downsides for Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.
We'll start with Obama's Rezko association because we
are well-steeped in Illinois politics, being in
Chicago, and have been following the Rezko case with
great interest.
The first item of interest to know is that the Rezko
prosecution is being pursued by the U.S. Attorney for
the Northern District of Illinois Patrick Fitzgerald
-- yes, the same one who convicted Scooter Libby as a
special prosecutor. The second thing to know is that
Rezko is one of those perennial scumbags who gives
large sums of money -- along with getting "business"
acquaintances to do the same -- to politicians in the
hope that eventually he will get a "pay-off" in terms
of getting government contracts or state jobs for
people, of which he gets a cutback. (We should qualify
that although Rezko hasn't been convicted of anything
and is thus presumed innocent, he has been indicted.)
The Clintons know this type of parasite well, since
they have had to give back donations from such leeches
on a number of occasions. Senator Clinton most
recently had to fork up more than $800,000 in
donations from one Mr. Hsu, a felon on the lam, who
had donated to her campaign.
A February 28th ABC News report on one of the recent
developments in the Rezko case states: "Obama is not
considered a target of the federal corruption
investigation, and his campaign staff says any
contribution tied to Rezko has since been donated to
charity."
Yes, Rezko's wife brought a thin corner lot -- which
was recently sold to a third party -- adjacent to
Obama's Hyde Park Chicago house. But the seller of the
home, a physician, has indicated that the price of the
home had nothing to do with the sale of the adjacent
lot.
Furthermore, there is nothing to indicate in any of
the long investigations of Rezko that Obama offered
any quid pro quo for campaign contributions, similar
to the situation that the Clintons have found
themselves in when having to deal with rogue donors.
The offering of a contract, job, or favorable
government regulation is what makes such a
donor-politician relationship a crime. If the mere
receipt of money from unsavory operators were illegal,
the Clintons and almost every other politician would
have been in jail a long time ago.
Those of us in Illinois politics who have followed the
course of the Rezko case through each new court filing
and leak know that the Rezko case has a high profile
target, and it is not Barack Obama, who is just a
recipient of Rezko campaign funding and sycophancy
(but with no indication whatsoever of any quid pro
quo). The person that Patrick Fitzgerald is in pursuit
of nailing is the Democratic Governor of Illinois, Rod
Blagojevich, who is known as "Public Official A" in
prosecution court filings. Whether it can be proven or
not (depending upon whether Rezko and some other
indicted schemers flip or not), it appears that
Blagojevich's office -- including the Governor --
participated in a "pay to play" scheme on a large
scale -- with Rezko receiving government contracts and
jobs for himself and others.
Obama, like the Clintons with many of their past
donors, appears just to be the recipient of largesse
because very few politicians ask where donations are
coming from, but return them when a donor is "outed."
http://www.buzzflash.com/articles/editorblog/056
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