NO QUARTER » Patrick Fitzgerald

And Justice For All

Ani — Sat, 08 Nov 2008 17:22:58 +0000

It is very difficult to reconcile Obama being elected to the presidency. I want him exposed for all his empty rhetoric, fraudulent tactics, race baiting, sexism and using homophobia to his advantage, but I don’t want to see my beloved country falling down around our ears just so I can say I told you so.

I’d like to believe Patrick Fitzgerald will come riding to the rescue with some indictment linking Obama to Rezko, or announce a racketeering indictment relating to all the caucus and voter fraud, but I don’t believe that will happen for a second. I’d like to think that, as nature abhors a vacuum, the media will turn their critical lens on Obama and start airing the truth. It is too little too late and I don’t know that I believe that either.

How do a reconcile the deep love I feel for my country and my upset with people already losing their homes and savings, yet wanting to see the new administration put us to rights again. Do I have faith that they can? Based on what I’ve seen from both Obama and the current Democratic leadership, I have no reason to.

I posted an article the other day condemning his election tactics as well as casting a jaundiced eye on those who allowed themselves to vote against their own interests in assisting his election. However, I said a few words at the conclusion about still being willing to open my heart and lend support, if only for my country’s sake, and I got some grief on the boards about it.

This is a tough one because I feel blackmailed into support by our current dire circumstances and by a media that deserves to be figuratively horsewhipped in the town square due to their irresponsible “journalism” and lack of honest coverage of all the candidates. It is also impossible to think the media would ever allow a huge scandal to break, given how much they were in bed with an Obama candidacy in the first place. Although, the dollar is king, so if it sells copy…

It is also a conflict to feel deeply moved by the historical aspect of Barack Obama’s election and I certainly understand the joy of the African American community, and all Americans that this barrier has been passed. I just wish that this honor and accomplishment was bestowed upon someone more qualified and less disingenuous.

David Axelrod, the DNC power elite and the media have thrown a lavish, yearlong dinner party for this man and stuck us with the bill. Is it possible for our country to succeed and get back on its feet in the near term if he fails? Or do we want that kind of failure, as only failure of enormous magnitude will shake the latte sippers and blackberry bloggers from their stupor enough to realize something’s gotta give here.

Pardon me, but I cannot wish ill. Too many hard working people are in need out there and are looking for answers and all they are hearing is hopey changey. As many wonderful NoQ readers have pointed out in recent days, if he keeps his empty rhetoric up, the electorate will awaken soon enough.

It is very safe to say I will not be drinking kool-aid anytime soon nor will I be sucked into the Obama collective. It is vital that citizens keep the pressure on our elected local, state and national representatives, the media and if necessary, their advertisers. Is it naïve to think that will make a difference? I refuse to be that pessimistic. If I allow that to creep over me, I won’t take action but curl up in a ball in the corner – and I will not give anyone the satisfaction of seeing me do that.

I really don’t have adequate words to describe the rage I feel at the third presidential election in a row feeling stolen and/or decided by those not doing their homework.

Is it best to adopt a wait and see attitude? To see if it’s possible to keep him out of office by legal means in the first place? How many of us, after the primary was forcibly shut down felt that he would implode before the convention, yet the hope never materialized. How many thought ‘spread the wealth around’ would surely do him in? Nope.

If and after he is indeed inaugurated, do I just shut the TV off for the next four years – or keep making noise, hoping some of our representatives will add something to the debate that will help. I will forever blame myself for not protesting out in the street in December of 2000 but in our pre-9/11 mindset, most did not know just how bad our compliance would be.

The rage is perfectly understandable and perfectly justifiable. I am searching for the way to make it effective and not destructive – either to me or my fellow citizens working hard for their families or to those in the military and their families, sacrificing daily for our country.

Most infuriating is that Donna Brazile basically sent out a missive months ago saying “message to base – stay home.” And they got this guy elected anyway – in great part because a bunch of Republicans decided to stay home. I hope in retrospect they are likewise happy with their irresponsible decision. It is interesting to note that PUMAs did have an effect on the election as I believe 3 million voted for Senator McCain. What was not taken into account, and was certainly beyond PUMA control, is that 6 million Republicans chose to sit on their hands.

The DNC may have behaved as though we didn’t exist but we do. Our voices matter and they will not be silenced. Through all of that I can still wish my country Godspeed, even though I am furious at the blind part of the electorate that has perpetrated what I feel is a disaster on all of us by electing this unqualified man to office.

Speaking only for myself, I have lots to sort out and am still reeling from the shock that at one of the most difficult and troubling times in our nations’ history, America has chosen American Idol over competence, patriotism, knowledge and experience. Regardless of party.

How do we want to participate in an administration, either critically or constructively, that has acted as though millions of us are completely invisible and our thoughts and contributions nonexistent? At this moment the answer is admittedly well above my pay grade.

Your thoughts on this would be deeply appreciated.

BREAKING: Obama Land Deal with Rezko and Mutual Bank Subject of New Court Complaint

Truthteller — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 19:24:29 +0000

No Quarter introduced readers to the Mutual Bank in Chicago after a Chicago Sun-Times columnist mentioned how a certain financial institution in Chicago would become the subject of a federal probe to be conducted by Fitzgerald’s prosecutors in relation to the conviction of Antoin “Tony” Rezko. Although I cautioned I did not have conclusive evidence when I argued Mutual Bank is most probably the financial institution in question, it now appears I may have been correct.

For according to a Washington Times exclusive printed today, a Real Estate and Commercial Credit Analyst of Mutual Bank has assumed whistleblower status and filed complaint against his former employer.

The subject of his complaint is the Mutual Bank and its potentially fraudulent reappraisal of the lot on which Obama’s home sits.

Obama, we recall, was only able to purchase the mansion he could not afford in June 2005 as a result of Rita Rezko’s ability to secure a mortgage for the lot on which the home sits from Mutual Bank.

And yes, Obama is involved in this complaint, for his decision to purchase a 10 foot strip of the lot on which his home sits from Rita Rezko in January 2006 was, according to the complaint, the reason why these potentially fraudulent reappraisals of the Rita Rezko lot were drafted.

I quote the Washington Times:

In a complaint filed Thursday in the Circuit Court of Cook County, Kenneth J. Connor said that his reappraisal of Rita Rezko’s property was replaced with a higher one and that he was fired when he questioned the document.

Mr. Connor, a real estate and commercial credit analyst at the Mutual Bank Corp. in Chicago, also noted in the complaint that the bank received a grand jury subpoena in October 2006 requiring it to produce information concerning Mrs. Rezko’s purchase, including the bank’s files on the property.

Mutual Bank, Rita Rezko’s account and the mortgage Rita Rezko received from Mutual for the lot on which Obama’s home sits were the subjects of a grand jury subpoena in 2006. I recommend you read my essay on Rita Rezko, the Obama land deal and Mutual Bank for an explication of why the mortgage she received from Chicago machine banker “Uncle” Amrish Mahajan of Mutual would have raised the eyebrows of federal prosecutors.

The Washington Post continues:

The complaint also said that the grand jury wanted information on Mrs. Rezko’s checking account and loan file and that the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. (FDIC) had audited the Rezko file - although Mr. Connor’s lower reappraisal had been replaced with a higher amount.

“Connor’s internal whistle-blowing activity at Mutual Bank implicates Mutual Bank and the potentially guilty officers thereof to prosecution under federal and Illinois statutes,” said the complaint, filed by attorney Glenn R. Gaffney.

The complaint said Mutual Bank officials could be guilty of making false statements, willfully overvaluing property, bank fraud, witness retaliation, willful violation of a lawful subpoena, FDIC violations, and state banking regulations…

According to the complaint, Mr. Connor reviewed the appraisal of the Rezko property by another firm, Adams Appraisal, which had set the value at $625,000. Mr. Connor’s complaint said that he told his bosses in a report that the property had been overvalued by at least $125,000 and that a “reasonable and fair evaluation” should have been no greater than $500,000.

Why would Mutual Bank desire to inflate the value of the Rezko property on which the Obama home sits? Why would Mutual Bank risk obstructing justice? A paragraph in the Washington Times exclusive answers these questions. I quote them again:

The complaint said the Rezko loan was approved by Mutual Bank President and CEO Amrish Mahajan and others so that Mrs. Rezko could buy a 9,090-square-foot vacant parcel of real estate. It said that in January 2006, Mrs. Rezko and Mr. Obama, along with his wife Michelle, signed an agreement to sell a 10-foot strip of the property to the Obamas. At that point, according to the complaint, Mr. Connor’s firm asked him to conduct the reappraisal.

Connor, in other words, was fired for noting that the value of the property had been inflated.

For if Mutual adhered to Connor’s appraisal, Rita Rezko would have received less money from Obama for the ten foot strip of land next to his home he purchased from the convicted slum landlord’s wife.

And Mahajan, the CEO of Mutual, had an interest in ensuring Rezko would receive more money from Obama, for Mahajan is deeply imbricated in the Chicago machine that used Obama to funnel government revenue into the privatization of public housing scheme from which Obama’s friends profited.

Now wonder why Mutual removed Connor’s appraisal from the Rita Rezko file.

Mahajan, the Mutual Bank, Rita Rezko and the Obama land deal are now the subjects of a complaint filed with the Circuit Court of Cook County, and Obama’s financial dealings with the Mutual Bank and with Rita and Antoin “Tony” Rezko are the subjects of news articles that explore Chicago corruption and questionable real estate transactions.

I guess the deal really was “boneheaded.”

No Quarter asked readers to focus on the land deal and on Mutual when the Chicago Sun-Times mentioned that a financial institution is the subject of federal prosecutors’ interest, for Obama’s decision to purchase land from Rita Rezko catalyzed all the press on his questionable land deal with convicted slumlord Antoin “Tony” Rezko.

Now we know that transaction was the subject of a federal subpoena in 2006, and now we know a complaint has been filed against Mutual for intimidating employees and attempting to increase the value of the Obama lot most probably in order to ensure Rita Rezko would receive enough money to repay the $500,000 loan she received from Mahajan and the Mutual Bank even though she only earns $35,000 per annum at her government job.

Much more is to be learned about this land deal. But now that it is the subject of a complaint and a federal subpoena filed in 2006, I imagine we will learn that Obama chose Rezko to tour the mansion and purchase the lot on which it sits in order to ensure that he could later repay Rezko for the land he could not afford.

Why else did Mahajan, one of Rezko’s bankers who also sat on the Chicago Plan Commission of Daley with Valerie Jarrett and Allison Davis, manipulate the value on the lot when Obama was ready to repay the Rezkos for the favor?

Must money always be kept within a small network of corrupt Chicago machine cogs?

I imagine we will read more about Obama and his financial dealings with Rita Rezko and Amrish Mahajan’s Mutual Bank before votes are cast in November. It was a “boneheaded” deal indeed, Senator Obama.

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No Quarter dossier on Obama and Rezko:

RezkoWatch contains even more information on Obama’s deep and problematic ties to convicted slumlord and notorious political fixer Antoin “Tony” Rezko.

Also listen to our NQR Radio Show entitled “READING REZKO with Truthteller and SusanUnPC”

Obama’s Looming Subprime Nightmare

Larry Johnson — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 19:00:24 +0000

Just like the real estate bubble, which exploded like the Death Star, the Worship Our Savior Barack train is going to derail. According to the Washington Times, a criminal complaint has been filed by a real estate appraiser who claims a fraudulent appraisal was used for the lot eventually sold to Barack Obama:

A former Illinois bank official, now claiming whistleblower status, says bank officials replaced a loan reappraisal that he prepared for a Chicago property that was purchased by the wife of now-convicted felon Tony Rezko, part of which was later sold to next-door neighbor Barack Obama.

In a complaint filed Thursday in the Circuit Court of Cook County, Kenneth J. Connor said that his reappraisal of Rita Rezko’s property was replaced with a higher one and that he was fired when he questioned the document.

Mr. Connor, a real estate and commercial credit analyst at the Mutual Bank Corp. in Chicago, also noted in the complaint that the bank received a grand jury subpoena in October 2006 requiring it to produce information concerning Mrs. Rezko’s purchase, including the bank’s files on the property.

The media, who for the most part have ignored the shady land deal between the felon Tony Rezko and Barack Obama, may now be shamed into at least examining the matter in light of their relentless scrutiny of Joe the Plumber. This was a fairly sophisticated money laundering transaction. For starters, Tony Rezko was one of Barack Obama’s major fund raisers. The property that Barack and Michelle Obama wanted to buy had an asking price of $1.95 million dollars. They got a sweetheart loan and bought the house for $1.65 million. Why? Because the owners of the home were able to sell the adjacent lot on the same day to Tony Rezko and his wife for $125,000 dollars more than the land was worth. The Rezkos paid full price, $625,000 for a strip of land adjacent to the house, that according to the appraiser is only worth $500,000.

The inimitable John Batchelor is on this like a chicken on a bug.

John writes:

Startling news this morning from a bizarre break in the mystery of what Tony Rezko is telling prosecutors in Chicago in exchange for a better deal on his conviction for graft and corruption. In the Washington Times — not from either of the Chicago papers — there is a report of a whistleblower lawsuit by previously unknown bank clerk Kenneth J. Connor against his former employer, the Mutual Bank Corporation in Chicago, for firing him because he refused to go along with an apparent real estate fraud involving the house that Barack Obama lives in. The details are complex, including the inflating of the value of the lot that Rita Rezko purchased and later sold a piece of to Barack Obama, including the fact that the bank owner, Amrish Mahajan, is a long-time Rezko crony and creditor, and I point to the gifted encyclopedic site The Real Barack Obama for a full explanation and savvy speculation of the reason Mr. Connor is upset. The heart of it is that Mr. Connor refused to go along with a fraud with regard the lot at 505o South Greenwood Avenue that Rita Rezko (as a cut-out for her husband Tony) bid on and purchased between January and June 2005 in order to make it possible for Barack and Michelle Obama to bid on and purchase their mansion at 5046 South Greenwood Avenue in Hyde Park. Mr. Conner now reveals all this in a lawsuit against the bank that fired him because he wouldn’t play along. Stepping around Mr. Conner’s ambition, there is the much more fetching clue here that the prosecutors have raced way past talking to Tony Rezko about the “Board Games” that led to his conviction, past Tony Rezko’s corrupt dealings raising cash for Governor Rod Blagojeich, past Tony Rezko’s years of skimming and cheating and bullying in Chicago, to go right after the critical piece of the Obama house deal that underlines that something is rotten in Hyde Park. Kenneth J. Conner doesn’t file a lawsuit in civil court unless he has spoken at great length with U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald’s office in front of a Grand Jury with regard the criminal investigation of Rezko and his clients. And the extremely irregular and unexplained purchase of the Hyde Park mansion for the newly elected and then sworn-in Senator Barack Obama in 2005 is a major mystery. On Sunday 12, when I spoke to Natasha Korecki, Chicago Sun-Times, re Rezko talking, I was convinced that the prosecution is pursuing the governor’s vulnerability first, and that the senator’s vulnerability was left till later if at all. Now I see, as can anyone who has studied the byzantine pleasure palace of Cook County, that Mr. Fitzgerald and his team have hold of secrets within secrets, and that Tony Rezko’s talking is like 3-in-1 oil, it lubricates the whole investigation of the governor and the senator. The lot! They are on to Rita Rezko’s lot! That is the backdoor to Barack Obama’s self-described “boneheaded” deal with Tony Rezko. That is the backdoor to what really happened between Tony Rezko and Senator-elect Obama and the Wondisfords sellers and the two silent-so-far realtors who were both friends of Tony Rezko.

Mr. Fitzgerald’s Clock is Ticking

It is follow the money. It is always follow the money. Who paid for the lot? Who paid for the house? When and how? Note that the Conner lawsuit also mentions that the grand jury was seeking, as far ago as October 2006, information on Rita Rezko’s checking account and loan file at the Mutual Bank. Her checking account. Fitzgerald is deeply involved in how 5050/5046 South Greenwood, the lot and the house (right), was passed over to Senator and Mrs. Obama. Mention also that another of my very best Chicago sources writes me that Mr. Fitzgerald best accelerate, his clock is ticking, and his tenure is iffy in an Obama Justice Department with a Democratic dominated Congress and an ineffective Chicago media

About the Financial Institution Mentioned in the Sun-Times: Obama, Tony Rezko, Amrish Mahajan, the Kenwood Mansion & Rita Rezko

Truthteller — Sun, 12 Oct 2008 08:09:52 +0000

**********Truthteller asks bloggers and reporters to direct their attention to Amrish Mahajan and the Mutual Bank of Harvey.**********

Mike Robinson’s AP article entitled “Obama Fundraiser, Convicted of Fraud, Spills Beans,” corroborates what we at No Quarter have been writing for weeks: Antoin “Tony” Rezko is cooperating with federal prosecutors interested in Barack Obama. While the national media’s attention to this topic is long overdue, I am not prepared to state that it is too little, too late. I am, however, disappointed.

Also disappointing but somewhat predictable is the blogosphere’s bungled reception of Mike Robinson’s article. Of course those who have embraced Obama will dismiss the story as so much yellow journalism. One blogger claims that prosecutors are interested in Blagojevich and not Obama. But looming in the blind spot of that blogger’s necessarily tendentious gaze is Rezko’s 9 JUN 2008 letter to Judge Amy St. Eve and the reference to Obama as “Individual D” in the superseding indictment and the proffer of evidence filed by Fitzgerald and his prosecutors during the Rezko trial. Obama’s name can be printed again and again on the surface of the legal documents filed during the proceedings of the Rezko trial, but these writers with all their “naked” insight will clothe the verifiable record with their blindness. Knowledge production, it seems, has been lifted from its evidentiary supports when Democrats write about Barack Obama and Antoin “Tony” Rezko.

And yes, those Democrats include some ostensible Hillary Clinton Democrats. Seizing upon the following quotation in a Chicago Sun-Times column, one blogger believes the AP story heralds the end of the political careers of Alexi Giannoulias and Barack Obama:

Sneed hears rumbles political fund-raiser/fixer Tony Rezko, who is now singing sweetly to the feds from his cell at the Metropolitan Correctional Center, has been talking about his “dealings” with a Chicago bank, which has political connections.

Stay tuned.

While Rezko was a customer of Alexi Giannoulias’s Broadway Bank, where he amassed a debt of $450,000 after writing bad checks at Las Vegas casinos, and while Giannoulias did write loans for Rezko, I do not believe one can aver with the confidence of the blogger I cite above that federal prosecutors are now focusing on Giannoulias, even if Giannoulias was tied to Rezko by his opponent during his 2006 bid for the office of Illinois state Treasurer. Allow me to be clear: Obama bundler, mobster banker and Obama protégé Giannoulias is, to be sure, embroiled in the Rezko scandal and in other aspects of Chicago politics any political observer would find unsavory, but he is not in my opinion the topic of the conservation occurring between Rezko, Rezko’s attorney and Fitzgerald’s team of prosecutors. I do admit he is grist for the mill of impetuous bloggers who desire web traffic and a controversial headline or two, however. Because I tend to rely on evidence and not on hearsay, I believe we should focus our attention on Amrish Mahajan and the Mutual Bank of Harvey, not on Giannoulias and the Broadway Bank, if we are to assign names to the financial institution about which Sneed of the Chicago Sun-Times has heard “rumblings.” Although Mahajan is not known to readers of No Quarter and to the national media, I imagine they will desire more information on the unscrupulous banker once they read the information I unpack below the fold. And yes, Obama is involved, deeply involved.

My interest in Amrish Mahajan and the Mutual Bank of Harvey was picqued by this list of contributors in Rezko’s bundling network provided by the Chicago Sun-Times last March. View the second page of the document, and notice the following entry:

Last name	First name	Obama donations	Rezko connection
Mahajan	Amrish	$2,500	Banker whose bank loaned money to Rezko companies. The bank also loaned Rezko’s wife money to buy a vacant lot next to Obama’s home.

The data available in the Sun-Times spreadsheet is corroborated by the following data, which is democratically available at the Federal Election Commission’s website:

MAHAJAN, AMRISH
CHICAGO, IL 60607
MUTUAL BANK

OBAMA, BARACK
VIA OBAMA FOR ILLINOIS INC
12/20/2003 500.00 24020030170
04/14/2004 1000.00 24020461757

Not only was Mahajan a member of Rezko’s bundling network; his bank, the Mutual Bank of Harvey, granted Rita Rezko the $500,000 mortgage she needed in order to purchase the lot on which the Obama mansion in Chicago sits. As many of you may recall, the Obamas could not have purchased the mansion they could not afford unless transactions for the mansion and the lot closed on the same day. Obama needed to locate someone who would buy the lot, and he approached Rezko, the convicted slumlord with whom Obama toured the property before they mutually agreed to the following arrangement:

The home and lot sales closed on June 15, 2005. A land trust controlled by the Obamas bought the house for $1.65 million, and the Obamas secured a $1.32 million mortgage from Northern Trust to complete that purchase. That same day, Rezko’s wife, Rita Rezko, bought the side lot for $625,000. A $37,000- a-year Cook County employee, she secured a $500,000 mortgage from Mutual Bank of Harvey.

The structure of this transaction begs the following question: What bank would lend a government employee who earns $37,000 per annum a $500,000 mortgage? What bank would assume such a risk?

The Mutual Bank of Harvey, of course, for the Mutual Bank of Harvey’s President is a man who is deeply connected to the Chicago machine that backed Barack Obama. Indeed, Amrish Mahajan was one of Mayor Daley’s first political appointments in 1989, when he was named to a seat on Chicago’s Plan Commission, where he would be joined by Obama’s former boss and Rezko’s business partner Allison Davis and by Valerie Jarrett, Daley’s Chief of Staff who chaired the Commission from 1991-1995. Mahajan, in other words, worked with those who devised and profited from Daley’s failed public housing experiment in Chicago, a public housing policy Obama helped fund as state Senator and US Senator.

Rezko, according to the Boston Globe, was one of the major beneficiaries of Obama’s legislative advocacy for funding of Daley’s public housing experiment. Other major beneficiaries are Jarrett and Allison Davis. Mahajan was also a beneficiary, for his bank had made $3.4 million dollars in loans to Tony Rezko’s slum landlord business since 2002. A banker for one of the slumlords who benefitted from the Daley housing program Obama helped bankroll, Mahajan was returning a favor when he wrote a $500,000 mortgage in 2005 for the wife of one of his clients. Although Tony’s financial problems were mounting in 2005, and although Rita earned only $35,000 per annum, Mahajan underwrote the mortgage. Favors must be reciprocated, I guess, especially when one can satisfy two parties at once: the person with whom one has a complicated relationship in real estate and the politician who helped finance that complicated relationship as state Senator and US Senator.

I doubt federal investigators are interested in the Mahajans solely for their involvement in the property deal involving Obama, Mahajan and the Rezkos. The Mahajans, I believe, are the foci of their probe for many reasons.

Anita Mahajan, the wife of Amrish, has been involved with questionable real estate deals that are the subject of federal probes with Governor Blagojevich’s wife, Patricia
Anita Mahajan exploited lucrative no bid contracts with the Department of Children and Family Services to steal $2.1 million from Illinois taxpayers; she was charged and released on a $250,000 bond in March 2007
“Uncle Amrish” has raised more than a half million for Blagojevich and approximately $50,000 for Mayor Daley, whose father helped launch Mahajan’s banking career
“Uncle Amrish” also helped Obama purchase a house he could not afford

The real estate transaction involving Rita Rezko, the Obamas and Mutual Bank of Harvey is just the tip of the iceberg. Indeed, the Mutual Bank of Harvey seems to be at the center of all the corruption in Chicago. To quote former Donald Perillo, Chicago insurance mogul and son of the lawyer for Al Capone, in the Chicago Tribune article I cite above:

Donald Parrillo said he isn’t surprised to see Mahajan mix it up with politics and business. “He got that attitude from the Parrillo family,” the former alderman said. “He wanted to get in the game.”

And Mahajan certainly is in the game. The banker of the Chicago machine, he is also the man who wrote the mortgage for Rita Rezko that facilitated Obama’s purchase the mansion he could not afford. This is why I believe prosecutors are interested in Harvey Mutual Bank. Not only did Rezko receive loans from this institution; this bank is heavily involved in problematic real estate dealings involving Blagojevich and Obama. And if I may quote Rezko in the 9 JUN letter he wrote to Judge Amy St. Eve:

Your Honor, the prosecutors have been overzealous in pursuing a crime that never happened. They are pressuring me to tell them the “wrong” things that I supposedly know about Governor Blagojevich and Senator Obama. I have never been party to any wrongdoing that involved the Governor or the Senator. I will never fabricate lies about anyone else for selfish purposes. I will take what comes my way, but I will never hurt innocent people. I am not Levine, Loren, Mahru , or Winter.”

Rezko is now talking, and prosecutors are presently interested in a politically connected financial institution. I bet Obama now regrets paying Rita Rezko $104,500 for the strip of the land in the lot on which his house sits in January 2006. Acquired with the assistance of a questionable $500,000 mortgage from Amrish Mahajan’s Mutual Bank of Harvey, this lot and Obama’s desire to expand his yard by bit was the catalyst for all the investigative reports into Obama’s deep ties to Rezko. By the way, Rita’s lot is only accessible through the front gate of Obama’s home; it is not a separate property, and it was never intended to be a separate property.

“It was a mistake to have been engaged with him at all in this or any other personal business dealing that would allow him, or anyone else, to believe that he had done me a favor,” Obama says of the real estate transactions with Rezko. I wonder if now he also believes it was a mistake for him to serve as the legislator who represented and bankrolled Richard Daley, Amrish Mahajan, Valerie Jarrett, Allison Davis and the Chicago Plan Commission. But at least he and Michelle have a house, a house the Mutual Bank of Harvey, the politically connected bank that wrote loans for Rezko, helped them procure in 2005. Too bad that house will be the end of Barack Obama.

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No Quarter dossier on Obama and Rezko:

RezkoWatch contains even more information on Obama’s deep and problematic ties to convicted slumlord and notorious political fixer Antoin “Tony” Rezko.

Also listen to our NQR Radio Show entitled “READING REZKO with Truthteller and SusanUnPC”

CORROBORATED: Rezko Speaks, Prosecutors Interested in Obama Listen

Truthteller — Tue, 07 Oct 2008 14:35:10 +0000

(bumped up by SusanUnPC)

We warned readers of No Quarter of the problems convicted slumlord and political fixer Antoin “Tony” Rezko would create for Obama during the final stretch of the Presidential campaign, and now we have confirmation. I quote the Associated Press:

CHICAGO (AP) — Federal prosecutors have asked to delay the sentencing of convicted fundraiser Antoin “Tony” Rezko indefinitely.

The motion filed Monday afternoon signals the key fundraiser for Gov. Rod Blagojevich, Sen. Barack Obama and other Illinois Domocrats may be telling prosecutors what he knows about corruption in state government.

It asks U.S. District Judge Amy J. St. Eve to delay the sentencing “while the parties engage in discussions that could affect their sentencing postures.” The language is all but an acknowledgment that Rezko is talking.

Rezko was convicted of launching a $7 million scheme to use his clout with Blagojevich’s administration to pressure a contractor and firms wanting to do business with the state for kickbacks.

And yes, Obama was involved in Illinois state government in 2003 through 2005, the time during which Rezko was defrauding the Illinois State Teachers’ Pension fund and bankrolling certain politicians. I quote what I wrote in my last essay on this subject:

2005 is the year Rezko helped Obama purchase the mansion in the Kenwood neighborhood in inner city Chicago. And 2003 is the year Rezko held a fundraiser for US Senate candidate Barack Obama at his posh home in Wilmette, Illinois. Another event of significance in 2003 is Illinois Governor Blagojevich’s appointment of Rezko to the Board that oversees the $30 billlion dollar teachers’ pension fund. This is the same year during which Barack Obama was appointed to the Illinois state Senate Committee on Pensions and Investments by his friend and mentor state Senator Emil Jones. According to the Superseding Indictment filed by Fitzgerald in December 2006, Obama’s appointment to this state Senate committee coincided with Rezko’s attempts to leverage his influence with “high-ranking State of Illinois officials” to oppose a pension consolidation plan that would complicate the efforts of Rezko and Levine to defraud investment firms and the pensions funds of Illinois. Notice also how Obama sat on the state Senate Pensions and Investments Board when Rezko funneled money he defrauded from an investment firm that sought access to the Illinois pensions fund to Obama through Joseph Aramanda, whose son worked as an intern in Obama’s US Senate office in 2005, the year Rezko advised and assisted the Obamas when they purchased the Kenwood mansion they could not afford.

I guess there will be surprises in October. And Obama thought Ayers was his only problem. Let us reintroduce the electorate to Antoin “Tony” Rezko.

Also read the commentary available at Memeorandum.

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No Quarter dossier on Obama and Rezko:

RezkoWatch contains even more information on Obama’s deep and problematic ties to convicted slumlord and notorious political fixer Antoin “Tony” Rezko.

Also listen to our NQR Radio Show entitled “READING REZKO with Truthteller and SusanUnPC”

Rezko Speaks, Prosecutors Interested in Obama Listen

Truthteller — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 22:55:37 +0000

No Quarter reproduced Rezko’s letter to Judge Amy St. Eve dated 9 JUN 2008 in an essay I published on 12 JUN 2008. I quote Antoin “Tony” Rezko:

Your Honor, the prosecutors have been overzealous in pursuing a crime that never happened. They are pressuring me to tell them the “wrong” things that I supposedly know about Governor Blagojevich and Senator Obama. I have never been party to any wrongdoing that involved the Governor or the Senator. I will never fabricate lies about anyone else for selfish purposes. I will take what comes my way, but I will never hurt innocent people. I am not Levine, Loren, Mahru , or Winter.”

Either Rezko is “Levine, Loren, Mahru, [sic] or Winter,” or Rezko decided he will no longer relate “the ‘wrong’ things” but the right things he knows about Governor Blagojevich and Senator Obama. For according to a Chicago Tribune article published today, Rezko has met with prosecutors and is considering cooperating with their investigation. I quote the Tribune:

Antoin “Tony” Rezko, a convicted influence peddler who was once one of Gov. Rod Blagojevich’s most trusted confidants, has met with federal prosecutors and is considering cooperating in the corruption probe of the governor’s administration, sources told the Tribune.

Rezko’s possible change of heart—after years of steadfast refusal—has sent ripples through a tight circle of prominent defense attorneys who represent dozens of potential witnesses and targets in the wide-ranging probe.

His cooperation would give prosecutors investigating the governor and his wife access to someone they have described as an ultimate political insider at the center of a pervasive pay-to-play scheme.

Rezko’s trial this year laid bare a culture of scams, bribes and backroom deals stretching from City Hall to the Statehouse. It even became fodder in the presidential campaign of Democratic nominee Barack Obama, whose fundraising and personal ties to Rezko go back more than a decade.

Key phrases in this excerpt are “ripples through a tight circle of prominent defense attorneys who represent dozens of potential witnesses and targets,” “political insider at the center of a pervasive pay-to-play scheme” and “culture of scams, bribes and backroom deals stretching from City Hall to the Statehouse.” Obama, we recall, is the “unnamed political candidate” mentioned in the superseding indictment and in the proffer of evidence filed by Fitzgerald and his prosecutors. I quote the Chicago Sun-Times:

Obama is not named in the Dec. 21 court document. But a source familiar with the case confirmed that Obama is the unnamed “political candidate” referred to in a section of the document that accuses Rezko of orchestrating a scheme in which a firm hired to handle state teacher pension investments first had to pay $250,000 in “sham” finder’s fees. From that money, $10,000 was donated to Obama’s successful run for the Senate in the name of a Rezko business associate, according to the court filing and the source.

Rezko, who was part of Obama’s senatorial finance committee, also is accused of directing “at least one other individual” to donate money to Obama and then reimbursing that individual — in possible violation of federal election law.

This is only a scratch on the surface, however. For as I describe in one of my many essays on the subject of Obama and Rezko, Obama’s relationship with the convicted slum landlord is extensive and elaborate. I quote myself on the years 2003-2005:

2005 is the year Rezko helped Obama purchase the mansion in the Kenwood neighborhood in inner city Chicago. And 2003 is the year Rezko held a fundraiser for US Senate candidate Barack Obama at his posh home in Wilmette, Illinois. Another event of significance in 2003 is Illinois Governor Blagojevich’s appointment of Rezko to the Board that oversees the $30 billlion dollar teachers’ pension fund. This is the same year during which Barack Obama was appointed to the Illinois state Senate Committee on Pensions and Investments by his friend and mentor state Senator Emil Jones. According to the Superseding Indictment filed by Fitzgerald in December 2006, Obama’s appointment to this state Senate committee coincided with Rezko’s attempts to leverage his influence with “high-ranking State of Illinois officials” to oppose a pension consolidation plan that would complicate the efforts of Rezko and Levine to defraud investment firms and the pensions funds of Illinois. Notice also how Obama sat on the state Senate Pensions and Investments Board when Rezko funneled money he defrauded from an investment firm that sought access to the Illinois pensions fund to Obama through Joseph Aramanda, whose son worked as an intern in Obama’s US Senate office in 2005, the year Rezko advised and assisted the Obamas when they purchased the Kenwood mansion they could not afford.

That is only a brief summary of Obama’s involvement with Rezko during the years that are the focus of Fitzgerald’s probe. For more on Obama’s relationship with Rezko since at least 1991, I recommend consulting the diaries whose titles are listed below.

Obama’s ties to Rezko are deep and controversial. Moreover, recently unsealed documents from the court proceedings reveal Judge Amy St. Eve permitted prosecutors to summon witnesses who could provide testimony on Obama’s ties to Rezko. Prosecutors, in other words, were interested in Obama’s role in Rezko’s elaborate web of influence peddling and corruption.

The alarm expressed by defense attorneys who represent witnesses and potential targets in the wake of the revelation that Rezko is cooperating with prosecutors should be of interest to readers of No Quarter. For not only is Obama deeply embroiled in Rezko’s legal woes; Obama was also one of the prosecutors’ many targets. And although Obama’s campaign will claim that “prosecutors during Rezko’s trial never made any suggestions that Obama was involved in anything improper,” they neglect to understand that anything Rezko may relate now that he is cooperating with prosecutors will be used against Barack Obama. Besides, Rezko mentions Obama in his letter to Judge St. Eve dated 9 June 2008. If prosecutors were not pressing Rezko to reveal details about his relation to Obama, why would Rezko bother to mention Obama’s name?

Because Rezko is cooperating with prosecutors who demonstrated an interest in Rezko’s relation to Barack Obama during the trial, I imagine Obama’s campaign and defense attorneys are not pleased with this latest revelation in the Chicago Tribune. And yes, we at No Quarter will keep everyone posted. Rezko, after all, is one of the many reasons we insist on probing Barack Obama’s record.

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No Quarter dossier on Obama and Rezko:

RezkoWatch contains even more information on Obama’s deep and problematic ties to convicted slumlord and notorious political fixer Antoin “Tony” Rezko.

Also listen to our NQR Radio Show entitled “READING REZKO with Truthteller and SusanUnPC”