Today’s breaking news from Chicagoland:
A report issued by Barack Obama’s transition [team] concluded that the president-elect had no contact with Gov. Rod Blagojevich or his office and no one acting on Obama’s behalf was involved in any “quid pro quo” arrangement the governor allegedly sought for filling the vacant Senate seat with a candidate of Obama’s choosing.
The report was put together by attorney Greg Craig following Blagojevich’s arrest for allegedly engaging in a scheme to sell the vacant U.S. Senate seat, as well as other state appointments and services.
Craig said Obama, his chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, and his adviser, Valerie Jarrett, all submitted to interviews with U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald last week. Craig said neither Jarrett nor David Axelrod, another senior adviser, had any contact with Blagojevich or his office.
Hmmmm … somehow I’m just a little less than convinced of this report’s complete veracity. Maybe it’s the brevity of the report. Or maybe it’s the fact that this “investigative” report, absolving the incoming Obama administration of any wrongdoing, was produced by the incoming Obama administration. It was written by recycled White House counsel Gregory Craig, who previously served as a major apologist and hand-waver for Bill and Hillary Clinton.
Even though the report was released yesterday evening, the major editorial pages are curiously silent this morning. There are questions to be asked, if anyone with a big stick is willing to ask them. Sure, it’s Christmas Eve, and maybe a big document drop before a major four-day holiday weekend (*cough*) just doesn’t raise the kind of suspicions it used to, now that our Deliverer is poised to take over the reins. (corrected – thanks to all the commenters)
But certainly there are numerous aspiring Woodwards and Bernsteins out there who haven’t had much to do since their all-expenses-paid vacations to Wasilla, AK ended some six weeks ago. Or maybe a bored editorial writer or two. Or maybe some cable news anchors with a little time on their hands. Anyone with a little curiosity? Anyone willing to “afflict the comfortable”? Anyone?
Once again, it seems that the legacy media, which spared no effort investigating the Bush TANG AWOL non-story, the Valerie Plame non-story (and is still milking it), and the “Downing Street Memo” non-story; which managed to dig up John McCain’s Vietcong torturer, which tried to con gullible teenagers into dishing dirt on the McCain children via FaceBook — well, they just don’t seem interested in investing a similar amount of effort when the fruits of their labors might dull the patina of holiness that they have worked so hard to place upon The One.
Christmas is the season for celebrating the arrival of the Heavenly Messiah, not an excuse to whitewash the ascension of an earthly one. The more unwilling the media is to deeply probe the Chicagoland-Blagojevitch cesspool, the more I am convinced that there is a lot about it that we should know.
PS – Commenters are welcomed to point out errors in judgment, grammar, or spelling, but please lay off the “ad homonym” attacks. Thanks.
