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Friday, Nov 30, 2007

* Yesterday, “Illinois Shadow” had this to say at Illinoize about congressional candidate Jim Oberweis and his history of strange behavior. So far, Oberweis has remained fairly quiet, but IS didn’t think it would last…

But Oberweis will soon insert his size 10 shoe into his size 12 milk hole, as he has done in all his quests for mediocrity. As always, the best person to slay Oberweis is Oberweis, and that will be the most satisfying part of this sequel.

* Little did the mystery blogger know that Oberweis had already displayed some of his old habits. Oberweis appeared this week on “Politics and Issues,” a show produced by Elgin’s WRMN radio and hosted by Tom Sandor…

I believe that voters are tired of the typical politicians… My main competition for this office is somebody who has been part of the Ryan-Blagojevich Springfield culture for the last 15 years.

He was referring, of course, to state Sen. Chris Lauzen. Now, say what you will about Lauzen, but he’s no insider, and he’s no “typical” politician. He’s definitely an outsider and, um, he’s about as far from typical as you can get.

The statement has a nugget of promise, however. Voters are almost as flabbergasted with the Statehouse crew as they are with Washington, DC. Still, it’s way beyond the pale to connect the dots between Chris Lauzen and Rod Blagojevich.

Listen to Oby’s comments…

* Meanwhile, in yet another clear example of the utter disgrace that is our national political media, the Washington Post ran a story yesterday that mentioned just about every single “Barack Obama is a Muslim” rumor without once noting that the rumor is completely false, except to print some denials from Obama’s campaign.

* The Sun-Times, on the other hand, took the journalistic route on one of Obama’s claimed strengths: Ethics…

Seven years ago, Sen. Barack Obama was on the board of a Chicago charity when his former boss, Allison S. Davis, came looking for money.

At the time, Davis was a developer represented by the law firm where Obama worked, as well as a small contributor to Obama’s political campaign funds. He wanted the charity to help fund his plans to build housing for low-income Chicagoans.

Obama agreed. He voted with other directors of the Woods Fund of Chicago to invest $1 million with Neighborhood Rejuvenation Partners L.P., a $17 million partnership that Davis still operates.

It’s not clear whether Obama told other board members of his ties to Davis, whose family would go on to donate more than $25,000 to Obama’s political campaigns, including his bid to be president of the United States.

“Let me get back to you on that,” Obama presidential campaign spokesman Bill Burton said when asked about that two weeks ago. He never did.

- Posted by Rich Miller

10 Comments

- Confused - Friday, Nov 30, 07 @ 9:57 am:
The second paragraph in the Post story says:

Since declaring his candidacy for president in February, Obama, a member of a congregation of the United Church of Christ in Chicago, has had to address assertions that he is a Muslim or that he had received training in Islam in Indonesia, where he lived from ages 6 to 10. While his father was an atheist and his mother did not practice religion, Obama’s stepfather did occasionally attend services at a mosque there.

Now, I agree that it’s a weird story, but I guess I’m more surprised that it comes up so much on the campaign trail. That’s definitely worth a story.

- Mark Johnson - Friday, Nov 30, 07 @ 10:03 am:
Rich:
Don’t you have to approve everyone over at Illinoize? So referring to the “Illinois Shadow” as a mystery blogger is a little disenginious. I’m not trying to be a jerk… I’m just curious.

- Rich Miller - Friday, Nov 30, 07 @ 10:16 am:
I know who he is, but his identity is a closely guarded secret.

- DC - Friday, Nov 30, 07 @ 10:17 am:
The Washington Post crowd still drives around out here with Kerry-Edwards bumper stickers on their BMW’s, Volvos and Accura’s. It’s no surprise they would conveniently not include at least their own statement that the muslim mudslinging has little merit. This is no slam on my hometown newspaper, but frankly, the Kankakee Daily Journal has better journalistic integrity and profesionalism that the Washington Post.

- Justice - Friday, Nov 30, 07 @ 10:25 am:
I have already seen information floating about as such relates to Obama, namely, the use of his first initial followed by his middle and last name. This election season will bring us to new candidate bashing lows as the season continues to shorten. The big guns will be lowered on Obama because he represents change. I don’t think he is squeaky clean, with the potential blows coming from the Rezko connection, but he does have a better chance than most.

- humanstain - Friday, Nov 30, 07 @ 10:43 am:
Why doesn’t MSM ever reference Obama’s connection to Davis when they discuss Davis’ ownership of slums and his refusal to clean them up even when ordered to do so by the court.

- Limerick - Friday, Nov 30, 07 @ 11:27 am:
The biggest challenge for Jimbo,
Is to stop sounding off like a bimbo.
Campaigns often head south,
After foot enters mouth.
You’d think he would learn from past limbo.

- Arthur Andersen - Friday, Nov 30, 07 @ 11:52 am:
That guy Davis apparently never saw an ethics rule he couldn’t violate. The S-T also reported that he is getting $30 large a year to sit on the board of a big real estate development company that has hundreds of millions of State Investment Board money. He’s also a member of the State Investment Board. Oops. And your comment on that, Sen. Obama?

- Rob_N - Friday, Nov 30, 07 @ 3:49 pm:
S-T writes, “Obama agreed. He voted with other directors of the Woods Fund of Chicago to invest $1 million with Neighborhood Rejuvenation Partners L.P., a $17 million partnership that Davis still operates.”

So what’s the worst that happened here?

Some down and out folks got affordable housing because an associate of Obama’s convinced an entire board (not just Obama) to help fund 1/17th of the project… Talk about trying to ink up some drama to sell papers.

If he gave that $25k to charity would the Sun-Times be a happier camper?

- Another Limerick - Friday, Nov 30, 07 @ 3:51 pm:
There once was a Senator CPA
Who was thought to be strange in his ways
Then along came Jim
Who upstaged him
And both left GOP voters in a daze

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