This week's spin is what a bad guy the governor of Illinois is yet how Obama, once again, knew nothing about this guy's character. As before, here's a person that Obama once had very congenial and close relationships with that turns out to be less than an honorable person. He just seems to have a real inability to judge character, which is frightening. Editors welcome new contributor: Betsy Red is the pen name of a Colorado Springs grandmother who has also blogged for the American Thinker, the American Spectator, and the Colorado Index. We're glad to have her aboard.
Both he and his campaign manager, David Axelrod, were fully supportive of Blago when he was running for governor (Axelrod ran the latter's campaign also), and the Obamas enjoyed frequent social occasions with the governor and his wife in recent years. Obama was happy to have Blago on stage with him at all his Illinois campaign stops, the Broadway stage production this summer at Invesco Field, the party at Grant Park on election night and both times Obama stood before the State Capitol in Springfield to address his adoring throngs.
Yet now we're told that Obama knew nothing about Blago's nefarious actions and of course, never spoke to him about any of it. Obama said he is 'stunned' and 'sobered' about these revelations. Aren't we all? Yet another person in the Obama camp turns out to have undesirable personality traits, yet Obama was blind to them until revealed on the public stage.
Just like the rest of America, Obama was obviously suckered back in October when federal investigators were ready to indict Blagojevich and didn't. They held off so as not to taint the election. Had Obama been told back then that his one-time buddy was a bad guy, he could have distanced himself before this latest round of problems. He could have said, "This is not the Rod Blagojevich I once knew" as he frequently stated about all his other friends that were popping up with nasty backgrounds.
I was born and raised in Illinois and have seen this pattern. Just as a person that wants to make it in the film industry moves to Hollywood, a Democrat that wants a springboard into national politics often finds their way to Illinois, specifically Cook County. Prior to the election, when the Feds released statements that they had enough info on the IL governor to indict him, like so much else, this stayed under the radar. I blogged about it at the time. Nothing was said; it was glossed over and now we learn the reason why.
The prosecutor, Fitzgerald, did not want to indict him in October before the election because he did not want to create a potential issue in the presidential election. It wasn't considered a good idea to indict the governor from the state of one of the candidates right before an election. Of course not. That might have triggered questions amongst the electorate and brought into question why, time after time, Obama is linked to questionable public figures.
He didn't know that Rev. Wright was damning America from the pulpit, at first he didn't even know that Bill Ayers had been involved in anti-American domestic terrorism (later stated he thought Mr. Ayers had repented of his despicable acts and since his wife was no longer on the FBI's most wanted list, she must be o.k., too), he didn't know Tony Rezko was involved in shady real estate deals although Obama himself funneled Illinois tax money to Rezko to build shoddy public housing and the list goes on and on.
And now, he had no idea that the governor of Illinois was almost indicted in October and now that Inauguration Day approaches, the rug has been pulled out, and Mr. Obama has a few weeks, plus the Christmas holiday to have this all quietly go away without much public scrutiny and certainly no intellectual inquisition by the media. Amazing.....
For me, the spotlight in this should also shine on the federal prosecutor, Fitzgerald. He doggedly went after Libby and Rove on the Valerie Plame fiasco, at great taxpayer expense. He knew that Libby and Rove were not the 'leakers', yet pursued the case with an obvious intent to cause as much damage to the Bush administration and Republican Party as possible.
Will he be as relentless and tireless in his pursuit of all the connecting dots and all the involved parties in this case? We know Obama will get a pass. Mr. Teflon never has anything stick to him, but will there be as much effort to at least try and get to the bottom of all the truth as we've observed Mr. Fitzgerald to exert in the past?