Obama Made Me Do It-How Rod Blagojevich plans to turn his trial into a political spectacle

What a P.O.S. It's gonna be a long hot summer.

Obama Made Me Do It
How Rod Blagojevich plans to turn his trial into a political spectacle.
By Edward McClelland
Posted Wednesday, June 9, 2010, at 6:33 PM ET

snip//

Blagojevich's lawyers have already tried to subpoena Obama to impeach the testimony of developer and Obama fundraiser Tony Rezko. Rezko, who is cooperating with the government's case against Blagojevich, has told investigators he tried to buy Obama's influence with illegal campaign contributions. Only Obama can rebut that claim, Blagojevich argued.

U.S. District Court Judge James B. Zagel turned down Blagojevich's request to subpoena the president, but the ex-governor will be hauling in Obamanauts Rahm Emanuel, now White House chief of staff, and senior White House adviser Valerie Jarrett. According to some reports, Obama used Emanuel to persuade Blagojevich to appoint Jarrett to the Senate seat. If Blagojevich goes down, he wants to take the Illinois Democratic establishment with him.

Even as hungry young Democrats in Springfield, Blagojevich and Obama were suspicious of each other. And not just because both wanted to be president. They represented two different strains in Chicago politics. Blagojevich, raised in a dreary apartment by a steelworker father, considered Obama an elitist egghead from Hyde Park, the academic ghetto surrounding the University of Chicago. Obama thought Blagojevich was a vapid machine-politics hack. As a loyal Democrat, though, Obama sat in on Blagojevich's campaign strategy sessions, where he learned to emulate the candidate's two-handed approach to politicking: the right hand shakes, the left goes for the wallet. Obama became a more aggressive fundraiser after watching in awe as Blagojevich collected $24 million during his first run for governor.

Obama even used Blagojevich as an example of how an ethnically exotic candidate could succeed in the Midwest. "There are some who might say that somebody named Barack Obama can't be elected senator in the state of Illinois," Obama would tell audiences. "They're probably the same folks who said that a guy named Rod Blagojevich couldn't be elected governor of the state of Illinois."

The two liberals collaborated on a bill that added 20,000 children to the state's health insurance plan. But Blagojevich could never hide his envy of Obama's rise, mocking him as "Baaary Obaaama" in an exaggerated Chicago accent. After Obama's roof-raiser at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, Blagojevich told him, "Great speech, Barack. But remember, this is as good as it gets."

Now Obama is president. Blagojevich, meanwhile, was the break-out buffoon on Celebrity Apprentice, where he distinguished himself with his napping and hapless typing.

more...

http://www.slate.com/id/2256494/pagenum/all/#p2

And he was right. When I read the title of your post, the first words that popped into my mind were the same POS in your first line.

"The two liberals collaborated on a bill that added 20,000 children to the state's health insurance plan. But Blagojevich could never hide his envy of Obama's rise, mocking him as "Baaary Obaaama" in an exaggerated Chicago accent. After Obama's roof-raiser at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, Blagojevich told him, "Great speech, Barack. But remember, this is as good as it gets."

I've seen some on the internet trying to puff themselves up by calling the Prez "Barry".