I'll give $illinois for page 3.

12/16/2008 12:48:03 AM

I read that the FBI had been wire-tapping Blago for three years.

I hope Obama and his cohorts were keeping their noses clean while they weren't getting national attention.

12/16/2008 1:24:19 AM

Quote :

"Obama clears himself and staff in Blagojevich case The president-elect says an internal review shows there were no inappropriate conversations with the Illinois governor about who would fill the vacant Senate seat."

http://www.latimes.com/news/politics/la-na-blago-obama16-2008dec16,0,5115342.story

Whew, glad Obama cleared himself of any wrong doing. I was worried there for a second.

[Edited on December 16, 2008 at 4:04 AM. Reason : .]

12/16/2008 4:03:40 AM

rahm emmanuel seems to be getting some heat.

12/16/2008 12:09:28 PM

Blagojevich tells reporters to 'hang loose'

Quote :

"Embattled Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich said Wednesday that he "can't wait to begin to tell his side of the story.""

http://www.cnn.com/2008/POLITICS/12/17/blagojevich/index.html

anyone else get the feeling that he's preparing to set the world on fire

12/17/2008 11:54:09 AM

this is a little old now (from yesterday i think). but for those implying that jesse jackson jr was a major player in all this and now it's out that he's apparently been an informant about corruption in illinois politics to the us attorney's office for years. wow. this thing is really getting interesting. i'm sure there will be a good book or two written about this in a couple years.

12/17/2008 1:09:42 PM

if blatent chicago corruption like this can reach the governer, it sure as hell can reach the oval office

its no suprise that the same seat obama "won" is being sold once again

12/17/2008 1:40:18 PM

you're one bitter little fratty aren't you? you have nothing else but guilt by association to latch onto.

12/17/2008 1:50:27 PM

the people who allowed him to reach the pinnacle of political success are dropping left and right to fraud and corruption charges .. he was nurtured in a notoriously corrupt system ...

how can you not be skeptical of him, unless you are so blinded by his bullshit charisma that you think he is infallible

12/17/2008 2:06:43 PM

i don't think he's infallible. but in this case, every sign is pointing towards him not being involved in any nefarious way.

was obama cutthroat in the way that he ran for state senate? yes. but he followed the rules and got people knocked off the ballot in completely legitimate ways. in fact, from what i've read, obama pissed quite a bit of the chicago establishment. and it seems that he pissed off blago as well when he and his people didn't want anything to do with his pay to play stuff.

i mean i know you're angry that obama won the presidency. and his rise has seemed strangely sudden. but i would think that seeing his presidential campaign and how masterfully it was run (99% of the time), that it would not be unbelievable that he could rise to senator with those same sets of skills that allowed him to beat hillary clinton and john mccain without having to commit illegal/unethical acts.

when you come to me with a shred of actual evidence, then i'll treat you seriously. but until then, you just look like a pathetic fool.

[Edited on December 17, 2008 at 2:14 PM. Reason : .]

12/17/2008 2:13:38 PM

just because theres little tangible evidence, doesnt mean it didnt happen

if youre smart, you can wash your hands clean, and cover tracks ... obama is smart

in a court of law, guilt by association flies .. not saying he is guilty, but there is copius solid evidence that he is directly involved, but proper investigation is not being conducted.. yet

12/17/2008 5:09:43 PM

Quote :

"in a court of law, guilt by association flies"

not saying this doesn't ever happen. but it shouldn't. jesus christ this is stupid.

let's get this clear: you're basing your doubts about the guy on guilt by association. period. you have no evidence, neither does anyone else. it's impossible to prove a negative. that is why there has to be positive evidence of a crime before someone can be charged. "innocent until proven guilty" and all that. this is just a media/right wing whack job on obama, nothing else. YOU'RE A HACK IF YOU BUY INTO THIS CRAP.

Quote :

"but there is copius solid evidence"

really? i've yet to see any.

[Edited on December 17, 2008 at 5:15 PM. Reason : .]

12/17/2008 5:15:01 PM

no, im rational

are you fucking blinded? the people who funded his campaigns, the people who got him into politics, the people who caused him to run uncontested, the people who took him from community organizer .. whatever the hell that is .. to president in less than 10 years ARE IN PRISON

HIS FUCKING SEAT IS BEING SOLD ... do you not think and ponder that maybe, just maybe, his seat was bought?? when the incumbant he ran against is forced to quit before the election?? dont kid yourself

OBAMA IS CHICAGO POLITICS .. CHICAGO POLITICS IS CORRUPT AND COMPLETELY OUT OF CONTROL ... WE ARE JUST SEEING IT NOW

no smoking gun is needed for this .. obama is a shady fukn politician who's roots run deeper into fraudulant chicago politics, more than ever .. since jfk .. who had dead people vote for him in chicago

gimme a break and get real, its ok to be speculative ... lets learn from our past when europe had a leader they thought could do no wrong

[Edited on December 17, 2008 at 5:27 PM. Reason : ]

12/17/2008 5:25:39 PM

BLAH BLAH BLAH I DON'T HAVE ANY EVIDENCE BLAH BLAH BLAH.

Quote :

"the people who took him from community organizer .. whatever the hell that is .. "

oh and you're a retard if you don't know what a community organizer after this past year.

hint: palin got started as a community organizer in the pta.

[Edited on December 17, 2008 at 5:30 PM. Reason : .]

12/17/2008 5:29:27 PM

palin was never a "community organizer" in the respect that obama was .. HE WAS NOT ELECTED TO THAT POSITION

she was an elected mayor .. who ran contested .. and ran for gov. .. contested

name your community organizer

[Edited on December 17, 2008 at 5:38 PM. Reason : quick, look it up .. if you have one]

12/17/2008 5:37:57 PM

dude it was alaska

12/17/2008 5:39:30 PM

and

alaska >>>>>>> illinois

[Edited on December 17, 2008 at 5:41 PM. Reason : ]

12/17/2008 5:40:14 PM

she governed some ice?

12/17/2008 5:41:49 PM

clever


name your community organizer

1

2

3

GO

[Edited on December 17, 2008 at 5:46 PM. Reason : ]

[Edited on December 17, 2008 at 5:54 PM. Reason : go search for it, chances are, you dont have one]

12/17/2008 5:42:25 PM

What Did Obama Do As A Community Organizer?

Quote :

"Chicago — Barack Obama often cites his time as a community organizer here in Chicago as one of the experiences that qualify him to hold the nation’s highest office. “I can bring this country together,” he said in a debate last February. “I have a track record, starting from the days I moved to Chicago as a community organizer.” When Obama says such things, the reaction among many observers is: Huh? Audiences understand when he mentions his years as an Illinois state legislator, or his brief tenure in the U.S. Senate. But a community organizer? What’s that? Even Obama didn’t know when he first gave it a try back in 1985. “When classmates in college asked me just what it was that a community organizer did, I couldn’t answer them directly,” Obama wrote in his memoir, Dreams from My Father. “Instead, I’d pronounce on the need for change. Change in the White House, where Reagan and his minions were carrying on their dirty deeds. Change in the Congress, compliant and corrupt. Change in the mood of the country, manic and self-absorbed. Change won’t come from the top, I would say. Change will come from a mobilized grass roots.” If you substitute “Bush” for “Reagan,” you have a fairly accurate description of Obama’s 2008 campaign. That’s not a coincidence; it suggests that something about community organizing was central to Obama’s world view back then, and has remained central to his development as the politician he is today. What was it? I counted myself among those who didn’t have a good idea of what a community organizer does. So I came here to learn more about Obama’s time in the job, from 1985 to 1988. What did he do? What did he accomplish? And what in his experience here stands as a qualification to be president of the United States?"

Quote :

"Perhaps the simplest way to describe community organizing is to say it is the practice of identifying a specific aggrieved population, say unemployed steelworkers, or itinerant fruit-pickers, or residents of a particularly bad neighborhood, and agitating them until they become so upset about their condition that they take collective action to put pressure on local, state, or federal officials to fix the problem, often by giving the affected group money. Organizers like to call that “direct action.” Community organizing is most identified with the left-wing Chicago activist Saul Alinsky (1909-72), who pretty much defined the profession. In his classic book, Rules for Radicals, Alinsky wrote that a successful organizer should be “an abrasive agent to rub raw the resentments of the people of the community; to fan latent hostilities of many of the people to the point of overt expressions.” Once such hostilities were “whipped up to a fighting pitch,” Alinsky continued, the organizer steered his group toward confrontation, in the form of picketing, demonstrating, and general hell-raising. At first, the organizer tackled small stuff, like demanding the repair of streetlights in a city park; later, when the group gained confidence, the organizer could take on bigger targets. But at all times, the organizer’s goal was not to lead his people anywhere, but to encourage them to take action on their own behalf. Alinsky started in the 1930s with workers in the Chicago stockyards. Many years later, when Obama arrived here, he came from a different perspective. “Barack had been very inspired by the civil-rights movement,” Jerry Kellman, the organizer who hired Obama, told me recently. “I felt that he wanted to work in the civil-rights movement, but he was ten years too late, and this was the closest he could find to it at the time.” Obama, in his memoir, put it more simply when he said he went to Chicago to “organize black folks.”"

[Edited on December 17, 2008 at 6:15 PM. Reason : [/obama]]

12/17/2008 6:14:14 PM

blagojevich is scum

12/17/2008 6:23:05 PM

^^hey guy, give it a fucking rest already.

when there is a single shred of evidence Obama was playing ball with Blag then come back. Until then, go away.

12/17/2008 7:20:55 PM

Quote :

"TKEshultz: alaska >>>>>>> illinois "

POPULATION

     ILLINOIS - 12,800,000  
     Chicago  -  2,600,000

     ALASKA   -    670,000
     Wasilla  -      9,700

     ILLINOIS - $500 Billion  

     ALASKA   - $ 30 Billion

12/17/2008 7:22:41 PM

sweet uniforms

12/17/2008 7:23:42 PM

i like how tke quotes an article, doesn't link it (it's from the NRO: http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=OWMxNGUxZWJjYzg1NjA0MTlmZDZmMjUwZGU3ZjAwNmU=&w=MA==) and, while biased, that article does tell what obama actually did to a certain extent. of course tke didn't quote that part, because it doesn't jibe with his completely invented version of reality.

12/17/2008 9:47:03 PM

^^^u should do per capita spending per citizen in alaska

its #1

12/17/2008 9:50:51 PM

Quote :

"per capital spending "

12/17/2008 9:51:28 PM

so much hatred! posting an old picture of mine must be the last resort

chill out man

12/17/2008 9:52:20 PM

alaska is the greatest state in the union. I really hope i am able to live up there one day, or at least maybe retire up there. # of people != great state

12/18/2008 9:14:36 AM

I really don't see what a global warming stance has to do with the topic at hand....


That being said Obama seems clean to me. I don't see any reason to think otherwise.

12/18/2008 10:17:23 AM

^^ spoken like someone who's never been there.

12/18/2008 12:20:46 PM

^SPOKEN LIKE A TRUE, UNINFORMED ASSHOLE

I HAVE NEVER LIVED THERE, BUT I SPENT AROUND A MONTH THERE IN 2006 TRAVELING, BACKPACKING, HITCHIKING, AND LIVING WITH REAL ALASKANS. SOUTHERN HOSPITALITY BE DAMNED, THE ALASKANS ARE NICE AS SHIT.

12/18/2008 1:59:52 PM

I AM ANGRY

12/18/2008 5:43:31 PM

12/18/2008 7:11:14 PM

http://www.suntimes.com/news/metro/blagojevich/1337789,CST-NWS-rahm18good.article

Quote :

"President-elect Barack Obama's incoming chief of staff Rahm Emanuel had a deeper involvement in pressing for a U.S. Senate seat appointment than previously reported, the Sun-Times has learned. Emanuel had direct discussions about the seat with Gov. Blagojevich, who is is accused of trying to auction it to the highest bidder. Emanuel talked with the governor in the days following the Nov. 4 election and pressed early on for the appointment of Valerie Jarrett to the post, sources with knowledge of the conversations told the Sun-Times. There was no indication from sources that Emanuel brokered a deal, however. A source with the Obama camp strongly denied Emanuel spoke with the governor directly about the seat, saying Emanuel only spoke with Blagojevich once recently to say he was taking the chief of staff post. But sources with knowledge of the investigation said Blagojevich told his aides about the calls with Emanuel and sometimes gave them directions afterward. Sources said that early on, Emanuel pushed for the appointment of Jarrett to the governor and his staff and asked that it be done by a certain date. At least some of the conversations between Emanuel and Blagojevich were likely caught on tape, sources said. After Jarrett took herself out of the running in mid-November, Emanuel submitted a list of suitable names to the governor's camp that didn't include her name. Emanuel, who has refused to comment on the issue, is not accused of wrongdoing. In portions of conversations released in a criminal complaint against Blagojevich, he can be heard complaining that Obama wouldn't give anything in return for a Jarrett appointment. "

I am beginning to think that for all of her stupid, Palin might have been a better choice.

At the very least, the shine on Obama is starting to wear a little thin for me.

I definitely regret standing in the rain as a poll observer for the Obama campaign for 10 hours on election day.

If they didn't do anything wrong, why lie about it. It seems that lying is going to be the hallmark of the Obama administration.

[Edited on December 19, 2008 at 10:01 AM. Reason : this sucks]

12/19/2008 10:00:06 AM

I find it difficult to believe that any politician can go through the Chicago political machine and come out clean on the other side.

Maybe Obama did make it through corruption-free. Time will tell.

12/19/2008 10:42:48 AM

I don't like the smell of this, but it appears that Emmanuel wasn't willing to play ball with Blagojevich anyway, so why did the Obama camp lie about not having contact in the first place?


One aspect i would find likely is that they knew that Blagojevich was attempting to sell the seat and failed to do anything about it. What would the implications of that be?

12/19/2008 11:19:46 AM

Quote :

"I find it difficult to believe that any politician can go through the Chicago political machine and come out clean on the other side. Maybe Obama did make it through corruption-free. Time will tell."

Time has told, as far as that's concerned:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illinois_Senate_career_of_Barack_Obama

He snagged his seat in the IL Senate by default because all of his opponents were disqualified due to corruption.

So one way to make it through Chicago politics squeaky clean is to taddle on all your corrupt opponents.

12/19/2008 11:28:34 AM

the word is "tattle"

Quote :

"Prior to the primary ... [Obama] challenged the validity of ballot petition signatures for his four Democratic opponents, resulting in their exclusion from the ballot and allowing him to run unopposed in the primary"

that's pretty straight up to me. those fuckers had false signatures on their petitions allowing them to run for state senate.

this was Obama's first election to state office. he subsequently won every single other election due to solid campaign skills and strategy.

I see nothing wrong here.



[Edited on December 19, 2008 at 12:38 PM. Reason : ]

12/19/2008 12:34:01 PM

Quote :

" “When classmates in college asked me just what it was that a community organizer did, I couldn’t answer them directly,” Obama wrote in his memoir, Dreams from My Father. “Instead, I’d pronounce on the need for change. Change in the White House, where Reagan and his minions were carrying on their dirty deeds. Change in the Congress, compliant and corrupt. Change in the mood of the country, manic and self-absorbed. Change won’t come from the top, I would say. Change will come from a mobilized grass roots.”"

I think I might just have to read "Dreams from My Father" pretty soon. I'd really like to get into the mind of Obama and figure out his ideological roots.

[Edited on December 19, 2008 at 12:38 PM. Reason : 2]

12/19/2008 12:37:50 PM

Quote :

"this was Obama's first election to state office. he subsequently won every single other election due to solid campaign skills and strategy."

(except his us house run. but whatever)

12/19/2008 1:02:38 PM

oh, right. the one race he lost....


well, even Jesus cursed the fig tree.

12/19/2008 1:09:03 PM

Quote :

"I see nothing wrong here."

Neither do I. I used "tattle" jokingly; it wasn't meant to be interpreted in a demeaning way.

12/19/2008 1:16:08 PM

well, you know, my sphincter is highly sensitive of any perceived criticism towards the O-Team.

12/19/2008 1:23:09 PM

Quote :

"but i would think that seeing his presidential campaign and how masterfully it was run (99% of the time)"

It's amazing how well your campaign can be "run" when you lie and break your promises and can then outspend your opponent 10 to 1

12/20/2008 9:49:00 PM

Which is worse?

Winning by outspending your opponent, or winning and not even winning the popular vote?

12/20/2008 10:28:03 PM

^^it's amazing how you can quote the half of the sentence that has nothing to do with the thread without the second half of the sentence. you really have a knack for that. bravo.

12/26/2008 1:11:34 AM

either obama is a really good guy or he is made of teflon

12/26/2008 11:47:18 PM

^ At the very least, he's a (really) good politician.

12/26/2008 11:52:53 PM

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1208/16952.html

Apparently Governor Blagojevich has thrown Obama a curveball. He's appointed Roland Burris, a senior African-American statesman in Illinois, as Senator for Illinois. Representative Bobby Rush has backed Burris appointment.

It looks like the governor is attempting to make this into a racial issue, trying to force Obama to take sides with most of the African-American establishment in Illinois backing the Burris appointment while the Congressional leadership in Washington is strongly against it. Reid and Co. have already said that they will not approve Burris' appointment since it was done by Blagojevich.

12/31/2008 12:50:19 AM