Barack Obama, in his May 6th victory speech in Raleigh, North Carolina, Obama decried — as he often does — the “same efforts to distract us from the issues that affect our lives by pouncing on every gaffe and association and fake controversy in the hope that the media will play along.” Indeed, as the media and blogosphere have reported on those surrounding the man who wants to be the most powerful man in the world, Obama’s supporters have often denounced such efforts as “guilt by association.”
Yet in the same speech, Obama declared — as he often does — that “between all the bickering and the influence-peddling and the game-playing of the last few decades, Washington and Wall Street have lost touch” with the values he believes are the foundation of America. Unlike his critics, who have looked at specific Obama associates — the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, domestic terrorists like William Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn, former PLO flack Rashid Khalidi, his various anti-Israel advisors — Obama’s campaign is based in no small part on a very generalized attack on the unnamed denizens of “Washington” and “Wall Street.”
Obama will occasionally get slightly more specific. For example, in the May 6th speech, he said that we “need a government that stands up for families who are being tricked out of their homes by Wall Street predators.” What Obama failed to mention was that by the end of March 2008, he had taken $1,180,103 from people and groups associated with the top ten issuers of subprime loans.  Since then, even a cursory glance at the list of Obama’s top contributors shows that contributions from subprime lenders has increased significantly. Indeed, Swiss banking giant UBS, which has written off more debt from the subprime crisis than any other bank, has contributed $363,257 not included in that total. Also excluded from the list was J.P. Morgan (which reported in April that its first-quarter profit fell by half), which contributed $353,808.
Obama failed to mention that his fundraising bundlers include: Louis Susman, Michael Froman and J. Michael Schell of Citigroup; Steve Koch of Credit Suisse; Bruce Hayman, David Heller, Eric Schwartz, and Todd Williams of Goldman Sachs; Mark Gilbert, Christine Forester, John Rhea, Nadja Fidelia, and Theodore Janulis of Lehman; and Robert Wolf of UBS Americas. These folks raised an additional $1,800,000 for Obama.
Such bundlers get perks from the Obama campaign and are are made to feel part of its inner workings through weekly conference calls and quarterly meetings, advance copies of his speeches, access to his top advisers, opportunities to influence the campaign’s message, and so on.
One bundler who deserves special mention is Chicago billionaire Penny Pritzker, who happens to be Obama’s national Finance Chair.  Pritzker was an owner and board member of Superior Bank of Chicago, which went bust in 2001 with over $1 billion in deposits. Timothy Anderson — who obsessively pursued the late Rep. Henry Hyde (R-IL) over his role in the failure of Clyde Federal Savings & Loan — has been quoted as saying that “Superior’s owners were to sub-prime lending what Michael Milken was to junk bonds.â€Â
In January, Max Fraser of The Nation compared the Democratic presidential candidates’ plans to address the subprime lending issue, concluding that Obama had staked out a position to the right of not only populist Edwards but Clinton as well. Fraser blamed Obama’s economic advisers, primarily Austan Goolsbee. Since January, however, we have seen that Obama knows how to ignore Goolsbee and even suggest he was never a senior adviser.
This is the campaign and the candidate who rail against “Wall Street predators.”
As for “Washington,” Obama often criticizes the influence of lobbyists in his speeches and TV ads. However, his campaign still accepts money from well-connected state lobbyists and from people who work for Washington firms that do substantial lobbying, such as former Sen. Majority Leader Tom Daschle. Moreover, The Hill reported last year that Obama was benefiting from the support of well-connected Washington lobbyists even though he has prohibited his campaign from accepting contributions from them and political action committees. Not only were such lobbyists allowed give “policy†and “campaign support,†but two lobbyists also told The Hill that Obama’s campaign contacted them asking to be put in touch with their networks of business clients and acquaintances – with one saying that Obama’s campaign made it clear that donations from lobbyists’ spouses were just fine. That claim was borne out in a later report from USA Today.
Obama’s bar on donations from federal lobbysists and PACs is also a dodge in a larger sense. As the Columbia Journalism Review has noted, contributions made by the various industry sectors tell the real story in a presidential race. The CJR noted, for example, that “lawyers and law firms lobby on behalf of their own interests  like fighting malpractice reform, which could again surface as a thorny issue for the new administration.” A list of the top industries donating to Obama shows “Lawyers and Lobbyists” have donated over $15 million.  The Finance, Insurance and Real Estate sector has kicked in $16.9 million. The Health sector has anted up with about $5 million.
Cozy relations with the big issuers of subprime loans, using people from such firms as fundraising bundlers, giving them access to his campaign advisers, while offering policy proposals that go easier on them than his rivals, giving the impresssion of barring lobbyists from his campaign while seeking to exploit their networks and their spouses, taking in tens of millions of dollars from lawyers, law firms (including those which lobby) and the financial services industry generally — none of these things appears to be illegal.
However, it is Barack Obama who condemns by association untold numbers of people who work in Washington and on Wall Street. The latter has a long tradition in American politics; so much so, in fact, that one marvels at Obama’s chutzpah in claiming it is some form of “new politics.” That Obama smears broad sectors of society while calling unrepentant domestic terrorists William Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn “mainstream” might be new in presidential politics. In any event, Obama claimed in his May 6th speech that he was going to end the “old politics” by “telling the truth – forcefully, repeatedly, confidently.” He might start by telling his supporters about his real relationships with “Wall Street” and “Washington.”
I guess we do not have to worry about radical socialist?
On the other hand Hitler was also supported by big business.
I am so confused, which meme should I apply here?
Try the hypocrisy, sashal.
thanks, Pablo.
At least I can be relaxed and stop worrying about national-socialism
Nothing like a little Baracky mendacity to start off the day. Thanks, Karl.
Try “Hitler was a socialist”.
Even if your head explodes at telling the truth.
Did anyone see Geraldine Ferraro this morning on Fox? Twisted up, sour, nasty cunt, you’d’a thought Karl was in drag.
My friends look at the power of The Community Organizer!
Interesting…..
From wikipedia:
“Among the key elements of Nazism were anti-parliamentarism, ethnic nationalism, racism, collectivism,[11][12] eugenics, antisemitism, opposition to economic liberalism and political liberalism,[13][14][12] anti-communism, and totalitarianism.”
Yeah, baby, Nationalsozialismus sure earned the support of big business.
Did she point out that Baracky is an empty suit again? Oh, the humanity. I am sure Baracky’s folks have the vapors by now. Feigned outrage to follow. Don’t you dare criticize my wife who is kind and loving despite thinking America is mean and not something to be proud of until I won a couple primaries …
Nationalsozialismus sure earned the support of big business.
They had their money in banks, therefore they were a tool of big business. They drove cars, ditto. They manufactured things, ditto.
How ’bout you just try thinking for a change?
I think this falls under the “Everybody does it” meme.
is that how you call the process you apply when you post here, Rob?
Tell us again about the drastic energy shortage in Iran, sashal.
That was some high-quality thinking there, my friend.
there is something about carin
I like
nah, they have plenty, genius.
All those nuclear power stations are just a shield to build a couple of nukes
They have 10% of the world’s crude oil supply and half the world’s natural gas, genius.
Obviously there’s no alternative but to build nukes.
Moron.
Nah, Ferraro was playing the role of a man-hating Tampon soaked in sour grape mash.
Which ones are those, sashal?
All right; how about we take a break from arguing over labels and get down to the nitty gritty.
If I had to strip away all of the hype, hopey, changey, adoration and reveal the kernal of my discontent with Obama, this post reflects that nugget. He, like virtually every politician in history, is saying one thing in a shining way while both his history and his actions say something else.
No big deal, you say? Baracky magnifies the problem because the absolute centerpiece of his campaign is his constant proclaimation of “new politics.” It’s the sort of message that Hillary would never be able to present without the vast majority of the electorate wetting themselves with laughter. However, this beacon of hopeyness can say the same, empty things over and over and, because he’s black (yes, I said it,) speaks beautifully empty speeches, and has the angelic, dulcet tones of his rich baritone people swoon as a reaction to their own dissatisfaction with government in general.
So disillusioned, so angry are people with the operation and results of government that he can present turd on toast and it will be received as a harbringer of goodly, godly change. This guy reflects the best we can do with regards to “reform” politics?
He is a poseur, a fraud, a gleeming huckster machine politician presenting himself as the best of us when it is the same ol’ same ol’, albeit with better floodlights and the built in superweapon of identity politics. Worst of all, he is attempting to hide it; all of the “associations”, the illiterate economic and tax policy knowledge, the foreign policy mixtures and mixups, the BLT and race hustling and all of the business as usual campaign financing in a clear construct of strict message managing, soft skin whining and complex misdirection worthy of David Blaine.
He. Is. A. Fraud.
ha ha ha ha… the repubs are getting worried eh? the repubs have big reasons to be scared of guilt by association tactics as most of their associates in big business are pretty appalling. those with integrity have nothing to worry about. but actually i would call it ACCOUNTABILITY not guilt by association. another concept repubs avoid altogether.
“He is a poseur, a fraud, a gleeming huckster machine politician ”
I like grifter.
Hey Karl, your early morning wind-up is more fact-less and feckless than usual today. Maybe you should lay off the Hannity for a week. 2001? You’re a subprime genius.
krista:
Shift key. Look into it.
Just call him a racist and get it over with, thor.
But, Sashal, it’s still hypocrisy. Like Al Gore lecturing me about saving energy. Both of ’em are filled with hot air, and only a fool believes the crap they spew. My point, is whenever liberal hypocrisy is pointed out … someone says … well, yes, but EVERYBODY does it.
No, everybody doesn’t do it.
Given a reasonably credible one, Big Business will always support socialists, sashal.
If the Government supports the workers, Big Business doesn’t have to pay them. If the Government makes sure the People always have money, there will always be customers. And they are confident that their support of the politicians involved will be reciprocated, so they will be spared the taxation, etc. required. The benefits flow directly to the Bottom Line beloved of bean-counting bureaucrats everywhere.
The distinction between “President of General Motors” and “People’s Minister for Vehicle Production, Great Lakes Region” is one of semantics based on wishful thinking. It’s the entrepreneurs and the productive who take it in the shorts under any form of collectivism.
Regards,
Ric
oh wait… maybe this is just another late minute losing Clinton supporter diatribe. whatever. Obama isn’t anymore perfect than anyone else in the world. And to survive in politics, it’s almost impossible to have perfect advisors. But at least Pritzker wasn’t being paid millions by Saudis. The Clintons have never been willing to release the financial records of their foundation, but god knows Bill Clinton’s foreign financial associations could use a little scrutiny.
So although I applaud full disclosure, using the claim of how dare he use guilt by association in order to do your own guilt by association hit job is pretty tacky.
Krista shouldn’t look up to nishi as commenting mentor.
Obama isn’t anymore perfect than anyone else in the world.
Not to hear him, Michelle and his disciples (in and out of the MSM) tell it.
krista:
Sentences. Look into them.
If someone RUNS with a platform of hopy-change … yet behind the scenes it’s business as usual, I’m thinking the hopey-change supporters should be skeptical.
Kinda how like many conservative voters are with McCain.
You wouldn’t see a McCain supporter painting a cartoon picture of adoring multitudes fawning over Maverick. That’s because we’re not under a thrall. Perhaps our opinion of him are a tad more based in reality.
Isn’t He the one we’ve been waiting for?
krista thinks this is the center of Hillary support?
Put. The. Quaaludes. Down.
Oh, O! is more perfect BECAUSE of his imperfections. Don’t you know?
I went to hear him speak, and I peed on myself.
Or something.
O! is the Kwisatz Haderach.
Thor presents his fact based dissent by accusing Karl of not having the facts.
Make sure you have your Obamagasm before you comment, Thor.
Carin #32: Bullseye!
The guy with the funny name that’s about to butt-fuck you, nah man, he’s no more a fraud than the guy whose currently easing in and out of your ass. Your ass my play temperamental favorites but it ain’t no debutante.
yes, spb, you are absolutely correct,
Why the fuck idiot mullahs want to build nuclear power stations with the help of russians? They have plenty of gas and oil.
Stupid islamofascist.
Shorter krista:
we are all flawed but, LOOK THERE! HOPEY SHINEY CHANGEY! Oh and RETHUGLICABS TEH SUXOR!!11eleventy!!11
O! is the Kwisatz Haderach.
Also the Twelfth Imam, Zorro, the Scarlet Pimpernel, and John Galt.
Truth!
heh.
I suppose it’s inevitable that, when one tries to defend your Messiah’s foolish foreign policy position, you’ll eventually end up running interference for the ayatollahs’ nuclear weapons ambitions.
Still no arguments or facts from thor. He’s too distracted by his Mandingo man love for Baracky. He longs to be the Monica in the Obama regime. Officially, Vick has been cast aside for the Rigid Hope™.
Pick up your blue dress at the cleaners, thor.
Karl, racist? Ya think? No. He’s just got a little Appalachian in him.
my = may on #38 Release the Freudian hounds!
krista – I suspect you will not find many Clinton supporters around here.
Spies, Brigands, and Pirates , Is that the best you can do as rebuttal?? Why am I even here? I used to avoid political blogs as the playground of empty minds. And I seem to be falling into that myself. And who the hell is nishi? Time for me to give up on blogs. Besides you seem to be an inbred group here and don’t like strangers, eh?
sashal’s confused? Well, some were confused by the existence of the nomenklatura… and by the way it still exists.
I like Candy.
Krista – our efforts of debating with you may seem weak, because we’ve already evaluated 1)your entertainment potential and 2) level of discourse.
I’m sorry to say you didn’t make the cut.
Obama lust is both blind and blinding, thor. You should know that. Thus you are trapped in the merry-go-round orgasmic delight of Bama lust. Thus you see hooded heathens at every comment, lynch ropes at every post while your eyes roll back in your head from the power of the Rigid Hope™.
breathe….
Sometimes it’s hard to tell Clinton supporters from Repubs these days. You all however don’t really merit either description. Just seem like bored people. Sometimes, however, Karl has interesting posts.
We really like literate people, strangers or not. A sense of humor helps. Not talking like a KosKiddie helps. And people that do not seem to be talking to themselves.
krista:
LOOK! HOPEY SHINEY CHANGEY!!! PAY NO ATTENTION TO THE CHICAGO MACHINE POLITICIAN BEHIND THE CURTAIN!!
O! (noes)
shorter thor:
O!
butt-fucking you can believe in.
LOL, well at least Carin has a sense of humor. Thankfully, I am happy to leave. Poor Karl.
Thor is yet another example of “the personal is political” ilk of the left. The racism and sexism the left dishes out against those they consider apostates is breathtaking in its rank hypocrisy. Thor salivates in using crude homosexual imagery and considers it legitimate political discourse.
Carin – I think the proper phrasing is –
“You have been weighed, measured, and found wanting.”
No problem with strangers — and it’s nice to see you’re using the shift key; we’re a literate bunch and don’t like having to interpret comments like they were a wall of hieroglyphs.
What we really don’t like is the kind of crap you tossed around in your first comment, followed by the crap in your second comment. Is this the first time you’ve even read anything ’round here?
Both blogs and the English language thank you for that.
Bon voyage!
That isn’t surprising really; FDR who ran against ‘great malefactors of wealth’ would eventually have financial
‘innovators’ like Joseph Kennedy, head up the SEC, Dillon & Read partner James
Forrestal, move from White House aide to Navy and finally Defense Secretary; even Brown & Harriman partners like Lovett and Harriman, Skull&Bones ’13, and ’15 (yes the same firm our president’s grandfather traded in German securities with)just like the
Jay’s uncles Nelson, & David. Along with ‘facilitators of privilege’ like
international business attorneys like
Sullivan & Cromwell (who were involved
in stealing McCain’s native Panama)Dulles brothers, and Cravaith, Swaine
John McCloy, who would actually sit with Hitler at the ’36 Olympics. But that was just a coincidence.
BJ – Extra shot of espresso this morning ?
Actually, I think it’s a mixture of projection and fantasy.
Krista
Dear, you are boring. Drop by again if you ever locate a personality.
Actually, it’s pure, Mandingo lust. And, no, i will not condemn myself.
I’m just brewing a new pot for thor’s coffee enema.
did you get into your dad’s blue pills again?
Karl, nomenclatura was unique soviet shtick that featured cadre of bureaucrats who would never go down even if they’d screw up in one place. They would get transferred to another one for more (and this continues with Putin regime).
I thought it was very specific to communist countries. Guess I was somewhat wrong about it.
Actually Karl has been posting from the warm spot between Hillary’s thighs since the Texas primary.
[NOTE: This is the same thor who wrote the following:
Nor is the first time that thor has apologized to me for his stupidity, only to repeat it. His honesty and integrity is simply staggering. Obama would be so proud. -K!]
O!
butt-fucking you can believe in.
The O is an apt logo, then. It used to be more of an o, but it’s been a tough campaign.
Same old Democrat politics. See, Obama is a liberal genius (just like Hillary was until the millisecond they found someone to more liberal than her to run against her, whereupon she stopped being a genius and became a crazy, lying, cuckolded bitch who doesn’t know when to shut up), so he must be allowed to insult the limited intelligence of the Democratic voters — for their own good!! — with flowery, hypocritical rhetoric. It’s his right as The Media Party Candidate.
O O Pelosi
o o Hillary
o ? Ferraro
Karl:
All along, I’ve been surprised by Obama’s rise out of Chicago politics. I suppose I just never saw that city backing Obama in such a significant way.
At any rate, I was curious about the following point:
“Pritzker was an owner and board member of Superior Bank of Chicago, which went bust in 2001 with over $1 billion in deposits.”
The Pritzker family has a ton of dough. In this instance, I know what a member of a board of directors is. Can you be more specific about what kind of an owner she was? Minor shareholder? Was this a public company or some Pritzker-family entity? Just complete the picture if you will.
thor #72: Now that was funny!
Where do you think O is getting a big chunk of fundage from?
Hedge fund managers– they are sendin their contributions to Obama, not McCain.
Whyever would that be?
;)
Huh?
Sashal, you have the oddest holes in your education, from our POV (I’m sure we, too, lack insights on stuff you consider trivial).
The most outstanding example of a nomenklatura was the British “gentleman” system, which endured from right after the Thirty Years War to just after WWI. For views of how that worked, consult Jane Austen, Dickens (especially David Copperfield) and Kipling, all of whom were thoroughly embedded in it; the latter two saw many of its deficiencies.
Regards,
Ric
–Karl, racist? Ya think? No. He’s just got a little Appalachian in him.
– After this election is over thor you’re going to be wishing the gaggle of starry eyed groupies on your side had a little Appalachian in them. Or put another way, had some Appalachians among them.
– Don’t know how to break this to you sparky, but in your genius you are thumbing your nose at the largest voting demographic in the electorate. One which you cannot win the election without, which is just ducky if you have a political death wish Einstein.
Sometimes it’s hard to tell Clinton supporters from Repubs these days
Wait, come back Krista – you win COMMENT OF THE DAY. Of course, the day is early …
There are so many levels of irony in that statement I just don’t know what to do with it.
Change = reform.
And Obama is just as two-faced slimy as Stokes.
http://tinyurl.com/3wwxmv
[MP3 URL made tiny for better formatting -K]
Hey Thor,
Do you kiss your mother with that mouth? Or should I simply suggest you shove a tampon in it???
Please, bring an intelligent argument to the table.
“Comment by Carin -BONC on 5/20 @ 7:16 am #
My point, is whenever liberal hypocrisy is pointed out … someone says … well, yes, but EVERYBODY does it.”
“The reason any conservative’s failing is always major news is that it allows liberals to engage in their very favorite taunt: Hypocrisy! Hypocrisy is the only sin that really inflames them. Inasmuch as liberals have no morals, they can sit back and criticize other people for failing to meet the standards that liberals simply renounce. It’s an intriguing strategy. By openly admitting to being philanderers, draft dodgers, liars, weasels and cowards, liberals avoid ever being hypocrites.”
-Ann Coulter
Hey Debbie,
Do you twice bake squid in that vagina? Or should I limply ingest you love a tarpon in it???
Please, my hammer was born for you. No.Argue.Flatten.Squid.
Thor,
Please speak English…I don’t have a translator with me.
P.S.
You are making an assumption…I never said I had a vagina. Your “argument” is lame and offensive. Just imagine what you might come up with if you actually exercised that gray matter in your skull. Oh, my bad…I’m assuming you have gray matter.
#36,
“O! is the Kwisatz Haderach.”
In that alternate reality, Hillary would be the Reverend Mother Gaius Helen Mohiam, Bush would be the Emperor, and McCain would be Baron Harkonnen. Ack, a simile too far.
Also I think the link in #79 messed up the page.
Well, at least he didn’t use the code words “New York Money Men.”
Yet.
Well, Debbie, I’d argue, if I felt inclined, that when you read this:
If you don’t laugh at the redundant stupidity of this implied multi-layered junk bond to subprime to bundled poli-donation parallel, then you don’t know what a junk bond is, who Michael Milken is/was, nor the what/when/who of the subprime market. The hell would I want to argue with you for? That’d be like wasting time arguing with the idiot who wrote the aforementioned idiocy.
Educating.Rita.Not.My.Yob.
You’re wasting lots of time, thor. Why stop now?
– thor, you spend most of your time arguing AS an idiot, why make distinctions bucky?
– OTOH, watching you do your nyah,nyah,nyan, immature childish act, denigrating the very people that could get your mulatto hopey changy poser elected, I think Baracky should hurry up and hire you for his campaign before you lose all your great ideas. You’ll fit right in. Bam-ass likes to surround himself with bigots like Wright.
Where do you think O is getting a big chunk of fundage from?
Hedge fund managers–
Hahahaha! I can’t believe that nishi-dope came back after Karl pwn3d her dopey ass on the 5th Amendment. I’d never show my face again after getting intellectually pwn3d like that, but she’s apparently used to it.
Yeah, and small businesses in Chigaco pay money to the mob ‘cuz they support and are in favor of more mafia strongarming. Dope.
Thor,
Thanks for your reply. Educating Rita (or Debbie) may not be your job, but at least I feel as though I am conversing with another human being. We may or may not agree politically, but we can offer each other the basic requirement of discussion, debate, and exchange of ideas – RESPECT. An element that is sadly lacking in all areas of life..JMHO.
I could stomach all these caustic replies from Obama disciples to easily verifiable campaign funding data in this article that paints their candidate at best as a hypocrite and, at worst, a Trojan horse; if only these comments weren’t coated in moral equivalence! I can’t help thinking that, if you had known who he was in the beginning then, you wouldn’t have fallen so madly in love with him that now all you can do in response to well-founded criticism is to point out that, he’s no worse than anyone else. (Yes; but there’s still the problem of that empty resume…)
Oh, please do, oh slavish stroker of the Rigid Hope™! I double dare you!
Anybody else notice how Bamagasm Boy talks a big rhetorical game but never delivers any fact based analysis to back it up? Oh, no, we are beneath his sharp rejoinders, which he never utilizes but has handy if he could only break through the ennui.
Like your Mandingo lover, thor, You. Are. A. Fraud.
thor bery bad man. thor not play nice. thor no like straw man boogey man scarecrow smartly worded mix. thor rather gaze at porn boobies.
BJTex, Obama does appear to me to be a fraud as you say, but I think he must be a fraud, since I also believe I agree with Shelby Steele’s analysis of him: that he is a “bound man”, a polite way of saying “a slave” to his own self-determined ignorance of himself. Who among us would want to be known that way?
raises hand!
I would be very surprised if Thor understood the saga of Michael Milken at any depth greater than what one might find in USA Today.
Oh, don’t be so hard on thor, thos. thor lovem boogity strawman. Mwah mwah snorgle slurpy slurp.
Today is National Be Nice to Levi and Thor Day.
SAM,
From one of the links in the main post:
Penny Pritzker was later named as a defendant in a civil suit arising out of the Superior Bank failure, but was dismissed because the court ruled a private party could not bring the alleged racketeering action (only the RTC could — and of course did not).
Great post, Karl.
sdferr: Do you have a linky to that statement? I’m not sure I understand where Steele is going with that characterization.
Thanks!
Oh, and ditto with Dan, Karl. Excellent post. Keep up the good work!
Thanks, all — don’t miss my update to comment #69.
I went to college with Tony Pritzker, ward of Jay. Nice guy. Not the brightest guy, but very sweet. He wrecked his Volkwagen Rabbit coming back from a nearby women’s college, and got a Miata, I think it was. I told him to wreck that and see whether they’d buy him a Ferrari.
Miatas are fun; I drove mine until the axle froze. By then, all the local dealers had closed, so I had to go with something else. That, and I usually had to leave the hardtop on in the city.
Awesome work, Karl.
Karl,
As The Grifter’s fable is unwound, the timing of his first becoming a bag man for real estate developer’s interests will become an item of some interest. I can follow a tenuous arc from Michelle’s father (soldier in the Daley machine) through the Palmer/Ayers bit but I haven’t been able to determine whether BHO first rented himself to the Pritzkers or to Rezko. I lean toward Rezko because of the probability that Michelle was the key link through the circle of crooked doctors with whom Rezko consorted.
Secondarily, the Pritzkers are generally associated with theft on a scale which precludes the necessity of renting a lowly and fresh State Senator. Their support for BHO as a US Senate or Presidential candidate is understandable but I’m betting that it based upon their assessment of his performance for Rezko.
Another nice tie in is Michelle’s “raise” after BHO worked his magic on the earmark giving her employer a million dollar grant. That one is rather easy to document and the clearest evidence of “business as usual – thieves division” that I’m aware of.
So far.
PS – Thank you for your continued effort and excellent output.
BJTexs, try http://fora.tv/2008/01/18/Shelby_Steele_on_Why_Barack_Obama_Cannot_Win
It’s a video of a talk he gave at Cody’s Books shown on C-Span BookTV.
I always look at articles that discuss Obama’s hypocrisy regarding guilt by association. What is amazing to me is the media’s incredible double standard for BHO.
When the very first news of the Jeremiah Wright scandal came out, the very first response from the Obama camp was to flood the media (in about 2-3 nanoseconds) a years-old picture of Wright with Bill Clinton. What’s that called? Guilt by association! And BHO got away with it.
When the very first news of the Ayers scandal came out, the very first response from the Obama camp was to shoot out the information about President Bill Clinton’s pardons of Ayer’s friends and demand that the media ask Senator Hillary Clinton to respond. What’s that called? Guilt by association by association! And BHO got away with it.
Just fyi.
Great article. Thanks.
sdferr: Thanks for the link. Steele’s talk about the “:hidden Obama” as a reflection of his black heritage and what happens when blacks (Cosby, for instance) start to speak wht’s really on their minds was fascinating.
Thanks BJTexs, for providing the American people with such a wonderful President from your state! This guilt by association is like playing the Kevin Bacon game, everyone in politics is somehow associated with one another and we all can play this game. Hillary= Peter Paul, Bill= Monica Lewinsky, Mark Penn= Colombia…..come on BJ you can play too! Yet you seem to think that since Barak is living in Chicago he must reflect the same image and morals of a typical Chicago politician. Thanks for your insightful lore and most of all thank you for providing such a wonderful person from YOUR state to be our best President ever!
I don’t think Bj is from Texas, though.
REMEMBER TO REMEMBER THE ALAMO!
Yeah, I don’t know where BJTexs could have gotten that notion…
after krista’s and darylick’s comments I’m reminded of Jeff’s thing about “blog language”. and we’re like the French. very demanding that one get it right. heh. maybe we need some kind of warning.
Well and mazel tov to you, darylick, for being an insufferable tool. I, og course, am not from Texas but would be quite fine with having had the President from my state.
As far as Chicago politicians, if the shoe fits, choke on it.
REMEMBER TO REMEMBER THE REZKO! and TRINITY! and AYERS! and WRIGHT! and DALEY! and …
[…] Protein Wisdom – Barack Obama’s politics of guilt by association [Karl] […]
Late for this comment, but Karl – Sen. Obama gave his bitter clingy speech at a fundraiser held at the Getty mansion. Getty – as in Getty Oil. Yeah, nice William Jennings Bryan campaign there, senator.
Though I suppose Donald Trump would be considered too low rent for that audience.
Burn yourself some yield, bitch, but I spent many a year swapping paper at them there big investment banks. Surprised, Gomer? Me like Obama cuz I gots an education and thar resume showin’ I know’m ’bouts high yielders an’ trajuries an’ muni papers an’ zero step-ups an’ convert’bles an’ them past Duracell deals an’ I evan got’s me friends used’ta been Drexel, Burnham, Lambert paper hangers. Effen USA Today tard.
Bloomberg me, I’m thorthinksuradouche.
Sprinklicious, Karl!
See Karl, this is why you so need me. Nothing is more annoying than bad metaphors. Who here is asshole enough to point them out to you? Dan’s not. He respects your effort, your humanity, your needs, sacrifices and wants. Not me. I’ll point and laugh when you vomit on your high-tops. You need enemies, Karl, like me.
#112
Yet you seem to think that since Barak is living in Chicago he must reflect the same image and morals of a typical Chicago politician.
I just love children. Youngster. City of Chicago and Cook county politics are incestuous and make Tammany Hall look like the girl scouts. BO would never had made it on the ballot if he didn’t know who to blow and how hard and what the payoff was.
#119
So what you’re saying, thor, is that you can be dead stupid and still be an investment banker. Well. That certainly the rest of us with higher IQs something to hope for.
No, what I’m saying is the contrived connectors toward Michael Milken and subprime lending are re-fuckin’-tarded.
Investment banking was on the third floor. Firewall, self-regulating firewall! No desk trader trespassing allowed. Front-running brought Milken down. Peeking at the banking side will get you time, just ask Mikey.
What you are saying, thor is that you bought a pig in the poke, and being inordinately proud of your intelligence and savvy you are now desperately trying to keep people form pointing out the flaws in your new political purchase.
Because if you acknowledged that, then you would have to admit you got scammed. Can’t have that, can you?
Needs, schmeeds. He deserves better.
No Mikey, what I’m saying is you can go onto myobama.com and create a group page, Porn Boobs for Obama for example, and do a targeted group money raise. I don’t think this rises to the maniacal intention threshold worthy of Karl’s conspiracy-weave talents. From such a bad weave to then insert and re-quote such dopish cursory name-dropping, it’s bad hack-jobbing, all I’m saying.
Just one of Michael Milken’s year-end bonuses almost matched that silly little bank’s total assets. Perspective, please.
Nice misogyny, Thor.
Sad, very sad.
[…] by independent “527″ groups are malarkey, but it’s worth relinking to prior posts here explaining that Obama allows: “policy†and “campaign support†from well-connected […]
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[…] Protein Wisdom – [In a] May 6th speech, [Obama] said that we “need a government that stands up for families who are being tricked out of their homes by Wall Street predators.” What Obama failed to mention was that by the end of March 2008, he had taken $1,180,103 from people and groups associated with the top ten issuers of subprime loans. . . Indeed, Swiss banking giant UBS, which has written off more debt from the subprime crisis than any other bank, has contributed $363,257 not included in that total. . . […]
[…] Slate has a long list of the many exceptions to Obama’s porous “no lobbyist” policies. * * […]
[…] Slate has a long list of the many exceptions to Obama’s porous “no lobbyist” policies. * * […]
[…] UBS had written off more debt from the subprime mortgage crisis than any other bank; a number of Obama’s top bundlers came from with firms mired in that mess. Such bundlers raised at least 22 percent of Obama’s […]
[…] UBS had written off more debt from the subprime mortgage crisis than any other bank; a number of Obama’s top bundlers came from with firms mired in that mess. Such bundlers raised at least 22 percent of Obama’s […]