Following the money

While blogger Bram Reichbaum asks where Lil Mayor Luke Ravenstahl's campaign dollars are being spent (as I did here) and even ties Ravenstahl to disgraced former Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich, I say if you've really been paying attention, it's obvious where the bucks are going -- Rogaine and Hair Club for Men don't pay for themselves!* -- and if Lukey doesn't, uh, stay on top of things he could end up looking like this:


And, then he might not be Pittsburgh's favorite grandson anymore...


* After all, it wouldn't be the first time he spent campaign dollars on his appearance.
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The Trib Editorial Board Does It Again

I'll say this. The good folks on RickyCougarMellonScaife's editorial board have raised spreading innuendo and half-truths to an art. And sometimes they even just make stuff up!

Case in point. I read this this morning:

Lost in all the hoopla of the presidential inauguration last week was the fact that U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald subpoenaed three top Obama administration officials -- Rahm Emanuel, Valerie Jarrett and David Axelrod -- in the investigation of Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, accused of attempting to sell the president's old Senate seat. Oooh, this could get juicy.

That was something I hadn't heard. So I went to the google and tried to look it up. That's when things got confusing. When I googled "fitzgerald subpoena rahm" I found this from late December:

The Illinois House committee probing a possible impeachment of Gov. Rod Blagojevich won't subpoena two incoming White House advisers, the committee chairwoman said Saturday, according to The Associated Press.

U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald asked the committee in a letter Friday not to subpoena President-elect Barack Obama adviser Valerie Jarrett and incoming chief of staff Rahm Emanuel. Blagojevich's attorney had asked the committee earlier in the week to issue the subpoenas. Mr. Fitzgerald said any such subpoenas would interfere with the ongoing criminal investigation into Blagojevich's activities.

But that's the Illinois House committee. The Trib said that Fitzgerald subpoenaed Emmanuel et al. Then I found this:

As Barack Obama attempts to define himself as a new kind of president, the White House newcomer is finding it increasingly difficult to emerge from the scandalous shadow being cast by Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich.

Over the weekend, the U.S. Attorney’s Office released the list of subpoenas served in the current case being prosecuted against the Illinois governor.

The names of a number of key Obama White House players have found their way onto that list, a fact that could affect perceptions of the new administration.

David Axelrod and Valerie Jarrett, two key Obama advisers, were among those subpoenaed in the case where it is alleged Mr. Blagojevich attempted to sell Mr. Obama’s vacant U.S. Senate seat to the highest bidder. Rahm Emanuel, Mr. Obama’s chief of staff, was also served a subpoena.

The Bulletin is another right of center news source, by the way. But that doesn't automatically mean they're wrong. They say that Fitzgerald released a list.

But then I found this:

It appears that Barack Obama won’t escape the Rod Blagojevich scandal as easily as first thought. Two senior aides to Obama have been served with federal subpoenas, calling into question how closely the Obama transition team may have been tied to Blagojevich’s attempts to sell Obama’s vacated Senate seat

Hotair.com is a reliably conservative news blog, by the way (again, no reason to automatically think they're wrong). However, all good intentions aside, it looks like this is where the Trib stumbled. Take a look at the sentence above. It says that "(t)wo senior aides to Obama" have been subpoenaed. But look at the link Hotair uses to support that. Here's how the article starts:

Sweeping federal subpoenas of Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich's administration include requests for records involving David Axelrod and Valerie Jarrett, senior advisers to President Barack Obama.

Among 43 subpoenas released by the Blagojevich administration Friday, one from Dec. 8 seeks notes, calendars, correspondence and any other data that relate to Axelrod, Jarrett and 32 other people and organizations. [emphasis added.]

So who just who was subpoenaed again?

To read the Trib, Emmanuel, Jarrett and Axelrod were subpoenaed. To read the AP (the initial source for the story), the Blagojevich administration was subpoenaed about its contacts with Emmanuel, Jarrett and Axelrod.

So I asked the the USAttorney's office for Northern Illinois (Fitzgerald's office) for a clarification. Just to be clear, I wrote that the Trib's editorial board said the three were subpoenaed but that others had posted on the net that the USAttorney's office had posted a list of those subpoenaed and that still others wrote that the material was released this weekend by Blagojevich's office. And they responded with:

These reports you cite were based on information released by the governor’s office and not by the US Attorney’s Office – we do not comment on or confirm or deny any information about grand jury subpoenas– thanks.

It's looking like the Trib's editorial board simply got it wrong and didn't bother checking to get it right.

Blagojevich to Appoint Former IL AG Roland Burris to Obama's Senate seat

From the Huffington Post:

Citing unnamed sources, the Chicago Tribune reported Tuesday that Blagojevich plans to appoint 71-year-old former Illinois Attorney General Roland Burris. Senate leaders have said they will not seat anyone Blagojevich names.

Blagojevich has scheduled a 3 p.m. EST news conference. His spokesman Lucio Guerrero declined to say what the Democratic governor plans to discuss.

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Jack Kelly Sunday

Let's get the important stuff from Jack Kelly's column out of the way:

U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald went to great lengths to make it clear that Mr. Obama is not a subject of the investigation into the charges for which Mr. Blagojevich was arrested Tuesday. Mr. Obama, moreover, had to be heartened by the obscenity with which Hot Rod described him in a taped telephone conversation Nov. 11, which made it clear that the Obama camp would offer Mr. Blagojevich nothing but thanks if he appointed the candidate Mr. Obama preferred to succeed him, Valerie Jarrett. [emphasis added]

Actually USAttorney Fitzgerald said this:

At one point, [Blagojevich] proposed a three-way deal -- that a cushy union job would be given to him at a higher rate of pay where he could make money.

In exchange, he thought that the union might get benefits from the president-elect, and therefore, the president-elect might get the candidate his choice. I should make clear the complaint makes no allegations about the president-elect whatsoever -- his conduct. This part of the scheme lost steam when the person that the governor thought was the president-elect's choice of senator took herself out of the running. But after the deal never happened, this is the governor's reaction. Quote, "They're not willing to give me anything but appreciation. Bleep them," close quote. And again, the bleed (sic) is a redaction.

My best guess (and this is ONLY a guess) is that the Governor said, "They're not willing to give me anything but appreciation. Fuck them." It could have been, of course, "To Hell with them" but "Fuck them" just sounds more "Chicago" doesn't it? Especially when the complaint says on page 63:

ROD BLAGOJEVICH said that the consultants (Advisor B and another consultant are believed to be on the call at that time) are telling him that he has to “suck it up” for two years and do nothing and give this “motherfucker [the President-elect] his senator. Fuck him. For nothing? Fuck him.”

Note to the historians, I think that's the most obscenity I've ever used on this blog.

It's interesting to watch the right wing noise machine try to tie Blagojevich to Obama. Especially when the term "motherfucker" is thrown around so much.

By the way, this is not the first time Jack Kelly's written about USAttorney Fitzgerald. Here he is in June of '06:

Mr. Fitzgerald is a sloppy prosecutor who rushes to judgment, and then has to backtrack, charged Washington, D.C., lawyer Clarice Feldman.

In one recent high-profile case, Mr. Fitzgerald's staff mistakenly sent 16 cartons of classified documents to attorneys for the terror suspects he was prosecuting, she said.

In another, Mr. Fitzgerald charged the victim in a financial fraud case instead of its perpetrators.

"Fitzgerald is good at creating elaborate facades which tart up the ramshackle huts to which they are affixed," Ms. Feldman said. "Once those facades are removed, it is obvious the cases behind them are rickety."

True to form, Clarice Feldman isn't just a "D.C. lawyer. She also writes for the conservative website "The American Thinker." Maybe Jack should have mentioned that back then.

But back to the column.

Jack weaves:

But how does this differ materially from Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., killing a tax bill after the CEO of a company that would have been adversely affected donated $1 million to the Charles B. Rangel School of Public Service at the City College of New York?

And how does it differ materially from the pardon President Bill Clinton issued to fugitive financier Marc Rich after Mr. Rich, through his ex-wife, contributed massive sums to the Democratic Party and to the Clinton library?

Yet Mr. Rangel is still chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee and Eric Holder -- who was excoriated by a congressional committee for his role in granting the Rich pardon -- is Mr. Obama's attorney general-designate. Rod Blagojevich is just the tip of a very large iceberg, one that encompasses local, state and national governments.

We've fact-checked Jack on Marc Rich before. He continually fails to mention that Marc Rich's attorney was that darling of the right - Scooter Libby.

As for Representative Rangel, Jack seems to indicate that nothing's going on that he's "still chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee." But did you know that there's an ethics investigation going on?

Yep:

Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), in a statement just released by her office, said a House ethics committee investigation into Ways and Means Chairman Charles B. Rangel (D-N.Y.) will be completed by early January 2009, which is officially the end of the current 110th Congress.

“In September, I called on the House ethics committee to look into issues raised by news reports on Chairman Rangel. This followed up on the chairman’s own request for an investigation by the committee," Pelosi said in her statement.

“I have been assured the report will be completed by the end of this session of Congress, which concludes on January 3, 2009. I look forward to reviewing the report at that time."

Not that Jack would have ever told you - no, he wants you to think that Rangel's getting a pass and that it's all one big left wing conspiracy.

But the point is clear - for the right wing noise machine, even if there's no evidence, they're gonna be pounding away at this.

For the record, if Blagojevich is found guity (and it looks real real bad for him right now) throw the motherfucker in jail.

Sorry this is so short today, my friends - going Christmas shopping with the wife.

Blagojaggoffevich

Maybe that 1970s hair on his head is growing into his brain or one of his many schemes for life after the governorship included getting a gig on the TV series Life on Mars.


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