For those wondering
how the Rezko trial will affect Obama, here’s a worrysome analysis on CBS News
site from NRO’s Stephen Spruiell:
This corruption,
should it become an issue in the campaign, could cause problems for Obama when
people start to wonder how he could have made it through “the combine” without
getting involved in the overlapping networks of patronage and influence.
Peraica, for one, argues that he didn’t.
“Senator Barack Obama is an
integral part and a product of this corrupt system,” Peraica says. “Senator
Obama has endorsed Todd Stroger for Cook County board president, Mayor [Richard
M.] Daley for mayor of Chicago, Dorothy Tillman for re-election as an alderman,
and other epitomes of bad government throughout his career in order to promote
himself politically, at the expense of, I would argue, principles and morals
and good government.”
Obama’s
relationship with Allison Davis -- the alleged go-between in Rezko’s scheme to
shake down Tom Rosenberg -- could pose another problem for him. Obama worked
for Davis at the law firm of Davis Miner Barnhill. Later, when Obama sat on the
board of a charity called the Woods Fund, he voted to invest $1 million in a
partnership operated by Davis, according to the Chicago Sun-Times.
Levine’s
testimony in the Rezko trial puts Davis in the middle of an attempted quid pro
quo, making him yet another associate Obama might be pressured to disown. And
the trial could stretch well into May, at which point a Rezko conviction could
lead to even more headaches for the candidate. If Rezko is looking at a long
prison sentence and decides to start talking, who knows what he might
say?
All the more
reason that Obama might be tempted to try to address this metastasizing problem
with a single bold gesture. Obama made a big speech about race to distract from
his ties to one unsavory Chicago character, but distancing himself from an
entire network of them might prove to be a tougher task. After all, Obama was
able to claim the middle ground in his defense of Wright, denouncing Wright’s
most radical views while excusing his run-of-the-mill resentments as being a
not-atypical part of the black experience.
But America will
have a harder time swallowing excuses for corruption as being a run-of-the-mill
aspect of the Illinois political experience -- particularly not from a
candidate that has promised a new kind of politics. To succeed, Obama would
have to denounce the behavior of some of his closest allies and demonstrate a
candor about his own experience in state government that’s been missing from
his campaign thus far. In the Rezko trial, Obama might have finally encountered
a problem that a speech alone won’t solve.
Read the whole tale. (
note: I erred earlier in comments saying the trial was still in recess, apparently
they were back all last week with Levine spilling his sorry guts.)
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2008/04/04/opinion/main3994002.shtml
