Dumb and Dumber: Did Obama stay silent as Blagojevich tried to sell senate seat?

December 10, 11:51 AMPolitical Issues ExaminerJudah Freed

Previous Next

Comment Print Email RSS Subscribe

Subscribe

Get alerts when there is a new article from the Political Issues Examiner. Read Examiner.com's terms of use.

Email Address   Include other special offers from Examiner.com Terms of Use

Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich, left, leaves his home
through a back ally Wednesday, Dec. 10, 2008, a day
after he was arrested on federal corruption charges.
(AP Photo/Mark Carlson)

President-elect Barack Obama says he did not know about plans by Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich to sell Obama's vacated U.S. Senate seat to the highest bidder. According to the wiretapping transcripts included in the criminal complaint filed yesterday when Blagojevich was arrested on federal corruption charges, the governor and Obama were clearly not on friendly terms.

Surveillance recordings of Blagojevich (pronounced Bluh-GOY-uh-vich) allegedly have him swearing about Obama not being part of the Illinois Governor's "pay to play" scheme to gain campaign contributions or personal favors in trade for an appointment to the senate seat.

However, if Obama did know about the governor's scheme and there's now a cover-up at play, we're faced with the same old question: What did Obama know, and when did he know it?

The recordings would seem to clear the president-elect of any involvement in Blagojevich's crime, but logic tells me that if Obama or any of his aides knew about the criminal enterprise and chose to play dumb, that is, chose not to report the illegal activities to federal authorities, that's ethically wrong, at best.

At worst, failure to report a crime may violate 18 U.S.C.A. § 4, so Obama or one of his aides conceivably could be charged as an accessory. Technically, the legal question in this instance involves what the law calls the "misprison of a felony," which sets a legal standard that a "sin of omission" does not seem to match.

According to U.S. case law in United States v. Johnson, 546 F.2d 1225 (5th Cir. 1977),  "The mere failure to report a felony is not sufficient to constitute a violation of 18 U.S.C.A. § 4." In other words, the offense requires active concealment of a known felony rather than merely failing to report a crime.

Therefore, I believe Obama and his aides likely are free and clear legally in the Blagojevich matter, 

However, I do find it as hard to believe that politically astute Obama was unaware of the governor's scheme as I found it hard to believe during the election campaign that Obama was unaware of the radical views of his former pastor, Jeremiah Wright.

And if Obama even had a vague hint about the governor's criminal antics, he should have reported his suspicion to federal authorities. Consequently, I have to question whether Obama calling for Blagojevich to resign goes far enough in the personal responsibility department.

Granted, it's possible that Obama truly did not know about the scheme. It's also possible that if he did know, he actually did report to federal investigators that Blagojevich had approached him or his aides to seek cooperation in trying to sell the senate seat, in which case such whistleblowing simply has not been publicly disclosed.

An unconfirmed rumor holds that Obama's chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, blew the whistle on Blagojevich. If that's true, good for both him and Obama, but Emanuel has denied he was the federal informant.

What's more likely, in my view, is that if Obama did know, he chose to turn a blind eye on the corruption in the governor's office the same way he chose to turn a blind eye to the corruption in Chicago politics. Obama has a history of focusing on matters that he can actually change. For evidence of Obama making such a choice, please see my September 16 column on "The Chicago Way."

If Obama did choose to play dumb, however, Blagojevich was dumber. No, let me amend that. In my opinion, Blagojevich was downright stupid.

I base my statement on Tuesday's press conference in Chicago where Patrick Fitzgerald, U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Illinois, read the criminal complaint against Gov. Rod Blagojevich and Chief of Staff John Harris.

According to the expletive-filled transcripts of the surveillance recordings, Blagojevich clearly knew or strongly suspected that he was being investigated and even wiretapped. Yet this did not stop him adn Harris from allegedly trying to sell Obama's senate seat.

Blagojevich also allegedly pressured Sam Zell, owner of the Chicago Tribune, into firing the editorial writers exposing Blagojevich corruption in trade for the governor supporting the financially strapped Tribune company's planned sale of the Chicago Cubs baseball team and stadium. Zell refused to cooperate.

Blagojevich further is alleged to have sought campaign contributions from lobbyists and other business leaders in trade for diverse official actions by the governor's office.

I'm not willing to convict Blagojevich in the press before his court trial, but I have to admit that the weight of the evidence strongly suggests the man was acting like an idiot if he pursued a "pay for play" scheme while knowing or sensing that he was being investigated, at least by the press if not by law enforcement.

Since Blagojevich apparently was committing the same kind of crimes that resulted in the corruption conviction of former Illinois Gov. George Ryan, the current governor must have been totally inane for not realizing he was being scrutinized and curtailing any corrupt impulses accordingly.

But the most stupid thing of all, however, is that Blagojevich must have been blind not to foresee that his probable arrest on corruption charges would mean the end of his governorship. As it stands, he will either be forced to resign or else he will be impeached by the Illinois legislature in Springfield.

Either way, the Democratic governor is probably going to be replaced soon by Lt. Governor Pat Quinn, another Democrat, who must decide whether to appoint a new U.S. senator or else call for a $50 million special election to fill the vacant senate seat. Let's hope Quinn is smarter than blundering Blagojevich.

CLICK FOR RELATED COLUMNS BY OTHER EXAMINERS:
* Blagojevich scandal: Appoint Manny Pacquiao to Obama's senate seat

  |  Bookmark this on Delicious

A REQUEST: Please comment on this column and interact with others who post comments. At the same time, please keep your comments relevant to the topic of the posting above. If a column is about apples, for example, please do not post a comment about kittens. instead post a comment that at least deals with fruit, so to speak. Thanks.