AP

 Obama with his good buddy Blagojevich

One of Rod Blagojevich’s attorneys said Wednesday it was possible the defense could call President Obama to take the witness stand if the corruption charges against the former governor go to trial, but added that it wasn’t clear that doing so would be necessary.

Defense attorney Samuel E. Adam said following a hearing in the case that it would be "an awesome experience in any career" to question Obama, who is not accused of any wrongdoing but did answer questions from federal investigators.

Blagojevich is charged with scheming to sell or trade Obama’s former U.S. Senate seat, campaign fundraising abuses and other offenses. He has denied wrongdoing.

Blagojevich attorneys have asked U.S. District Judge James B. Zagel to give them an early look at the government’s evidence, including records of interviews with Obama, First Lady Michelle Obama, chief of staff Rahm Emanuel, presidential adviser Valerie Jarrett and two labor backers of Obama, Thomas Balanoff and Andy Stern.

Zagel indicated he might rule on the request Jan. 27

Read More:

Les Kinsolving, Worldnetdaily

Barack Obama is manipulating the media to control the news

Carol Marin is political columnist for the Chicago Sun-Times, as well as political editor for Chicago’s NBC 5 News, as well as interviewer/contributor to WTTW’s “Chicago Tonight” program.

As such, she may be one of this nation’s most Obama-knowledgeable of all in our media.

As a former CBS news correspondent, she reported for “60 Minutes.”

All of which makes it beyond belief that almost all of this nation’s media – with the exception of the Media Research Center – failed to report what this Obama news authority wrote in the Sun Times on Sunday, Jan. 4 of this year:

“As ferociously as we march like villagers with torches against Blagojevich, we have been, in the true spirit of the Bizarro universe, the polar opposite with the president-elect. Deferential, eager to please, prepared to keep a careful distance.

By Chicago News

Obama with two subpoena targets, David Axelrod and Valerie Jarrett

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.

That was the day before the FBI arrested Blagojevich, a two-term Democrat, on charges that he tried to trade his appointment to replace Obama in the Senate for campaign contributions. Wiretapped conversations show Blagojevich thought Jarrett was interested in the seat and he wanted campaign money or a high-paying job in return, according to a sworn statement.

BY Carol Marin Chicago Sun-Times

Sen Kennedy, Gov. "Hot Rod" Blagojevich, and Barack Obama

Barack Obama jogged only slightly ahead of Rod Blagojevich across the news landscape of the past month, the glistening horizon of a new Camelot ahead, perhaps, but the jagged outline of the clouted city not far behind.

Obama and Blago are more than the yin and yang of Illinois politics. They represent, a la Jerry Seinfeld, the ultimate Bizarro plotline.

Bizarro is the alter ego of Superman, a concept the Seinfeld crew borrowed from DC Comics and incorporated into a 1996 episode. If you never saw it, it goes like this: For every apathetic Jerry, nudgy George and raucous Kramer there is, in the Bizarro world, the polar opposite: an empathetic Jerry, an urbane George and a genteel Kramer.

By Les Kinsolving, Worldnetdaily

Eric Holder with one of his corrupt clients Gov. Rod Blagojevich

During a Jan. 7 news conference on Capitol Hill, Maryland’s Democrat U.S. Sen. Ben Cardin declared:

“Eric Holder is an experienced and dedicated public servant who will restore trust and confidence in a Department of Justice that recently has strayed far from its role as a non-partisan protector of the rule of law and the civil rights of all Americans. I have no doubt that Mr. Holder will be an attorney general who will serve the American people and not just the White House. He will vigorously enforce the civil rights laws to protect all Americans from unlawful discrimination and help close our nation’s justice gap.”

And speaking of justice – as Sen. Cardin mentioned (along with other participants in this press conference, including the NAACP, the National Council of LaRaza, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights and the National Women’s Law Center), where was candidate Holder’s alleged devotion to the cause of justice in the case of Mr. Marc Rich?

I looked carefully at the press release issued by Sens. Cardin and Sheldon Whitehouse, D-R.I., and those four organizations. I could find no mention at all of the Eric Holder outrage in the case of Marc Rich.

By The Prowler, American Spectator

Bill Richardson is one of many "friends of Barack" in trouble

One reason the Obama transition team pushed New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson overboard was concern that other close associates of Obama might be drawn into the burgeoning “pay for play” scandal that is now enveloping not only Richardson, but also the administration of Pennsylvania Gov. Ed Rendell, as well as other prominent Democrats.

“The biggest concern is [Valerie] Jarrett and anyone associated with the public housing industry in Chicago,” says an Obama transition team adviser. “Some of Obama’s earliest and most influential fundraisers came from the low-income housing industry.”

In fact, according to federal law enforcement sources, the company at the center of the “pay for play” scandal, CDR Financial, was about to announce the opening of a new office in Illinois. “They were expecting to make some money there, just how and how much isn’t clear yet, but it’s something that is being looked at.”

By Donald Devine, Conservative Battline

Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich boorishly peddling Barack Obama’s Senate seat was ugly enough. But why did U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald act so soon, before the case was fully developed? As former top Department of Justice official Victoria Toensing noted, “The governor’s maneuvering to sell the Senate seat most likely had not yet crossed the line to become criminal.”

The Attorney’s actions were very strange. Here you have an officer of the law – whose legal guidelines require that he not go beyond the specific public facts of the indictment – holding a colossal media conference telling the world Blagojevich was engaged “in a political corruption crime spree,” that he “has taken us to a new low,” that various of his actions were “appalling” (several times), and finally that his “conduct would make Lincoln roll over in his grave.”

The guidelines specifically require that a “prosecutor shall refrain from making extrajudicial comments that pose a serious and imminent threat of heightening public condemnation of the accused.” What could Mr. Fitzgerald have said to the TV that would have been more prejudicial than what he actually intoned into every living room in America? As Ms. Toensing rightly concludes, this is unethical conduct pure and simple and deserves public condemnation.

While he was effusive with prejudicial comments, the U.S. Attorney was evasive on the central question of why the wiretaps were set in the first place. He answered with technical statements about how difficult they were to be secured, avoiding the question, why? Weeks after, it is still not clear when and why wiretaps were set. They apparently started with a complaint from person who was perturbed that she could not secure a low-level state contract. Thereafter, the investigation meandered widely over an incredible five years until it finally landed with a bug in the governor’s office. That this is a rather circuitous route perhaps explains why Fitzgerald did not give a direct answer. But it gets worse.

U.S. Attorneys are supposed to “exercise reasonable care” over the law enforcement officials used for the investigation, as Toensing also notes. Yet, at the same media event, FBI Special Agent Rob Grant volunteered a question to himself out loud, asking no one in particular whether Illinois was the “most corrupt state in the United States?”, answering his own question that if it is not the worst “it’s one hell of a competitor.” He gratuitously added that even his seasoned agents were “thoroughly disgusted and revolted by what they heard” as they listened to the wiretaps. Even if Grant’s agents are this sheltered, it is hard to argue his language was not prejudicial.

The U.S. Attorney has been there before, in the high-profile Scooter Libby case. To quote Toensing,

In his news conference in October 2005 announcing the indictment of Scooter Libby for obstruction of justice, he compared himself to an umpire who “gets sand thrown in his eyes.” The umpire is “trying to figure what happened and somebody blocked” his view. With this statement, Mr. Fitzgerald made us all believe he could not find the person who leaked Valerie Plame’s name as a CIA operative because of Mr. Libby. What we all now know is that Mr. Fitzgerald knew well before he ever started the investigation in January 2004 that Richard Armitage was the leaker and nothing Mr. Libby did or did not do threw sand in his eyes. In fact — since there was no crime — there was not even a game for the umpire to call.

But this is all lawyer stuff. Ms. Toensing is too much a professional attorney to draw practical conclusions. Why did Mr. Fitzgerald do this? His own explanation was twofold. He did not want to wait until the Senate replacement was already seated. Yet, as all now know, the Senate could have held up the nomination. His second explanation was, “I laid awake at night” worrying that the editors of the Chicago Tribune would be fired under pressure from Gov. Blagojevich before he could act. This seems even more unlikely since the U.S. Attorney was already working quietly with the newspaper. Was he just promoting himself? As an old bureaucratic insider, he undoubtedly knows that the first leaker earns the media’s favor and is protected by that status. He could be understood to be investing in some insurance with the media at the conference by laying awake in their interest.

As any student of the bureaucracy could tell the legalists, this strategy is especially helpful to guarantee one’s own job security. Once a federal prosecutor brings a case only the most foolhardy President or Attorney General would dismiss him. There is a long history of U.S. Attorneys doing so and successfully enhancing their job tenure, as Fitzgerald could not fail to notice. A few clever ones have used the publicity to run for higher office (and another high office in Illinois might soon be vacant)! If top U.S. officials even thought of appointing a replacement, as a new administration otherwise would be free to do, any prosecutor who wanted to keep his job could merely whisper “obstruction of justice” and be safe in his job forever. President Obama, coming from Illinois, would not even think of it.

Former U.S. prosecutor (and ex-quarterback at Ohio State), Daniel Westerbeck has a more intriguing suggestion – that Fitzgerald was actually protecting Mr. Obama. He notes that although the official Complaint did not mention any contact between the president-elect and the governor, Obama’s top strategist David Axelrod had earlier admitted constant interaction over the Senate replacement. He even had a candidate, Valerie Jarrett. Thus, as soon as Sen. Obama was elected, the country could have faced the possibility of a Constitutional crisis involving the president-elect. Westerbeck surmises that Attorney General Michael Mukasey avoided this by informing the Obama team about the wiretaps. What we know is that Ms. Jarrett withdrew weeks before the news conference. Westerbeck’s reasoning was that after the election, as Patrick Fitzgerald and the Attorney General pondered this, their choice was stark: 1) do we follow the normal protocol and let the tapes roll and maybe reel in Obama staffers (or, God forbid, Obama himself) bargaining with Blago in the US Senate seat auction; or, 2) do we tip Obama in a briefing and abruptly terminate the investigation at the governor’s level and thus preclude it from reaching Obama and his staff? I think they made a political and legal calculation in the nation’s interest and chose the latter course. They saved Obama, or certainly his staff, from the taint of the criminal action and also prevented the sale of a US Senate seat by a corrupt Cook County Democrat politician by arresting Blago [prematurely].

While such a decision would have its altruistic dimensions, Mr. Westerbeck also concludes there was a pragmatic one. “So Obama now owes the Justice Dept. and US Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald, in particular, a big one”, even the Attorney General position if Eric Holder falters, which he well might given his role in the Marc Rich pardon. Certainly, there would be no removal of Mr. Fitzgerald for as long as he wants to remain.

No doubt such an easy and crass target as Blagojevich will be tried and undoubtedly convicted of something. There are enough scared politicians who will succumb to prosecutors’ threats and make a case against him. But after acting so early, what case can Fitzgerald make? Should we not care as long as the foul-talking tough guy gets his due? Of course, it is good to go after public corruption but is talking tough a crime? It will be interesting to compare the governor’s with tough-talking Obama chief of staff Rahm Emanuel’s taped remarks when they are released. Marvelously, Fitzgerald had anticipated, had already answered this question himself at his media conference. When a Chicago reporter asked when merely “talking-tough” had become a crime, he referred her to the conspiracy statutes.

The dirty little secret of the U.S. Federal justice system is that if you do not have the evidence to convict a person of a crime, convict him of conspiracy. Everyone conspires with others on non-criminal matters – common conspiracy simply means working in secret for a common goal – so once it is allowed it is shooting fish in a barrel to convict on “conspiracy” alone without an underlying crime. If U.S. prosecutors could convict a nice and attractive person like Martha Stewart on a conspiracy charge without her being charged with an underlying crime, surely they could get a scalawag like the Illinois governor on the same dodge, without having to meet the higher standards of proof for committing an actual crime.

How have we come to this? It was not until the 19th Century that conspiracy was even considered a crime other than as conspiracy against the state and it was not used generally until the great increase in difficult to prove white collar crimes with the rise of the welfare state in the 20th Century. Indeed, even today federal white collar crimes are considered crimes against the U.S. Government, i.e. the state. Even so, it was not until very modern times that one could be convicted of conspiracy without being charged with an underlying crime. Conspiracy especially became the charge of choice to convict for secretive drug crimes as distribution exploded in the wake of the hippie revolution of the nineteen sixties.

Today a prosecutor can jump from any one trivial crime to another for five years or more and through plea agreements rather than trials (90% of convictions are pleas) coerce defendants into enticing higher-ups into recoded conversations and based on their tough-talk can convict media-appealing big shots of conspiracy when no actual crimes have taken place even after the fact. That even the President-elect could have been implicated for simple horse-trading under these standards should be sobering, although taking on media star President Obama this early is unthinkable. Either way, no one can touch prosecutor Fitzgerald, who now has as high potential and even firmer tenure than the president himself.

By John O’Connor, Associated Press

It takes two to tango and Obama's people should held accountable

Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s official calendar shows he met with a top union official in his Chicago office the day before Barack Obama was elected president—just as federal prosecutors say the governor was scheming to trade Obama’s Senate seat, possibly for a cushy union job.

The meeting with Andy Stern, president of the Service Employees International Union, also was attended by Tom Balanoff, president of the Illinois chapter of the union, which has been Blagojevich’s largest campaign contributor.

The governor’s schedules, released Tuesday to The Associated Press, shed new light on the governor’s activities during the period outlined in a criminal complaint that accuses the Democrat of a wide-ranging scheme to profit from official action, such as selling Obama’s U.S. Senate seat and pressuring the Chicago Tribune to fire unfriendly editorial writers.

Other entries on Blagojevich’s calendars for September, October, November and December include the governor attending a party for Tribune Co. owner Sam Zell, who is trying to sell the Chicago Cubs and Wrigley Field, lunch with the Cubs’ general manager and a meeting with a wealthy former Senate candidate.

By Justin Rood, ABC News

Obama and disgraced Governor Bill Richardson

President-elect Barack Obama took big money from a man at the center of a federal probe that has forced one of Obama’s top Cabinet picks to withdraw.

Financial records show the Obama campaign got more than $30,000 from California financier David Rubin, the target of an investigation into donations and possible “pay-to-play” deals involving New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, Obama’s pick for commerce secretary.

Richardson removed himself from consideration for the post Sunday, saying the ongoing grand jury investigation threatened to hold up his confirmation. Richardson and Rubin have both denied any wrongdoing in the matter, which involved contributions and state business in 2003 and 2004.

Tony Rezko traded money for favors with Obama

The only problem with the report is ABC forget to talk about Obama, an expert at these deals, just ask Tony Rezko.

Watch ABC Report on Pay to Play