Illinois Governer Facing Corruption Charges

[ForeverNight]

Source

 

CHICAGO (Reuters) - Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich was arrested on corruption charges on Tuesday, including trying to sell the U.S. Senate seat vacated by fellow Democrat President-elect Barack Obama, federal prosecutors said.[/Quote]

 

Interesting, no? What is it about Politicians from Illinois?

[jrrtoken]

Just blame it on Capone.

[TKA-001]

True story: When my family and I went on a vacation to Springfield, we visited the capitol building, and they let my brother sit in the governor's chair just because he asked. On our way out, I asked him how he had come up with the idea of asking, and he said "Fortune favors the bold."

[Chevron 7 locke]

So how many years will this guy be looking at if he's found guilty?

[The Doctor]

What is it about Politicians from Illinois?

 

If that's a stab at Obama, I'ma kick you.

[Q]

It makes me think about how many Illinois governors have ended up in the Big House since i was a kid.

 

I'm not sure: three, maybe?

[ForeverNight]

If that's a stab at Obama, I'ma kick you.

 

I was originally going to say Chicago, but since Springfield is the capital it's wouldn't work.

 

Hell, maybe it is a stab at Obama, I don't know yet. Once his years are over and History can look in with it's supra-powered microscope, than we'll find out. So, for now, consider it a stab at every corrupt politician to come out of Illinois.

 

Don't kick me... please.

[The Doctor]

Alright, I won't kick you, but I am getting very sick of conservatives trying to label Obama a terrorist, a liar, or some kind of communist nut job. And your original post seemed like a thinly veiled attempt to call him corrupt. I apologise if this wasn't the case.

[ForeverNight]

Nope, not the case at all.

[Tysyacha]

I'm from Illinois, and I'm proud to say I voted for an indicted Governor! *LOL*

[Tommycat]

Alright, I won't kick you, but I am getting very sick of conservatives trying to label Obama a terrorist, a liar, or some kind of communist nut job. And your original post seemed like a thinly veiled attempt to call him corrupt. I apologise if this wasn't the case.

 

Haha it's no great secret that Illinois has a less than stellar record when it comes to political scandals.

 

Besides, can you say you are not guilty of doing the same to Republicans? I mean I have been tired of hearing the "not my president" junk for the past 8 years. Labeling Bush as a moron, racist, and several other not so nice things. Just wait til the conservative talking heads actually have some "REAL" dirt to pin on Obama. It's gonna get a lot worse. You should probably get thicker skin.

 

No biggie to me though. I intend to give OUR president a shot to prove he's a good man. He's got a rough job ahead of him.

[ForeverNight]

I agree, but that's for another thread.

 

Try this one: The Offical Obama Debate Thread

 

Yar-El has already posted something about this already in that thread. However, this is just for talk about this topic, not about Obama and his connection to the Governor.

[Jae Onasi]

What surprises me is how brazen he was about what he said--he had to know he was being watched, and yet said all these things anyway. I think this is just the tip of the iceberg of a huge corruption problem--I believe the attorney general moved so quickly because the feds were concerned that someone was going to buy the Senate seat and that would have created even greater problems. The feds got a court order for a wiretap of his home and office only in October. "Candidates 1-5" I'm sure will start singing if there's even a hint of wrongdoing. Rep. Jackson held a press conference yesterday to insist he hadn't tried to buy the seat himself, he apparently was candidate #5. What I found very interesting was that Jackson had not had a meeting with Blagojevich in 4 years--this is a Congressman from Chicago, representing IL in the House of Representatives. How could a governor not meet with someone at this level of politics for 4 years? That's just crazy.

 

Further, apparently Gov. Rod wanted to be appointed to a cabinet position in exchange for appointing whoever Obama wanted to the seat, and had aspirations of running for the Presidency in '12 or '16. Obama has denied any involvement directly or through staff on this matter.

 

Oh--my 'favorites' in this--trying to hold back a half million in funds to Children's hospital in Chicago if the CEO didn't give Rod a cut of that money, and when the CEO didn't pay up, told his staff to take the money back. Even better--trying to shake down the Chicago Tribune. Hello--trying to shake down a newspaper? How long do you think that would stay out of the newspaper, Rod? The Tribune Corp practically salivated when they were able to break the story so quickly when Rod got arrested.

 

Pat Quinn is already calling for an impeachment of Blagojevich--some would say "Of course, because he becomes Gov. when that happens." However, the way he words things makes me think there's no love lost between the 2 men.

 

As this was straying into Obama territory, I've closed this and moved the latest post over the The Official Obama thread found here; http://www.lucasforums.com/showthread.php?t=194417 Please continue the discussion there. - Thanks -- j7

 

Since Rod is becoming such a hot topic, I moved posts pertaining only to Hot Rod from the Obama thread to here and merged it with a closed thread. Carry on. --Jae

[jrrtoken]

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=98300727&ft=1&f=1003

 

The Obama SuperFriends have filed their report determining that he and his staff had no contact with Blagojevich. Of course, since this was conducted by the Obama staff themselves, you may question it, since it wasn't conducted by the Department of Justice or some other government organization.

[Jae Onasi]

Think about this, though--if you're President-elect, and you know your seat is going to be open, why wouldn't you be having contact with the guy who's going to appoint your replacement? Saying no one on Obama's team had contact with Rod is quite unbelievable given the importance of the IL Senate seat. It would absolutely be in Obama's interest to make sure someone friendly to him, and more importantly a friendly Democrat, was appointed to his seat, especially since the Democrats are so close to a super-majority in the Senate.

 

We know Rahm Emanuel had contact with Blagojevich's people about the Senate seat. See article in Chicago Tribune here. This comes as no surprise--Emanuel is friends with both Obama and Rod, and Emanuel won the House seat that Rod once held prior to winning the election for IL governor. I would expect to see more information to come out on Emanuel and Rod and discussions about the Senate seat.

 

December 13, 2008

 

Rahm Emanuel, President-elect Barack Obama's pick to be White House chief of staff, had conversations with Gov. Rod Blagojevich's administration about who would replace Obama in the U.S. Senate, the Tribune has learned.

 

The revelation does not suggest Obama's new gatekeeper was involved in any talk of dealmaking involving the seat. But it does help fill in the gaps surrounding a question that Obama was unable or unwilling to answer this week: Did anyone on his staff have contact with Blagojevich about his choice for the Senate seat?

 

Blagojevich and John Harris, his former chief of staff, face federal charges in an alleged shakedown involving the vacant Senate seat, which Illinois law grants the governor sole authority to fill.

 

Obama said Thursday he had never spoken to Blagojevich about the Senate vacancy and was "confident that no representatives" of his had engaged in any dealmaking over the seat with the governor or his team. He also pledged Thursday that in the "next few days" he would explain what contacts his staff may have had with the governor's office about the Senate vacancy.

 

Emanuel, who has long been close to both Blagojevich and Obama, has refused to respond to questions about any involvement he may have had with the Blagojevich camp over the Senate pick. A spokeswoman for Emanuel also declined to comment Friday.

 

One source confirmed that communications between Emanuel and the Blagojevich administration were captured on court-approved wiretaps.

 

Another source said that contact between the Obama camp and the governor's administration regarding the Senate seat began the Saturday before the Nov. 4 election, when Emanuel made a call to the cell phone of Harris. The conversation took place around the same time press reports surfaced about Emanuel being approached about taking the high-level White House post should Obama win.

 

Emanuel delivered a list of candidates who would be "acceptable" to Obama, the source said. On the list were Obama adviser Valerie Jarrett, Illinois Veterans Affairs director Tammy Duckworth, state Comptroller Dan Hynes and U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky of Chicago, the source said. All are Democrats.

 

Sometime after the election, Emanuel called Harris back to add the name of Democratic Atty. Gen. Lisa Madigan to the approved list, the source said.

 

Blagojevich and Harris, who resigned his state post Friday, are charged with plotting to sell the selection of Obama's replacement in exchange for lucrative jobs or campaign cash for the governor. Among other things, a government affidavit filed with the charges claimed that Blagojevich had kicked around the idea of using his Senate selection to leverage an appointment to an ambassadorship or Cabinet post in the Obama administration.

 

Federal authorities have not suggested Obama or his team knew about Blagojevich's alleged schemes.

 

In an interview, Schakowsky said she spoke to Emanuel on Thursday and he seemed unfazed by the controversy.

 

Schakowsky also spoke of a conversation she had with Emanuel shortly after he was named chief of staff. She said she called Emanuel him "to get some intelligence" on whether Obama might approve of her selection as senator.

 

"He indicated that the president-elect would be fine with certain people and I was one of them," Schakowsky said.

 

Schakowsky said it was natural for Obama to take an interest in the selection process for his Senate seat. "It makes perfect sense for the president-elect or his people to have some interaction about filling the seat he was vacating," she said.

 

Though now working full-time on Obama's transition, Emanuel has yet to resign his congressional seat. Illinois law has a different process for filling vacant House seats than Senate seats. When Emanuel resigns, a special election will be held for his replacement.

 

One alleged scheme outlined in the charges against Blagojevich involves the special election for Emanuel's seat. The government affidavit said Blagojevich and others were recorded talking about an unnamed "president-elect adviser" concerned about the election for Emanuel's congressional seat who might help the governor land a new job at a non-profit organization.

 

Tribune reporter David Heinzmann contributed to this report.

 

The Chicago Tribune has complete coverage here.

 

@ The Doctor:

Transcript of the Good morning American interview. However Ayers wants to characterize it and dodge it with careful language, he was friends with Obama, and denying that is unwise. The more important question is how much influence Ayers' ideas on activism and education have on Obama policies. I'm going to assume Ayers isn't giving Obama tips on how to bomb the Pentagon, however.

[Achilles]

The Obama SuperFriends have filed their report determining that he and his staff had no contact with Blagojevich.

Question: if Obama has agreed to withhold the report at the request of the investigating prosecutor, how do we know what it says?

[Jae Onasi]

I broke these posts off of the Obama thread and merged it with the closed thread on Blagojevich, because I think the issue of Gov. Rod Blagojevich's indictment and his alleged attempt to sell the Senate seat being vacated by Obama when the latter is sworn in as President merits its own discussion.

 

Note that this is an Ayers-free zone. Any posts about Bill Ayers will be deleted as off-topic unless Ayers is specifically involved and named in this or any future indictments of Blagojevich.

[GarfieldJL]

I found an article of interest that pretty much shows that there appears to be a pattern of this behavior all the way back to the late 1980s.

 

Newsbusters: ABC News Sat on Blago Bookie Mob Boss Charge for years.

 

This means that people knew he was corrupt, at least the media knew. This would have been out in 30 seconds after they got the story if it were a Republican (slight exageration but not by much).

[jonathan7]

I found an article of interest that pretty much shows that there appears to be a pattern of this behavior all the way back to the late 1980s.

 

Newsbusters: ABC News Sat on Blago Bookie Mob Boss Charge for years.

 

This means that people knew he was corrupt, at least the media knew. This would have been out in 30 seconds after they got the story if it were a Republican (slight exageration but not by much).

 

How about a decent source? I don't count that Newsbusters crap as a source, while there maybe a "liberal bias" in the media currently - I don't know how you can legitimately count that as being anything less than an awful lot more biased than the "liberal media".

[GarfieldJL]

How about a decent source? I don't count that Newsbusters crap as a source, while there maybe a "liberal bias" in the media currently - I don't know how you can legitimately count that as being anything less than an awful lot more biased than the "liberal media".

 

Actually, I checked their sources (which was in the article I might add) and they are telling the truth, they provided valid sources to back up what they said in the article.

 

Several years ago, when Mr. Blagojevich was running for re-election, Cooley provided the same information to the ABC7 I-Team. Because Cooley did not want to be identified at the time and the governor denied it, ABC7 did not report the story.

--ABC 7 NEWS -- Blagojevich was bookie, says federal informant

 

There, straight from the horse's mouth which confirms what Newsbusters said.

 

Furthermore News busters provided a situation on the Republican side that the liberal media jumped all over and it wasn't even remotely as serious: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-0406180364jun18,0,7479994.story

 

Oh and guess who the Opponent was: Barack Obama

 

Not trying to drag Obama into this but making a point that Newsbusters did their research.

[The Doctor]

Actually, I checked their sources (which was in the article I might add) and they are telling the truth, they provided valid sources to back up what they said in the article.

 

--ABC 7 NEWS -- Blagojevich was bookie, says federal informant

 

There, straight from the horse's mouth which confirms what Newsbusters said.

I think I understand now - when a news organisation contradicts what Fox News or some similar wrong- right-wing source claims, it's biased and left-sided and completely baseless. But if that same source states something in support of what you want it to, it's suddenly a valid source.

 

Furthermore News busters provided a situation on the Republican side that the liberal media jumped all over and it wasn't even remotely as serious: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-0406180364jun18,0,7479994.story

 

Oh and guess who the Opponent was: Barack Obama

 

Not trying to drag Obama into this but making a point that Newsbusters did their research.

Don't worry, we all know how you hate to drag Obama into something he has absolutely no part in.

[ForeverNight]

I think I understand now - when a news organisation contradicts what Fox News or some similar wrong- right-wing source claims, it's biased and left-sided and completely baseless. But if that same source states something in support of what you want it to, it's suddenly a valid source.[/Quote]

 

And if a new organization contradicts what the mainstream media says it's automatically wrong sorry Right-Wing?

 

Anyway, what's the problem with Garfield's statement. He gave his original source, J7 asked for confirmation, and Garfield provided further info from ABC...

 

Where's the problem???

[The Doctor]

I have no problem with what he said per se so much as I have a problem with the double standards he holds on media sources - only ones that suit his purposes seem to be valid, and anything else is tainted with left-wing radicalism. It's getting old, fast.

[Jae Onasi]

I found an article of interest that pretty much shows that there appears to be a pattern of this behavior all the way back to the late 1980s.

 

Newsbusters: ABC News Sat on Blago Bookie Mob Boss Charge for years.

 

This means that people knew he was corrupt, at least the media knew. This would have been out in 30 seconds after they got the story if it were a Republican (slight exageration but not by much).

 

Not necessarily--the Chicago Tribune held back a number of stories (per an interview with one of the Tribune reporters on WGN radio last week) because they were required to by the Feds so that the investigation wasn't compromised. It's possible ABC held back if they were also working with the Feds. Also, Hot Rod knows how to work crowds and people--he's incredibly engaging and charismatic, and if you didn't know directly that he was involved in shady stuff, you'd have a tough time believing anything nasty about him because his public persona is very charming, almost beguilingly so. I knew something odd was going on because Blagojevich as governor spent hardly any time in Springfield, and some of the news outlets were sharply critical of his actions. The fact that Medicaid payments to hospitals and providers were up to 8 months late certainly made me think something funny was going on with the books. It just never occurred to me that the governor was shaking down hospital CEOs for political donations in order to get funding.

 

The Tribune is not a left-wing source, by the way. It tends towards the conservative side.

 

Obama had ZERO interaction with the Ryan situation, other than being in an incredibly fortuitous situation when it happened. Jack Ryan was running on the Republican ticket and would have beaten Obama easily in that election--he had far better funding, name recognition, popularity. When the sex scandal broke, however, it made him a political hot potato within the Republican party so he stepped aside. The Republican party, for reasons I've never been able to fathom because it's probably one of the worst political blunders I've seen in any Senate race by a party, decided to bring in the outsider Alan Keyes to run against Obama. Keyes, with no IL experience and barely even legal residency, had pretty much no chance to beat Obama, who had the Chicago Democratic machine working for him on top of his IL Senate experience and long-term residency in the state.

[GarfieldJL]

Jae, Chicago Tribune is not Conservative Leaning, in fact there are only a handful of media sources in the United States that aren't anywhere from far-left to left of center. Look at the schools where they teach journalism.

 

Also, I'm not blaming Obama for the Chicago Tribune situation, but I'm making the point that (and it also proves why the argument that Chicago Tribune is conservative is flawed), they went after stuff to attack a man's family, stuff that was in place to protect a child. Yet, something about a corruption scandal involving a politician who potentially has ties to the mob is off limits (referring to Illinois Governor). That's where your arguement falls apart.

 

Point is, that I trust the conservative sites because they provided sources (in the same article I used), and the sources were legit, and I also watched articles disappear from several news agencies that had been there previously during the election. That's why I'd trust Rush Limbaugh over many media outlets at this point, not that I think he's a good news source (which he isn't); it's just the mainstream media is that dishonest in my opinion.

 

To sum it up, the media tried to keep this story buried until he finally made threats towards a newspaper that wasn't being supportive enough, and he didn't have the charisma Obama did to get away with it. Nor was there a situation where the media had a pathological hatred of the man currently in office.