From the Chicago Sun-Times:
President-elect Barack Obama’s chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, refused to take questions from reporters this morning about whether he was the Obama “advisor” named in the criminal complaint against Gov. Rod Blagojevich.
The complaint states Blagojevich wanted a promise of a high-level appointment or some other reward for Blagojevich in exchange for Blagojevich naming Obama’s friend Valerie Jarrett to replace him in the U.S. Senate.
Emanuel was uncharacteristically absent from Obama’s news conference this morning.
Blagojevch was caught on tape saying that he wanted the Obama advisor in question to know what Blagojevich wanted in exchange for the Jarrett appointment.
Blagojevich said, “He asks me for the fifth CD thing, I want it to be in his head.” Emanuel represents the 5th Congressional District in Illinois.
No one in the Obama campaign or administration has been charged with any wrongdoing. Obama said this morning that none of his staff has had a hand in any dealmaking on his Senate replacement.
So was Emanuel the Obama advisor Blagojevich was speaking about? Was Emanuel working on a deal to trade a high-level appointment in the Obama cabinet in exchange for Blagojevich’s selection of Valerie Jarrett to fill Obama’s Senate seat?
Rep. Rahm Emanuel, Barack Obama’s new chief of staff, is a real pit bull whose favorite target has always been Republicans. He is known as “Rahmbo” because of his hyper-partisan, bare-knuckle tactics that were honed in Chicago-style politics.
Emanuel once sent a dead fish to a pollster who displeased him. In one meeting with his staff, Emanuel shouted out, “Since my kids are gone, I can say it: They [Republicans] can go f— themselves!”
Following the 1992 campaign, Emanuel met with Clinton campaign advisers to discuss which politicians and members of the press they would retaliate against. Grabbing his steak knife, Emanuel shouted out to George Stephanopoulos and others at the meeting the name of another enemy. He then lifted the knife, brought it down with full force into the table, and screamed, “Dead!”
Like Obama, Emanuel has compiled a hard-left voting record in Washington. He currently has a 4 percent rating from the American Conservative Union and has consistently voted in favor of higher taxes, regulation and liberal social issues.
Rahm Emanuel served on the board of directors of the federal mortgage firm Freddie Mac at a time when scandal was brewing at the troubled agency and the board failed to spot ‘red flags’ while earning $16.2 million.
Yep, he fits in well with Obama’s corrupt Chicago-to-Washington gangster machine, and you can bet he will give his last dying breath maintaining Obama’s steel-fisted control over the free world.
UPDATE: FOX News Chicago is reporting that Rahm Emanuel, Obama’s chief of staff, spoke with Governor Rod Blagojevich on “multiple occasions” about the Senate succession that Blagojevich had wanted to sell to the highest bidder — and that Emanuel will likely be on the FBI wiretap.
Says Ed Morrissey:
That doesn’t necessarily mean that Emanuel knew about Blagojevich’s efforts to extort payment for the selection, but it puts a damper on the idea that Emanuel tipped off the feds, too. It wouldn’t take “multiple” meetings for Emanuel to decide to squeal. If Emanuel continued meeting with Blagojevich, that indicates some kind of negotiating was happening, and that would strongly suggest that Emanuel was working on Blagojevich’s terms.
It’s still possible that Emanuel was working with the feds, but why stay silent about it now? They’ve already arrested Blagojevich. Emanuel could now say, “I helped Patrick Fitzgerald when I saw something wrong and worked with them to get him to make explicit statements,” rather than spend this week ducking reporters. The “sources within the investigation” would hardly want to make a cooperating witness look bad, either. Emanuel has been acting like someone advised him to keep quiet to keep from making incriminating public statements, and this may be the reason why.
This story ain’t over yet, folks.
Obama, Rahm Emanuel, Blagojevich, Rahmbo, Chicago
