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* This is a pretty good quote by David Mendell…
“David Axelrod has always been skillful at creeping into your room in the middle of the night and slicing out your heart, somehow without leaving behind a single fingerprint or drop of blood that ties him or his candidate to the crime,” said Obama biographer David Mendell of Obama’s top political aide.
* Of course, the first thing to come to mind would be the Blair Hull scandal, and Mendell addressed that as well…
Axelrod, Mendell and others have reported, had asked about divorce records of a wealthy Democratic candidate, Blair Hull, when he considered working for Hull, and been rebuffed. The Chicago Tribune, his old newspaper, sued to unseal the records of Hull, who was Obama’s Democratic primary opponent, and later to unseal Republican Jack Ryan’s. Ryan, the 2004 GOP nominee in the Illinois Senate contest, ended up having to quit the race.
Axelrod denied to POLITICO, as he has many times before, that he suggested either approach to the paper. “I and we have zero to do with it,” he said. (Suggesting such a line of inquiry, incidentally, would hardly have been out of bounds in an ordinary political campaign, but to keep the move fingerprint-free would have reflected a certain dexterity.)
“Axelrod and the Obama Senate campaign played no public role in unsealing the Hull or Ryan divorce records. But the behind-the-scenes machinations were more complicated,” said Mendell, who broke the Hull story for the Tribune in 2004, in an email, adding; “You really have to connect the dots to pin things on Axelrod.” [Emphasis added.]
From Mendell’s book…
Nevertheless, Hull’s ads were working. And when Hynes’ quick hit of television had no effect, the Hynes brain trust began worrying even more about Hull. Hynes’s campaign spokesperson, Chris Mather, stepped up her phone calls to me and other reporters in hopes of slowing the Hull momentum. However, the intense lobbying effort actually had the opposite effect with me. Hynes’s obvious fear gave Hull even more credibility.
At about this time, I met with a Hynes operative for lunch. When I had gone to meet Mather earlier in the campaign season, we convened near Hynes’s office. But this operative wanted to come to me, so we gathered at a North Michigan Avenue restaurant just a couple of doors from the Tribune Tower. Before I had taken a bite of my grilled chicken sandwich, I was handed a folder of opposition research on Hull. Among the papers was a copy of the outside sheet of the filing of one of Hull’s two divorces in Illinois. Hull, in fact, had been divorced three times. He was married to his first wife for nearly thirty years, raising three children with her. After moving to Chicago, he then twice married and divorced the same woman. The rest of the divorce file had been sealed, and this vague court order was the only document publicly available.
The order contained only one salient fact: Hull’s second wife, Brenda Sexton, had once been granted an order of protection against him. [Emphasis added.]
So, in his book he clearly blamed the Hynes campaign for the Hull leak, but now Mendell is putting the blame on Axelrod? Weird.
* Meanwhile, last month, Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr. said he was no fan of President Obama’s jobs plan…
U.S. Rep. Jesse L. Jackson, Jr. (D-IL-2) tonight said in a statement that he does not think President Obama’s “American Jobs Act” will work. […]
“The President’s plan will help - assuming Republicans help to pass it - but it is short of the need.
His Democratic primary opponent Debbie Halvorson sharply criticized Jackson for not fully supporting the president. Today, he sent an e-mail message to supporters…
I am in full support of President Obama’s jobs plan and building a airport for our future. Help me help President Obama.
* And in other news, Congressman Rush is back in the headlines…
A Democratic congressman compared the NCAA to the Mafia over how it controls the lives of student athletes.
“I think they’re just one of the most vicious, most ruthless organizations ever created by mankind,” Illinois Rep. Bobby Rush said of the NCAA at a congressional forum on college sports Tuesday. “I think you would compare the NCAA to Al Capone and to the Mafia.”
Rush made the accusations at the forum called to look at the impact of “back-room deals, payoffs and scandals” in college sports. The congressman spoke after hearing from a couple of mothers of former student-athletes who complained of ill treatment by schools after their sons suffered injuries. […]
One mother, Valerie Hardrick, said the University of Oklahoma refused to grant a waiver for medical hardship that would allow her son, Kyle Hardrick, to play basketball at junior college after transferring from OU. Prior to Tuesday’s forum, Hardrick’s family provided to The Associated Press documentation showing that team doctors diagnosed him with a torn meniscus in his knee and wrote down on practice logs that he should be held out because he was hurt. Hardrick’s family said the university has refused to pursue the waiver unless the family agrees to a settlement that would prohibit him or his family members from enrolling at Oklahoma or any of the universities governed by its board of regents. The proposed settlement also would prevent the Hardricks from filing a lawsuit against the university.
“My insurance does not cover all of Kyle’s medical bills,” an emotional Valerie Hardrick said. “The University of Oklahoma refused to pay for Kyle’s surgery, his rehab, and his medication. The university actions also allowed Kyle to be released without appropriate medical treatment before consulting his original surgeon.”
posted by Rich Miller
Thursday, Nov 3, 11 @ 3:16 pm
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It is and always was Hynes
Comment by George Thursday, Nov 3, 11 @ 3:33 pm
On Axelrdod: As they said of rogue criminal and murderer omar little in the crime show the wire “he may not have done this one, but he’s done others”.
I have friends who were division 1 student athletes, most were grateful for the scholarship they got, chance to compete, friends they made, and honor of representing the school. There are challenges in that organization, but they are not Al Capone.
Comment by shore Thursday, Nov 3, 11 @ 3:34 pm
Not that Mendell is wrong about Axelrod’s skill in the black arts, but it would help if he could clarify what he’s referring to. While Rod McCullogh was, IIRC, the original source for Ryan’s divorce records, he might not have been the only one with that info. And the Tribune, Axelrod’s former employer, did lead the charge into court to unseal the records. Coincidentally, Obama was the only beneficiary of the Tribune’s legal leg work.
Rush didn’t state it very well, but the NCAA could use a little scrutiny. They’ve made billions off of amateur athletics. It’d be nice to know someone was looking out for some of the lesser known athletes who haven’t had a particularly great experience as indentured servants, oops I mean “student athletes.”
Comment by 47th Ward Thursday, Nov 3, 11 @ 3:54 pm
So we can yet another Tribbie book
Comment by CicularFiringSquad Thursday, Nov 3, 11 @ 9:23 pm
Brenda Sexton always struck me as something as an opportunist and an ingrate. It seemed fairly certain that Blair Hull ponied up big dollars for Rod Blagojevich’s gubernatorial candidacy and Sexton coincidentally got appointed head of the Illinois Film Office. Later on, she let her former husband twist in the wind.
I have no tolerance for domestic violence, but the allegations against Hull seemed a trifle conflated.
Comment by Esquire Thursday, Nov 3, 11 @ 11:44 pm
The real culprits are Hull’s campaign staff, Mike Henry and crew, who were pulling down big bucks from the Hull campaign (Henry was taking $20,000 per month). They knew about Hull’s divorce issues in the spring of 2003 but failed to advise Hull to get the dirt out in early summer which would have made it old news by the 2004 primary. Hull was being plucked like a pigeon by his own campaign operatives.
Comment by Louis Howe Friday, Nov 4, 11 @ 3:47 am