The jailbirds, that is—starting with Barack Obama’s old neighbor and associate Antoin “Tony” Rezko. Hard to say for sure, but it looks to me like Rezko started singing for his supper (and a reduced sentence) in order to make sure he got the best deal he could before Rod Blagojevich starts talking. There is no honor among thieves, and Blagojevich appears to be a particularly dishonorable specimen. (As well as, if Michael Barone is right, a particularly stupid one.)The interesting thing about this situation is that while U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald has made it very clear that there’s no evidence that the president-elect was even aware of anything improper, he hasn’t made the same statement about Obama’s staff. The person of concern here appears to be the designated White House Chief of Staff, Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-IL), who has suddenly ceased to be a fixture at the president-elect’s press conferences; as the Chicago Tribune’s John Kass points out, there are good reasons to think that if Blagojevich wanted to work a deal with the incoming Obama administration, he’d work through Rep. Emanuel; or rather, there’s one good reason: Rep. Emanuel’s state senator, the powerful Democratic politician James DeLeo. According to Kass,
DeLeo is also considered by some to be the real governor of Illinois. Blagojevich is the nutty guy who makes the speeches and gets the federal slap. They’re so close that if Jimmy suddenly stopped walking, Rod would chip his teeth on the back of Jimmy’s head.It’s reasonable to assume that if there’s one fellow Rod would talk to about the Senate seat, it’s Jimmy. And given their relationship, Jimmy could talk to Rahm.
(Kass further suggests, interestingly, that DeLeo’s quid pro quo for setting that up might well have been appointment to Rep. Emanuel’s House seat. Welcome to Illinois politics.) Given that we know that Rep. Emanuel talked multiple times with Blagojevich (see video below), it seems quite possible that he could be the next Illinois politician in the crosshairs. This, obviously, would not be a good start for the Obama administration, in a lot of ways.
HT: Scott Johnson