Major DNC Donor to Party Treasurer: Obama is a Bad Investment

Posted on Tuesday, July 29, 2008 8:15:17 AM by dascallie
(From Hillary Clinton forum today)

The following is a letter sent to DNC Treasurer Andy Tobias telling him why, from a rational investor's point of view, Obama has not earned the author's vote. The letter was sent by one of the DNC's biggest donors, a donor who has historically maxed out to the DNC and who was a maxed out donor in both the Kerry and Clinton campaigns, in response to comments by Tobias that she could not see the forest through the trees.

You decide.

Dear Andy,

So you want to know what is taking me so long to "get on board"? Let me try to answer with some discussion of what my 25 years on Wall Street and the Hedge Fund community have taught me, and what insights I can share in order to explain my stance.

As you know, anyone in our profession meets with countless management teams on a monthly, quarterly, and annual basis. The "plots" change from time to time and the cast of characters play musical chairs. After awhile, they become all too familiar. You have seen the movie before. When you spot the corrupt CFO enter the scene, it immediately casts a doubt on the rest of the management team. One or two conclusions can be drawn - either they are inept or they wanted a dishonest player. Neither answer provides any comfort, but always insight. I have been lied to by the best of them over the decades; I am sure you have had similar experiences.

After years of stepping in land mines, I learned to read people and situations. I had no choice - my listening skills were honed, my gut fine-tuned. I picked up on what was and was not said, and I always paid close attention to the cast of characters. The actions of a management team always told me more than anything they ever said. If they were bailing out, so was I. If the head of sales left unexpectedly, alarm bells went of.

In the thirteen years that I have had audited results, I lost money in only one year, and then only in single digits. I am proud that I was able repay my investors' faith and confidence in me by compounding their funds assets, net of fees, at 18% over those 13 years. I took my responsibilities seriously and when I knew I could not give it 110% of my energies, I turned it over to someone who would. My investors deserved someone who would work tirelessly on their behalf, looking under every rock in support of their interests.

The fact that I became successful was not what made me proud. It was how I did it. My soul is intact. It was the self-imposed rules and standards that I adhered to. I believed in a win, win, and still do. My investors always came first. I never screwed anyone over. I made plenty of mistakes, but I always owned them, never blaming others. I treated everyone fairly and with respect, believing everyone has something to offer. I always tried to do the right thing.
So what does this have to do with me not falling in line and supporting Obama? Well everything as you can see.

Andy, if I worked and served the people in the 13th District in Chicago, I would have known all of the players. And to win that district, would I have gamed the system to run unopposed? Tony Rezko would not have had a seat at my table. Either Obama is a fool and is blind to what should have been obvious, or someone like Tony is fine by Obama's standards. The guy is a dirtball. And a dirtball would not be part of my circle, certainly not my inner circle. I would rather not be elected than associate with someone like Rezko.

Nor for political or any other reasons would I choose Rev. Wright, Rev. Meeks, or Father Plager as my spiritual mentors. Again, he is either blind or an opportunist. Would I be hanging out with Mr. Ayers? Would you? Would you refuse to be photographed with Gavin Newsom? There is a pattern with this guy - he manipulates; the ends justify the means. He lacks character.
Getting not one bill passed in the first 6 years of his career in not inspiring. Having Emil Jones hand him the ball 26 times on the one-yard line in order to make Obama a United States Senator does not cut it either. What deals he made, he did to benefit no one but himself. He never worked long enough in either Senate to help the people who elected him. Andy, I could never imagine you taking credit for legislation someone else slaved over. Starting in his community organizing days he claimed sole responsibility for other people's accomplishments all for the purpose to boosting his career.

In terms of the campaign itself, I had the opportunity to witness his methods up close. During the primaries I was in 6 states, 2 of which had caucuses; it was not clean. El Paso was a joke with the Obama campaign stealing the caucus packets, locking supporters out - Intimidation 101, 102 and 103. Fair elections do not seem to be a priority in my birth state. No other machine exists from the days of Boss Tweed, but Chicago's. How many elected officials are in jail?They are the joke of the nation. It is called the Chicago machine for good reason.

It was clear that what I saw and experienced was not a fluke or isolated incidents, but coordinated, deliberate and arrogant. I got to see him and his organization for who he is and what it is - not inspiring, to say the least. Not something I would have, in business, endorsed in any way. In fact, I would most likely have reported them to the appropriate regulators.
Andy, I have consistently found you to be a compassionate person, but more importantly you have always put your money where your mouth is. Does it not bother you that a guy like Obama can serve a poor district and give away a paltry $1000 to charity? He only stepped up his giving when he decided to run for President and he knew his charitable giving would be made public. How could anyone see that much misery and not try to personally do something about it?
Please, show me something this guy ever did that was not done in a calculated fashion to create and advance his own personal narrative? Something selfless, perhaps, just because it was the right thing to do?

Every person I have talked to who worked at the Law Review at Harvard with him, or in the later part of his career, said the same thing: he was arrogant and self-centered. One person laughed, saying Obama wanted to be King of the World, that he was always running for something, never staying in one place long enough to amass accomplishments or be held accountable.

Do you not you find it troublesome that he has hundreds of paid bloggers, posting vicious attacks not only about the Clintons but her supporters as well? The whole purpose was to cast him as the second coming, while trashing her and quashing other points of view.

At first I thought is was just some hyped up kids, and then a pattern emerged. He paid others to do his dirty work. The most egregious sexist cracks were rampant, both on the Internet and the MSM. Yet, what did Howard and Obama say? Nothing. Obama promoted it, paid his bloggers to write it. Never once did he try to stop it. Howard, after the damage was done finally commented on it, but barely. Wink, wink.

Andy, I heard remarks that still make my jaw drop.

You know I consider myself a centrist. The right wing of the Republican Party scares me, but so does the left. Ideologues of either side should not have control simultaneously of the executive, legislative, and judicial arms of the government. Absolute power corrupts, be it on the left or the right. Ha, but you will say.... the courts. If you have the legislative branch, all will be fine. McCain voted Ginsberg in, he is not a stupid man and certainly not an Ideologue, and he took heat in the primaries for refusing to have a litmus test for judges. And need I remind you that Obama thought Roberts was an acceptable appointment until some more experienced hands in the Senate told him that would not do?

Painting him as Bush 3 is a little annoying, and what's up with the MoveOn Baby Alex commercial? Give credit where credit is due. McCain went against his own party twice on immigration reform, on ethanol subsidies, and campaign finance reform. He started talking about Global warming 8 years ago. I don't agree with McCain on a number of topics, but I do believe he has principals and a backbone. He is not willing to say anything to get elected.

I can't say the same for Obama who is turning out to be more like Bush than McCain; Obama is at least as arrogant as W, just more polished. Are you not ashamed, in these past weeks, of his reckless abandon of any pretense to a moral center on issues such as FISA, separation of church and state, gun control? And what he did to one of my heroes, Wes Clark? Insulting my intelligence and my standards will not win me over.

But, in this conversation, you will say, McCain wants to be in Iraq for 100 years. No, he said that as in Japan, or Korea, we could have a presence. We have been in both of those countries for 60 years and not leaving any time soon, and the world is safer for it.

Next will be, McCain is not knowledgeable about the economy. While with Carly Fiorina, who I remember from her Lucent days, at a town meeting he turned the mic over to Carly when asked about the mortgage mess, painting her as the expert. Wow - he gave a woman a compliment, praising her knowledge, referring to her as the expert. How often have you praised Charles, or me, and everyone for that matter? Why? Because you are gracious and you know it reflects well on you.

All this might not bother me if so much if the stakes where not so high, but they are. I am an issues person, not a cult of personality devotee. Substance matters. Barack is a politician, an inexperienced one at that, pretending he is different. I just see him as arrogant and power hungry. Our country deserves better, someone I would be proud to do business with.

Andy, my country comes first, not the Democrat party. Having said that, I believe that the Democratic Party has just kicked away the best candidate and our best chance to redeem our country, Hillary Clinton, a proven centrist. Given his resume, or should I say the lack of one, he is either ineffective or hiding something, neither answer gives me the warm and fuzzies. If she is chosen in Denver, you can count on my full and enthusiastic support. Until then,
I own my vote.

http://www.hillaryclintonforum.net/discussion/showthread.php?t=21580

2008Obama reveals Rezko played a bigger fundraising role

http://mobile.chicagotribune.com/detail.jsp?key=150639&rc=top&full=1

By David Jackson
Chicago Tribune reporter
March 14, 2008 17:13

PMIndicted Chicago businessman Antoin "Tony" Rezko was a more significant fundraiser for presidential candidate Barack Obama's earlier political campaigns than previously known. Rezko raised as much as $250,000 for the first three offices Obama sought, the senator told the Tribune on Friday.

Obama also said for the first time that his private real estate transactions with Rezko were not simply mistakes of judgment because Rezko was under grand jury investigation at the time of their 2005 and 2006 dealings. In addition, he said, "The mistake was he had been a contributor and somebody involved in politics."

In an extensive interview that he hoped would quell the lingering controversy over his relationship with Rezko, Obama said that voters concerned about his judgment should view it as "a mistake in not seeing the potential conflicts of interest."

But he added that voters should also "see somebody who is not engaged in any wrongdoing . . . and who they can trust."Obama said that when he questioned Rezko about news reports of his questionable political dealings, his friend assured him there was nothing wrong. "My instinct was to believe him," he said.

Asked if he ever thought Rezko would expect something from their relationship, Obama was definitive. "No, precisely because I'd known him for [many] years and he hadn't asked me for favors."

Since the Tribune in November 2006 revealed their personal financial dealings, Obama has called himself "boneheaded" for doing business with Rezko at a time when the Chicago dealmaker was widely reported to be under federal grand jury investigation.

The most vexing issue hits Obama right at home. The Obamas and the Rezkos bought adjacent South Side properties from the same seller on the same day in June 2005. They subsequently engaged in a series of private transactions to improve and re-divide their parcels, giving the Obamas a bigger yard and a buffer for their $1.65 million Georgian revival home.

Over the last year, Obama has been reluctant to discuss his dealings with Rezko. His efforts to deflect questions seemed successful until January, when Sen. Hillary Clinton effectively introduced Rezko to a national audience by invoking his name at a caustic Democratic debate in South Carolina.

On the eve of the crucial Ohio and Texas primaries earlier this month, Obama cut short a combative news conference in San Antonio when reporters peppered him with Rezko questions, saying such requests "can just go on forever."

Clinton faces her own set of unanswered questions--about her personal tax returns, her scheduling records as first lady and donations to the Clinton Presidential Library. But that doesn't negate the unease that even some Obama supporters have expressed about Obama's ties to Rezko.

Though Obama had insisted he has answered all inquiries, until Friday's interview his campaign's piecemeal written statements had left lingering uncertainties about whether the up-and-coming senator exchanged favors with the target of a federal probe.

The friendship between Obama and Rezko began in 1991, when Rezko was making his mark as a well-regarded, politically connected housing developer. Obama, a community organizer, won national recognition as the first black president of the Harvard Law Review, and Rezko offered Obama a job building inner-city homes with his Rezmar Corp. Though Obama declined, a friendship and political alliance began.

When Obama launched his bid for the Illinois Senate in 1995, Rezko was his first substantial contributor.

The following year, Obama was elected, then re-elected in 1998. Rezko helped bankroll Obama's subsequent campaigns: Obama lost a primary bid for the U.S. House of Representatives in 2000 but won re-election repeatedly as a state senator and then was sworn into the U.S. Senate in January 2005. Rezko, already under indictment by the time Obama announced his presidential run, has not contributed to or raised funds for that race.

dyjackson@tribune.com

My bold and highlight. SJ

Obama and Rezko

By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY Posted Thursday, March 06, 2008 4:20 PM PT
Election 2008: For an ambitious and savvy politician, Barack Obama has not picked his friends wisely. They include an assortment of influence-peddlers, terrorists and Iraqi billionaires. If you thought the Clinton White House was interesting, just wait.

Related Topics: Election 2008

The jury has been selected and opening arguments were heard Thursday in the corruption trial of Antonin "Tony" Rezko. If the name doesn't ring a bell, it's because the press hasn't shown much interest in what has been considered a local Chicago story. But it has international and disturbing implications.
Hillary Clinton may have been casting the first stone in a recent debate when she blasted Obama's cozy relationship with Syrian immigrant and "slumlord" Rezko, who rose to become a player in Chicago and Illinois politics. But she was right on target.

Rezko: Fixer for a front-runner?

Rezko was among Obama's earliest supporters. In 1995, when Obama ran for a seat in the Illinois Senate, Rezko, through two of his companies, gave Obama $2,000. Obama won election in 1996 in a district that coincidentally included 11 of Rezko's 30 low-income housing projects.

In 2003, when Obama said he'd run for the U.S. Senate, Rezko held a lavish fundraiser at his Wilmette, Ill., mansion. Rezko has raised a lot of money for Obama, who is returning $150,000 raised by Rezko and his associates and is giving $72,650 in Rezko contributions to charity.

Rezko is known by the Chicago press as a "fixer" who can make things happen for a price. Little is done out of the goodness of his heart. He's on trial for bilking up to $6 million from the people of Illinois through kickbacks while working for the administration of current Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich. Did Rezko find jobs for Obama supporters? That is one of the questions the Chicago press wanted to ask before Obama cut short a recent press conference.

Rezko and Obama would do business yet again. In 2005, when Rezko was under federal investigation for influence peddling in Blagojevich's administration, Obama and Rezko's wife, Rita, bought adjacent pieces of property from a Chicago doctor.
The doctor sold one parcel to Obama for $1.65 million, $300,000 below the asking price, while Rezko's wife paid full price, $625,000, for the adjacent vacant lot. Six months later, Obama paid Rezko's wife $104,500 for a 10-foot-wide strip of her land, allegedly so that he could have a bigger yard.

The deal rendered the Rezko parcel too small to build on, thereby increasing the value of Obama's property. What was Rezko expecting in return for this favor to Obama that made Rezko's parcel almost worthless?

An interesting sidebar to the deal was that just weeks before, an Iraqi billionaire by the name of Nadhmi Auchi, who has a French conviction for corruption to his credit, had loaned Rezko $3.5 million through the Panamanian company Fintrade Services FA.

A 2004 Pentagon report obtained by the Washington Times identified Auchi as a global arms dealer and Iraqi billionaire "who, behind the facade of legitimate business, served as Saddam Hussein's principle international financial manipulator and bag man."

The report states that "significant and credible evidence has been developed that Nadhmi Auchi has engaged in unlawful activities" such as bribing "foreign governments and individuals prior to Operation Iraqi Freedom to turn opinion against the American-led mission to remove Saddam Hussein." He also helped "arrange for significant theft from the U.N. Oil-for-Food Program to smuggle weapons and dual-use technology into Iraq."

Yet Auchi, despite his French conviction and other activities, was somehow able to get permission to come to Chicago in 2004. John Batchelor of Human Events says that in April 2004 Auchi met with Rezko, Gov. Blagojevich, State Senate President Emil Jones Jr. and reportedly then-state Sen. Obama, who'd just won the Democratic U.S. Senate nomination.

So this, er, businessman meets Obama and friends at the Four Seasons hotel in downtown Chicago. Obama acknowledges attending an event there where Rezko was present but doesn't recall meeting Auchi. "He shook a lot of hands and met a lot of people," an Obama aide told the London Times.

Did he shake Auchi's? The newspaper said the timing of the loan to Rezko and the Obama property purchase, along with the purchase of land next door by Rezko's wife from the same seller, raise questions about whether Auchi helped buy the house. It raises a lot of questions.

Why would an Iraqi billionaire, a "fixer" like Rezko and a Saddam protege, be interested in a rising U.S. politician who was also opposed to the ousting of Hussein by U.S. forces? Why would that billionaire lend that much money to Obama's fundraiser, Rezko, with the two buying adjacent properties from the same seller on the same day?

Rezko has told a court that Auchi is a "close friend." Obviously. Aside from the $3.5 million loan, Auchi and Rezko became partners in a Midwest pizzeria business. Through various dealings, Rezko wound up owing Auchi more than $27 million. What did Auchi want in return? Perhaps a friend in the White House? Both Rezko and Auchi were, and are, in the business of buying influence.

Among Obama's circle of friends is William C. Ayers, currently a professor of education at the University of Chicago and a former aide to Chicago's current mayor, Richard M. Daley. He served with Obama on the board of the Woods Fund of Chicago.
Back in the 1970s he was known simply as Bill Ayers, a terrorist with the Weathermen who was quoted in the New York Times as finding "a certain eloquence in bombs." Married to fellow Weathermen terrorist Bernadine Dohrn, he writes openly about his role in the 1974 bombing of the U.S. Capitol Building.

His memoirs appeared in the New York Times, oddly enough, on Sept. 11, 2001. In them, he wrote: "I don't regret setting bombs. I feel we didn't do enough." Does Barack Obama agree? Or will he denounce these words of his friend as he did with Louis Farrakhan after Farrakhan's endorsement of Obama?

The trial of an Illinois influence-peddler may answer the many questions that surround the past and future of Barack Obama. Clearly, the friends he has chosen are not friends of honest, clean government or of the United States.

http://ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=289698788263978#

Obama and Chicago Mores

By JOHN FUND
March 3, 2008; Page A17

On Tuesday, Barack Obama may well wrap up the Democratic nomination. Yet how he rose so quickly in Chicago's famously suspect politics -- and who his associates were there -- has received little scrutiny.

That may change today as the trial of Antoin "Tony" Rezko, Mr. Obama's friend of two decades and his campaign fund-raiser, gets under way in federal court in Chicago. Mr. Rezko, a master fixer in Illinois politics, is charged with money laundering, attempted extortion, fraud and aiding bribery in an alleged multimillion dollar scheme shaking down companies seeking state contracts.

John McCain's dealings with lobbyists have properly come under a microscope; why not Mr. Obama's? Partly, says Chicago Tribune columnist John Kass, because the national media establishment has decided that Chicago's grubby politics interferes with the story line of hope they've set out for Mr. Obama. Former Washington Post reporter Tom Edsall, who now teaches journalism at Columbia University, told Canada's Globe & Mail that "reporters have sometimes allowed themselves to get too much caught up in [Obama] excitement." Then there are Chicago Republicans, loath to encourage the national party to pounce because some of their own leaders are caught in the Rezko mess.

For its part, the Democratic Party may once again nominate a first-time candidate they haven't fully vetted politically. Democrats flocked to Michael Dukakis in 1988, ignoring Al Gore's warnings about Willie Horton; later they were blindsided by revelations about Bill Clinton after he was elected president.

This year, Hillary Clinton made a clumsy attack on Mr. Rezko as a "slum landlord" during one debate. But her campaign has otherwise steered clear -- at least until last Friday, when Howard Wolfson, a top Clinton aide, suggested to reporters on a conference call that "the number of questions that we don't know the answers to about the relationship between Mr. Rezko and Mr. Obama is staggering." Mr. Obama's campaign told me they have answered all questions about Mr. Rezko and have no plans to release any further records.


Mr. Obama has admitted that the 2005 land deal that he and Mr. Rezko were involved in was a "boneheaded" mistake, in part because his friend was already rumored to be under federal investigation. The newly elected Mr. Obama bought his $1.65 million home on the same day, June 15, that Mr. Rezko's wife bought the plot of land next to it from the same seller for $625,000. Seven months later she sold a slice of the land to the trust that Mr. Obama had put the house into, so the senator could expand his garden.

Mr. Obama has strenuously denied suggestions that the same-day sale enabled him to pay $300,000 under the house's asking price because Mrs. Rezko paid full price for the adjoining lot, or that he asked the Rezkos for help in the matter. Both actions would be clear violations of Senate ethics rules barring the granting or asking of favors.

Still, there are anomalies. Mr. Obama admits that he and Mr. Rezko took a tour of the house before it and the adjoining plot were sold. Financial records given to federal prosecutors a year later show Mrs. Rezko had a salary of only $37,000 and assets of $35,000. In court proceedings at that time, to explain how much his bail should be, Mr. Rezko declared that he had "no income, negative cash flow, no liquid assets."

So where did the money for Mrs. Rezko's $125,000 down payment -- and the collateral for her $500,000 loan from a local bank controlled by Amrish Mahajan, like Mr. Rezko a Chicago political fixer -- come from?

The London Times reports that, three weeks before the land transactions, Nadhmi Auchi, an Iraqi billionaire living in London, loaned $3.5 million to Mr. Rezko, who was his Chicago business partner. Mr. Auchi's office says he had "no involvement in or knowledge of" the property purchase. Mr. Auchi is a press-shy property developer (estimated worth: $4 billion) who was convicted of corruption in France in 2003 for his involvement in the Elf affair, the biggest political and corporate fraud inquiry in Europe since World War II. He was fined $3 million and given a 15-month prison term that was suspended provided he committed no further crimes.

Mr. Auchi was also a top official in the Iraqi oil ministry in the 1970s. He has for years vigorously denied charges he had dealings with Saddam Hussein after the first Gulf War. However, an official report to the Pentagon inspector general in 2004 obtained by the Washington Times cited "significant and credible evidence" of involvement by Mr. Auchi's companies in the Oil for Food scandal and illicit smuggling of weapons to the Hussein regime.

In 2003, Mr. Auchi began investing in Chicago real estate with Mr. Rezko. In April 2007, after his indictment, Mr. Auchi loaned another $3.5 million to Mr. Rezko, a loan that Mr. Rezko hid from U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald's office. When Mr. Fitzgerald learned that the money was being parceled out to Mr. Rezko's lawyers, family and friends, he got Mr. Rezko's bond revoked in January and had him put in jail as a potential flight risk.

In court papers, the prosecutor noted that Mr. Rezko had traveled 26 times to the Middle East between 2002 and 2006, mostly to his native Syria and other countries that lack extradition treaties with the U.S. Curiously, Mr. Auchi has also lent an unknown sum of money to Chris Kelly, who, like Mr. Rezko, was a significant fund-raiser for Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich (himself under investigation by a federal grand jury as an alleged beneficiary of the Rezko shakedowns). Mr. Kelly is himself under indictment for obstructing an IRS probe into his activities.

Mr. Obama says he has "no recollection" of meeting Mr. Auchi during a 2004 trip the billionaire made to Chicago, and no one believes he knew of his background. While his name will come up in the trial as a beneficiary of Rezko donations (since donated to charity), Mr. Obama will not be called to testify.

There may be nothing more in Mr. Obama's dealings with Mr. Rezko beyond an "appearance of impropriety." Still, Mr. Obama does have an obligation to explain how he fits into Chicago politics. David Axelrod, Mr. Obama's Karl Rove, is a longtime spoke in the Daley machine that's dominated Chicago for a half century. Gov. Blagojevich, also part of the machine, shared key fund raisers with Mr. Obama.

"We have a sick political culture, and that's the environment Barack Obama came from," Jay Stewart, the executive director of the Chicago Better Government Association, told ABC News. He notes that, while Mr. Obama supported ethics reforms as a state senator, he has "been noticeably silent on the issue of corruption here in his home state, including at this point, mostly Democratic politicians."

Mr. Obama will eventually have to talk about Illinois, if only to clear the air. After John McCain last month was attacked for cozy ties to lobbyists, he held a news conference and answered every question. Hillary Clinton held a White House news conference on Whitewater and her cattle futures. Mr. Obama must do the same for questions about Mr. Rezko and "the Chicago way" of politics. If he doesn't, they may increasingly haunt his candidacy.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB120450564143806509.html?mod=djemEditorialPage

Mr. Fund is a columnist for WSJ.com.

As Developer Heads to Trial, Questions Linger Over a Deal With Obama

By MIKE McINTIRE and CHRISTOPHER DREW

Published: March 02, 2008

Tony Rezko was obviously in trouble. He was a defendant in at least a dozen lawsuits, federal investigators in Chicago were poking around, and his name was in newspaper articles about corruption and fraud.

None of that stopped Mr. Rezko, a politically connected developer, and Senator Barack Obama from completing real estate deals a few years ago that resulted in the Obamas obtaining their dream house and the Rezkos buying an empty lot next door.

Nearly three years later, fallout from Mr. Obama's relationship with Mr. Rezko, who raised more than $150,000 for Mr. Obama's campaigns, continue to dog Mr. Obama on the presidential campaign trail. That distraction promises to linger as Mr. Rezko goes on trial on corruption charges starting Monday.

Mr. Obama, a Democrat, is not part of the case against Mr. Rezko, who is accused of shaking down companies seeking business with the State of Illinois. Mr. Obama has conceded that it was a mistake to bring Mr. Rezko into his personal real estate dealings, although he has insisted that there was nothing unusual about the developer's decision to buy a sought-after lot in an upscale neighborhood.

But a review of court records, including new details of Mr. Rezko's finances that emerged recently, show that the lot purchase occurred as he was being pursued by creditors seeking more than $10 million, deepening the mystery of why he would plunge into a real estate investment whose biggest beneficiary appears to have been Mr. Obama.

As Mr. Obama and Mr. Rezko were completing the property purchases in June 2005, Mr. Rezko was fighting to keep lenders and investors at bay over defaulted loans and failing business ventures. But he side-stepped that financial dragnet by arranging for the land to be bought in his wife's name, making it the only property she owned by herself, according to land records.

Click here for Full Article

Mansion 'mistake' piles the pressure on Obama

From The Times
February 26, 2008

James Bone in New York and Dominic Kennedy in London

The key players Timeline: Barack and the billionaire

A British-Iraqi billionaire lent millions of dollars to Barack Obama's fundraiser just weeks before an imprudent land deal that has returned to haunt the presidential contender, an investigation by The Times discloses.

The money transfer raises the question of whether funds from Nadhmi Auchi, one of Britain’s wealthiest men, helped Mr Obama buy his mock Georgian mansion in Chicago.

A company related to Mr Auchi, who has a conviction for corruption in France, registered the loan to Mr Obama's bagman Antoin "Tony" Rezko on May 23 2005. Mr Auchi says the loan, through the Panamanian company Fintrade Services SA, was for $3.5 million.

Three weeks later, Mr Obama bought a house on the city's South Side while Mr Rezko's wife bought the garden plot next door from the same seller on the same day, June 15.

Mr Obama says he never used Mrs Rezko's still-empty lot, which could only be accessed through his property. But he admits he paid his gardener to mow the lawn.

Mrs Rezko, whose husband was widely known to be under investigation at the time, went on to sell a 10-foot strip of her property to Mr Obama seven months later so he could enjoy a bigger garden.
Mr Obama now admits his involvement in this land deal was a “boneheaded mistake”.

Mrs Rezko’s purchase and sale of the land to Mr Obama raises many unanswered questions.

It is unclear how Mrs Rezko could have afforded the downpayment of $125,000 and a $500,000 mortgage for the original $625,000 purchase of the garden plot at 5050 South Greenwood Ave.
In a sworn statement a year later, Mrs Rezko said she got by on a salary of $37,000 and had $35,000 assets. Mr Rezko told a court he had "no income, negative cash flow, no liquid assets, no unencumbered assets [and] is significantly in arrears on many of his obligations."

Mrs Rezko, whose husband goes on trial on unrelated corruption charges in Chicago on March 3, refused to answer questions about the case when she spoke by telephone to The Times.

Asked if she used money from her husband to buy the land next to Mr Obama's house, she said: "I can't answer these questions, I'm sorry."

Asked how long she and her husband had known Mr Auchi, she replied: "I will not be able to answer this question."

Mr Auchi's lawyer, asked whether the Fintrade Services loan was used to buy the land which became Mr Obama's garden, stated: "No, not as far as my client is aware."

Mr Auchi's links with Mr Rezko are a new political headache for Mr Obama, the charismatic Illinois senator vying to become America’s first African-American president.

Hillary Clinton has sought to make Mr Rezko, who has bankrolled Mr Obama's political career since his first run for the Illinois state senate in the mid-1990s, into an election issue by calling him a "slum landlord" in a televised debate. She has repeatedly suggested that Mr Obama has effectively not been "vetted" by media scrutiny and will not withstand "the Republican attack machine".

See the London Times for complete article at: http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/us_and_americas/us_elections/article3433485.ece?token=null&offset=24