7, 2003

As if this were not enough, Auchi may have actually enabled — by providing some of the funds – the purchase of Obama’s Chicago mansion:

• “Mansion ‘mistake’ piles the pressure on Barack Obama,” The Times Online, London, February 26, 2008
• “How to Buy A Mansion You Can’t Afford, No Quarter, February 4 , 2008
• “From the Tribune archives: Rezko owns vacant lot next to Obama’s home,” Chicago Tribune, November 1, 2006

But there is much more to this story.

Auchi acted as Tony Rezko’s proverbial banker: He is reported to have loaned/invested more than $27.8 million to Rezko and his various projects.  And there is no denying that Barack Obama is one of those “projects.”

Read “Timeline: British billionaire and Barack Obama” in The Times Online, London, February 25, 2008. The article provides a summary of some of the interactions between Auchi — and his company, General Mediterranean Holding (GMH) —  and Tony Rezko.

So what did Rezko and his cohorts do with all of this money?  Well, the list is too long to detail here. But read Rezko’s Wickipedia entry, and you’ll get the idea.

According to Salon.com’s story, “How close were Barack Obama and Tony Rezko?” February 1, 2008:

In 1989, Rezko and a business partner founded Rezmar Inc., a real estate company that aimed to rehabilitate South Side apartment buildings. Partnering with community groups that could help them win government loans, Rezmar purchased 30 properties.

At first, Rezmar had a golden reputation. But many of its tenants would have been better off in housing projects. During the winter of 1997, a Rezmar building was without heat for five weeks, until the city took the company to court.

It was one of a dozen cases in which the city had to force Rezmar to turn on heat for its tenants. More than half of Rezmar’s buildings went into foreclosure, and several have been boarded up. According to a Chicago Sun-Times investigation, Rezmar properties were ‘riddled with problems — including squalid living conditions, vacant apartments, lack of heat, squatters and drug dealers. ….

Rezko, after all, built part of his fortune by exploiting the black community that Obama had served in the state Senate, and by milking government programs meant to benefit black-owned businesses.

But Obama took Rezko’s money even after the businessman was sued by the city of Chicago for failing to heat his low-income apartments, and even after Rezko was caught using a black business partner to obtain a minority set-aside for a fast-food franchise at O’Hare Airport.

See also: “Broken promises, broken homes,” Chicago Sun-Times, April 24, 2007.

Obama had, in fact, written letters to the Illinois Dept of Housing, recommending Rezco’s company for some of these these very projects.

See: Obama’s letters at The Chicago-Sun-Times (PDF format).

There is much more to know about the relationship between Obama, Rezko and Auchi. An Internet search reveals an abundance of information from reliable sources. But this is enough to make my point. Obama has had the benefit of lots of money that came to him by way of many corrupt individuals.

So far, Obama has admitted to $250,000, though it is unclear whether he has returned more than $150,000 of it. And he seems to have been willing, at the very least, to ignore — and even enable — the actions of these vile characters.

Isn’t it sad, but ironic, that it took a non-MSM online newspaper, OpED News to do one of the most thorough studies on the corruption that begat Barack Obama and his involvement in it?

Read Evelyn Pringle’s articles:

• “Barack Obama – The Wizard of Oz”
• “Barack Obama – Operation Board Games For Slumlords”
• “ Barack Obama – Subplots of Operation Board Games – Part I“

There can be very little doubt, after all, that Obama knew about this, and that he spent a lot more time with Rezko than he has admitted.  The FBI, in fact, logged many Obama visits to Rezko’s offices in 2004 and 2005, contradicting Obama’s assertions that he didn’t know Rezko well.  

Curiously, although a Chicago Sun-Times article entitled “My Life as an FBI Mole,” is quoted identically in all 3 of the articles below, that story has been removed from the Sun-Times website.  The fifth link below purports to contain the entire text from the article.

See:

• “FBI MOLE SHOWS FACE,” Illinois Review, February 10, 2008
• “One-degree of separation: Rezko-Obama—When is a coincidence not a coincidence? (Updated),” Rezko Watch, February 12, 2008
• “Follow the Money: Obama “dropped in” to do Rezko favors,” Avid Editor, March 13, 2008
• “My life as an FBI mole (Real estate broker convicted of fraud becomes a mole for feds to nail Rezko),” Chicago Sun-Times, February 10, 2008

Further, quite a few of Rezko’s housing projects, which indeed became slums, were in the district Obama represented as an Illinois Senator. One or two were little more than a mile from Obama’s home.  Surely a responsible Illinois Senator would have made numerous efforts to intervene on behalf of the victimized residents.  But I could find no indication that Obama even tried.

See:

• “Irrefutable Proof That Obama’s Own District Was Home to 11 Rezko Foreclosed Properties, No Quarter,” No Quarter, March 12, 2008
• “It Is ‘Possible’ Obama Was Aware of Rezko’s Financial and Legal Woes,” No Quarter, January 28, 2008

If Auchi was The Godfather and Rezko was a caporegime — to use an analogy from The Godfather — does that make Obama the equivalent of a faithful soldier?  I certainly hope not.  But I have to admit, as I did the research for this article, lines from that movie kept going through my head.

“Be my friend… Godfather.”
[kisses Don Corleone's ring]

Don Corleone: “Good. Someday, and that day may never come, I’ll call upon you to do a service for me. But, until that day, accept this justice as a gift on my daughter’s wedding day.”

I believe Barack Obama still has a lot of questions to answer.  I fervently hope that the mainstream media will ask them before the primaries are over.  If he doesn’t answer them now, he will certainly be subject to major attack from Republican-oriented organizations before the November election.  And it will be nobody’s fault but his own.

I’m afraid, however, that recent media comments that Obama “has stepped in it,” aren’t adequate.  He may never really have been out of it.

Obama’s invocation of Jay-Z’s defiant “Dirt Off Your Shoulder” battle anthem during the same speech adds evidence to the claim that he gave Hillary the finger.

To see Obama brush his shoulders off, go to 2:25 of this video clip.

Obama’s gesture prompted a mash-up video that made the Jay-Z/Obama connection explicit. Ari Melber, the other Obamabot named Ari at The Nation, posted the video on The Nation’s website, noting, “Obama really is a Jay-Z fan, too. When asked which hip hop artists he likes in a recent interview, he said, ‘lately I’ve been listening to a lot of Jay-Z — this new American Gangster album.’”

Spencer Ackerman, another young white male media Obamaton, called Obama’s gesture “perhaps the coolest subliminal cultural reference in the history of American politics.”

So what is the hype about? What did Jay-Z actually say that captivated Barack Obama? Here is the hook and first verse to the new theme song of Obama ’08:

[Chorus: Jay-Z]
If you feelin’ like a pimp nigga, go and brush your shoulders off
Ladies is pimps too, go and brush your shoulders off
Niggaz is crazy baby, don’t forget that boy told you
Get, that, dirt off your shoulder

[Verse One]
I probably owe it to y’all, probably to be locked by the force
Tryin to hustle some things, that go with the Porsche
Feelin no remorse, feelin like my hand was forced
Middle finger to the law, nigga grippin ma balls
Stab the ladies they love me, from the bleachers they screamin
All the ballers is bouncin, they like the way I be leanin
All the rappers be hatin, off the track that I’m makin
But all the hustlers they love it just to see one of us make it
Came from the bottom the bottom, to the Top of the Pops
Nigga London, Japan and I’m straight off the block
Like a running back, get it man, I’m straight off the block
I can run it back nigga cause I’m straight with the Roc
=

Obama hasn’t flipped a “middle finga to the law” but to Hillary instead (his godfather Tony Rezko and possible financial angel Nadmi Auchi were the ones flicking off the law). He got his clock cleaned in a debate about his closest associates, his domestic policy proposals and national security credentials, but after a quick, not-so-subliminal reference to Jay-Hova, Obama’s back to “feelin’ like a pimp.”

But don’t blame Obama if you don’t like his reaction. He’s never responsible. George Stephanopoulos and ABC forced him to behave like a wannabe American gangster.

Let’s hope ABC anchor Charlie Gibson — who’s boning up for tonight’s debate on ABC News at 8:00 p.m. — will see this nosy Sun-Times columnist’s question about telling the truth, and ask Barack if his fuzzy memory has improved about that now-infamous party:

Which is it? Obamarama . . .
April 16, 2008
BY MICHAEL SNEED Sun-Times Columnist

A Pinocchio problem? To fib . . . or is it a faulty memory?

• • To wit: Dem presidential contender Barack Obama’s handlers may be telling the press Obama has NO “recollection” of a 2004 party at influence peddler Tony Rezko’s Wilmette house, but a top Sneed source claims Obama not only gave Rezko’s guest of honor, Iraqi billionaire Nadhmi Auchi, a big welcome . . . but he made a few toasts!

• • Trial file: The name of Auchi, who was banned from the U.S. in 2005, according to court papers, surfaced at Rezko’s trial Monday. (Top Illinois businessman and Rezko pal Bill Cellini, whose name has also surfaced at the trial, was also at the Rezko party.)

• • The Quinn bin: Lt. Gov. Pat Quinn apparently is the only one with a good memory and admitted being at the Rezko party, attending late, and welcoming Auchi on behalf of the state of Illinois. …

Larry Johnson covered the sordid details on those individuals and that party — which Barack is so conveniently fuzzy about — the day the news broke, in “Saddam Hussein, Barack Hussein Obama’s Hidden Real Estate Partner?”

::::::::::::::::::

Tonight’s debate, carried by ABC News, airs in prime-time. That means that those of us on the West Coast won’t see it until 8:00 p.m. PST, three hours after you on the East Coast will have seen the debate. (Probably, ABC News will grant C-Span permission to reair the debate later.)

I couldn’t find information at ABC’s site that it will provide streaming video. If any of you run across that information, please send me an e-mail at susanunpc at gmail dot com, and I’ll post that link.

While I searched ABC News’s site for information on live streaming, I ran across a couple interesting stories. Here’s an A.P. backgrounder story on the debate, likely subjects, and the upcoming debate in North Carolina.

And here’s background on Charlie Gibson — including praise for his earlier performance in the January 5 debate — from Reuters:

ABC scored a primetime debate between Sens. Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama less than a week before the April 22 Pennsylvania primary. Gibson and chief Washington correspondent George Stephanopoulos will moderate.

“The stakes, at least for Sen. Clinton, couldn’t be higher,” Stephanopoulos said. “Pennsylvania has become a must-win.”

Both Clinton and Republican candidate Sen. John McCain have made hay out of Obama’s recent comment that economically downtrodden voters in small Pennsylvania towns “cling to guns or religion” because they are “bitter,” words that Obama later admitted were ill-chosen.

Gibson drew rave reviews for the January 5 debate at St. Anselm College in New Hampshire, as well as a 2004 presidential debate. He’s been cramming for the past several days on the usual debate topics and also a few esoteric ones, like carbon sequestration — storing carbon and coal plants underground to reduce greenhouse gases.

“It’s a subject I don’t know a whole lot about, and it probably won’t come up,” Gibson said. “But I don’t know beans about carbon sequestration, so I read up on it.”

…