RW Update

RezkoWatch has recently been brought out of mothballs and most posts prior to July 1, 2008, are available here and at our successor blog, RBO.

Preliminary notes on the Obama mortgage

This will be RW's 29th post about Obama's "Rezko" house. Two recent events have brought the mortgage of Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) and his wife, Michelle Obama, who took theirs out with Northern Trust on their Hyde Park townhouse, back into the news. First, Countrywide mortgage lenders is being sued in Illinois by Attorney General Lisa Madigan. Second, The Politico asked all 100 Senators "about their home mortgages in the wake of the revelations that Senators Chris Dodd (D-Conn) and Kent Conrad (D-ND) received special treatment from their lenders. In Obama's case, he stated that he did not receive any such favors."

Finally, a retired Illinois state employee, writing under the pseudonym "Richard Henry Lee", in a July 1, 2008, article at American Thinker, shed some light on the Obama's mortgage itself:

According to the mortgage documents which his campaign released, the Obamas obtained a $1.32 million mortgage from Northern Trust. ... The Obamas' loan documents (warning: large file) show that they received a 30 year fixed rate loan at an interest rate of 5.625% with no points. This interest rate is seems to be in line with the going rates for a Jumbo mortgage which are typically about 0.25 to 0.5% higher than a smaller, conventional mortgage. Freddie Mac lists an average rate of 5.58% for June 2005 and 0.6 points. Obama paid no points and given the jumbo differential, his rate is better than the average. The first payment is given as $7,598.67 presumably due August 1, 2005 which is consistent with the loan terms.

The second mortgage, dated November 25, 2005, is also a loan from Northern Trust, for an amount not to exceed $250,000. This appears to be a credit line for whatever purpose. It could have been used to purchase a 10 foot portion of the adjoining lot from Rita Rezko for $104,500 on January 11, 2006. There is no interest rate given for this credit line and it may be a variable rate.

Another unanswered question was who paid Obama's 2005 property taxes. On May 5, 2008, RW wrote:

Cook County Tax Assessors' Office shows that Sen. Obama's 2005 assessed taxes were, as we already know, $21,729.03, and for the "current year", 2006, $22,162.47, which had been paid in March and December 2007. The taxes for both years had been paid; there were no open years, back taxes due, or any additional taxes or special assessments noted.

Additionally, William Miceli is clearly identified on this tax document as the assessee for Sen. Obama's entire real estate holding. In the upper righthand corner of the page is the handwritten notation "Assessee is with Miner, Barnhill & Galland PC @ 14 W Erie", which is the law firm's address.

We now learn from Lee that the mortgage documents show that William Miceli "signed the real estate documents on behalf of the trust," making him the trustee, which explains why the property tax documents were to be sent to him and not Northern Trust.

However, we still do not know who paid those 2005 property taxes.

Regarding the interest rate negotiated by the Obamas, Lee writes:

The Obama's declared mortgage interest deductions on their tax returns of $32,418 for 2005, $60,449 for 2006, and $57,838 for 2007. But their Northern Trust loan at the terms stated would have generated interest payments of about $30,871 for 2005, $73,395 for 2006 and $72,368 for 2007. For 2005, there would have been additional interest payments for their Hyde Park Condo which they sold on April 29, 2005 so even the 2005 deducted amount is low.

Using the mortgage interest deducted for 2006 and 2007, one can estimate an effective interest rate of about 4.6 to 4.65%, far below the stated interest rate in their loan documents of 5.625%, assuming no prepayment of the loan. After the Obamas got their loan, interest rates were increasing. See http://www.freddiemac.com/pmms/pmms30.htm and click on the link in the article for 30 year fixed rate mortgages. So there were no declining rates to take advantage of.

The Obama's might have refinanced with an Adjustable Rate Mortgage whose rates are lower, but the loan documents released by the Obama campaign did not include an ARM mortgage. See http://www.freddiemac.com/pmms/pmms5.htm for a five year adjustable rate. For June 2005, it was 5.06, but would be higher for a jumbo.

It is of course possible that the Obamas were able to pay down their mortgage loan. His books were selling and Michelle had nearly tripled her income from the University of Chicago Hospital when her husband was elected a United States Senator. So the Obamas may have chosen to apply some of the windfall toward paying down the mortgage. It would have required about $240,000 in paydown for the reported mortgage interest to equal 5.625%.on the reduced principle.

But this calculation ignores any possible interest payments on their quarter million dollar line of credit, something they should not have needed if they had spare cash to pay down their mortgage.

It seems inconceivable that the Obamas simply forgot to include all the interest. Another possibility is that they skipped some payments, but that too seems unlikely. Maybe his campaign can explain this discrepancy.

Oh, Mr. "Lee", have you not yet learned that with the Obamas every question answered just leads to another hall of mirrors?

The large (pdf) file of mortgage documents is 94 pages, some of which, at first glance, RW has seen previously and will now comb for details. Expect a follow up post soon.

Klein: Obama campaign site: Free Islamic terrorist!

Dr. Sami Al-Arian

A blog posting on Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.)'s official campaign site—which is "just a sampling of a large volume of racist, anti-Semitic and pro-Palestinian rhetoric published on the user-friendly MyObama community blog pages"—"urges Americans to take action to secure the release of imprisoned terrorist fundraiser Sami Al-Arian, comparing the controversial former professor to Martin Luther King and Malcolm X," Aaron Klein, Jerusalem bureau chief of World Net Daily reported June 29, 2008.

In a blog post on Obama's site titled, "We are all Palestinians," user Ulf Erlingsson laments what he calls the "harsh" conditions of Al-Arian's imprisonment – explaining he "lives in segregation … is not allowed any visitors and is given only two phone calls a month."

The posting quotes Agha Saeed, chair of the American Muslim Taskforce on Civil Rights and Elections, comparing Al-Arian to King and Malcom X, who "symbolized the struggle for human rights in the fifties and sixties. Dr. Sami Al-Arian has come to symbolize the current struggle for human rights."

Al-Arian is also labeled an "internationally recognized political prisoner."

Obama's site readers are called upon to "take urgent action. Just 3 phone calls and 1 E-mail to make a difference."

The blog, "first noticed this weekend" by Little Green Footballs, "goes on to list phone numbers or e-mails for Al-Arian's jail, a civil liberties office at the Homeland Security Department and the attorney general handling the Al-Arian case. The posting gives specific instructions for what protestors should say when they call the various agencies," Klein wrote.

The blog also links to a Free Al-Arian website for readers interested in learning more.

Al-Arian, a former university professor, was arrested in 2003 on multiple charges of funding terrorists, including the Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror organization, which took credit for every suicide bombing in Israel since 2005. In 2006, Al-Arian accepted a plea bargain resulting in a conviction with conspiracy to aid Islamic Jihad.

Al-Arian was sentenced to 57 months in prison including time served. He was to serve the remainder of 19 months and then be deported, but he was held in contempt of court for refusing to testify in other related terrorism cases involving former associates. The contempt charges were overturned last year, but in March Al-Arian was subpoenaed to testify in front of another grand jury in a terrorist case, and he has so far refused.

The Al-Arian posting is joined by volumes of controversial rhetoric posted by registered users on Obama's official campaign site. Some of the offending postings have been removed, while others still remain.

"The Obama campaign does not monitor all blog material, which is posted by registered users, but says it removes offending posts that are brought to the attention of the administrators," Klein wrote.

Read the rest of Klein's article here.

RW Quotes of the Week

"There does not seem to be anything great about Obama. It appears more and more that there is no there, there. The argument that 'he will surround himself with great people' is no good either. He hasn't yet. He does the opposite - he attaches himself and detaches himself from people like a mosquito - just long enough to suck some blood and move on."—John, Liberal Rapture, 06/28/08.

In response to the anti-PUMA group HOUND (Hillary-Obama-United-Not-Divided), the Just Say No Deal Coalition counters with "H.O.U.N.D. = Heck, Obama's Unqualified, No Deal!"

Let's talk about Obama's 2006 trip to the Middle East (Updated)

Sen. Barack Obama and Nadhmi Auchi

Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) is "poised to announce—as early as this weekend", according to "word in European diplomatic circles", that he "will be adding stops in England, France and Germany when he heads to Iraq and Afghanistan," Lynn Sweet reported June 27, 2008, in the Chicago Sun-Times.

The Obama campaign said this week that details about the Iraq and Afghanistan trip would be released in the coming days. ... The Obama team, experts at stagecraft, might see a plus of July 4 pictures of Obama with U.S. troops in a war zone.

This raises several inconvenient questions.

Will Sen. Obama, who has served as its Chairman since January 2007, finally convene the U.S. Senate Committee on Foreign Relations, Subcommittee on Europe either before or after his trip?

On Sen. Obama's only trip to Iraq in January 2006, he was part of a Congressional delegation (CODEL) led by Sen. Evan Bayh (D-Ind.) which also included Sen. Christopher Bond (R.-Mo.) and Rep. Harold Ford (D.-Tenn.), but was actually only in Iraq for a mere two days.

What we do know about this trip is that Sen. Obama spent the two days in Iraq before separating from the delegation to "spend eight days in Israel, Kuwait, Jordan and the Palestinian territories." The rest of the delegation later went to Afghanistan and Pakistan without Obama.

What we do not know is who accompanied Sen. Obama on his eight-day swing through Israel, Kuwait, Jordan and the Palestinian terroritories.

What we also do not know is with whom he met in those countries and what they discussed. Isn't the public entitled to know these things?

Is it possible that Sen. Obama met up with fellow Chicagoan, political fixer Antoin "Tony" Rezko, who FBI informant John Thomas reported had made more than 20 trips back and forth between Chicago and the Middle East between October 2004 and October 2006, when he was arrested by federal agents upon his return to the United States?¹

Is it possible that Sen. Obama met up with Iraqi-British international businessman Nadhmi Auchi, whom he had toasted at a private dinner party hosted April 3, 2004, at Tony Rezko's mansion, with both Obama and Auchi later saying that they did not recall ever having met?

Is it possible that Sen. Obama met up with fellow Chicagoan Iraqi-American Aiham Alsammarae whose children subsequently, in December 2006, contacted his senatorial office for his assistance in protecting their father who was incarcerated in a Baghdad jail inside the Green Zone? Did Sen. Obama and Alsammarae discuss the yet-pending Iraqi power plant contract that the Senator's aide, Seamus Ahern, discussed between April and October 2006 with Daniel Frawley, Rezko's business partner?

Yes, these are inconvenient questions. But, once again, let RW remind its visitors, we're electing a President. In this post-9/11 world, Americans are entitled to know everything they possibly can about the candidates who are asking for their trust and for their votes.

Endnote ¹: By the way, RW first posed the question about Sen. Obama's less-than-$200 unaccounted for contributions on February 13, 2008. Where has the media been on this?

Update: Steve Gilbert, Obama To Campaign In Europe, Mideast, Sweetness & Light, June 28, 2008.

Announcing the First Ever Obama Jackass Award; New Nominations Now Accepted

And it's awarded to ... Sen. Barack Obama

"[B]ecause of the campaign that Hillary Clinton waged, my daughters and all of your daughters will forever know that there is no barrier to who they are and what they can be in the United States of America. They can take for granted that women can do anything that the boys can do (cheers begin) -- and do it better, and do it in heels. I still (Obama laughs) -- I still don't know how she does it in heels."—Gateway Pundit.

UPDATE: RW is now accepting nominations for the Obama Jackass Award. Please submit name (hint, hint) and reason for the nomination (include link, please). Obama Jackass Award spamming is discouraged although we here at RW feel your pain.

Tick, tock -- Rezko trial figure indicted

Convicted political fixer and Sen. Barack Obama's personal real estate fairy, Antoin "Tony" Rezko

As "prosecutors pressed ahead with their investigation of corruption" in Illinois state government, suburban doctor Robert J. Weinsten, "heard on FBI tapes discussing alleged corruption with a key government witness against" convicted political fixer Antoin "Tony" Rezko, was indicted Thursday, June 26, 2008, in a three-count indictment on charges of "wire fraud, mail fraud and lying to an FBI agent" when he said that Stuart Levine "never told him about Rezko's political clout," the AP's Mike Robinson reported.

Weinstein is a "longtime business partner of convicted political fixer Stuart Levine," Bob Secter and Ray Gibson wrote in the Chicago Tribune. "Weinstein was one of several business and political figures who had not been charged with wrongdoing but whose names swirled around the peripheries of the schemes involving Levine and Rezko. Others included prominent Republican power brokers William Cellini and Robert Kjellander. They have not been charged."

"Weinstein didn’t testify at Rezko’s two-month corruption trial, but jurors still heard from him. The two could be heard chattering on surveillance tapes about illicit state deals, and Levine would often boast to Weinstein about how he carried out various scams, including those involving a state hospital and pension boards," Natasha Korecki reported in the Chicago Sun-Times.

Robinson wrote:

The indictment says Weinstein was well aware of Rezko's influence in the Blagojevich administration and that during an April 21, 2004 conversation, Levine specifically told him a key vote by the Illinois Health Facilities Planning Board was fixed. [...]

The new indictment also charges that Levine and Weinstein joined in defrauding two organizations: the Rosalind Franklin University of Medicine and Science, formerly known as Finch University of Health Sciences/the Chicago Medical School, and the Northshore Support Organization, which Weinstein established in 2001. He said its goal was to support the medical school.

In Rezko's trial verdict, Weinstein was named in Counts 13, 14, and 15 for wire fraud.

Obama's $286+ million bundled dollars (updated)

In the past week, RW has been writing (here and here) about campaign finance reform Obama-style, including the fact that Josh Gerstein reported February 12, 2008, in the New York Sun that funds raised by Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.), "more than $118 million, or one-quarter of the total raised in [that] cycle, [was] banked without disclosure of who gave the funds or where the donations originated."

The money is coming from hundreds of thousands of donations of $200 or less, which have been widely praised for democratizing the system for funding White House bids. However, the surge in low-dollar gifts has come at the cost of transparency, since federal law only requires campaigns to itemize donations when a donor gives more than $200.

One has to wonder how many of these $199 or less contributions may have passed through the hands of Sen. Obama's bundlers—corporate officers and employers—leaving the donors' names undocumented and unreported.

RW reported March 30, 2008, that Public Citizen (WhiteHouseForSale.or) listed 9 of Sen. Obama's fundraising bundlers as registered lobbyists who had by then collected in the neighborhood of $1.5 million for his campaign—in addition to their own personal contributions.

Today, even though Public Citizen lists 14 registered lobbyists (list follows article) as Obama bundlers, the $1.9 million they have collectively raised is deceiving. This only reflects the minimum amount either pledged or raised by each bundler and there is no way to know how much they have actually raised. There are only three categories: $50,000, $100,000 and $200,000. Funds raised in excess of the pledged amounts are not reported for each bundler.

Should the minimum amount raised by these 14 registered lobbyist bundlers—$1.9 million plus—seem impressive, even more impressive is the fact that Sen. Obama's campaign has reported to the Federal Election Commission that there are actually 358 bundlers who have collected a grand total of $286,381,726.

Does the FEC know from whence that all those nearly $290 million came?

Obama's 14 Bundlers

Timothy M. Broas of Maryland, Winston & Strawn, last lobby report 2000; raised more than $100,000.

Frank Clark of Illinois, Commonwealth Edison, last lobby report 2000; raised more than $200,000.

Howard W. Gutman of Maryland, Williams & Connolly, last lobby report 1999; raised more than $200,000.

Scott Harris of Washington, D.C., Harris Wiltshire and Grannis, last lobby report 2006; raised more than $200,000.

Allan J. Katz of Florida, Akerman Senterfitt, last lobby report 2004; raised more than $200,000. (Member of the Florida Democratic Committee and Democratic National Committee, Tallahassee City Commissioner)

William T. Lake of Washington, D.C., Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale and Dorr, last lobby report 2001; raised at least $50,000.

Robert S. Litt of Maryland, Arnold & Porter, last lobby report 2002; amount raised not listed.

Kenneth G. Lore of Washington, D.D., Bingham McCutchen, last lobby report 2001; raised at least $50,000.

Thomas J. Perrelli of Virginia, Jenner and Block, last lobby report 2002; raised more than $200,000.

Thomas A. Reed of Virginia, Kirkpatrick & Lockhart Preston Gates Ellis LLP, last lobby report 2006; raised more than $200,000.

Paul N. Roth of New York, Schulte Roth & Zabel, last lobby report 2005; raised at least $50,000.

Alan Solomont of Massachusetts, Solomont Bailis Ventures, last lobby report 2006; raised more than $200,000.

Robert M. Sussman of Washington, D.C., Latham & Watkins, last lobby report 2006; raised at least $50,000. (2004 Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) co-chair)

Tom E. Wheeler of Washington, D.C., Core Capital Partners, last lobby report 2003; raised more than $200,000.

Update: Deb Cupples, How should one read Obama's campaign finance statistics?, No Quarter, June 28, 2008.

The Blagojevich-Rezko countdown is underway

Where have we heard this story before?

Gov. Rod Blagojevich's wife, Patti Blagojevich, "got nearly $50,000 from a real estate deal in late 2002" involving convicted political fixer and everyone's personal real estate fairy Antoin "Tony" Rezko, described November 17, 2006, by the Chicago Sun-Times Chris Fusco and Dave McKinney as a "developer and former top Blagojevich political fund-raiser."

In the following two months, the governor began giving friends of Rezko seats on influential state boards and began hiring former Rezko employees to upper-level state jobs.

The chain of events in December 2002 and January 2003 is detailed in records obtained by the Sun-Times. It's the first record of Patti Blagojevich making money off a Rezko deal around the time Rezko began seeking favors from the governor.

The governor's office vehemently denied that the first lady's business dealings with Rezko had anything to do with his influence in her husband's administration.

[...]

Regardless of what Patti Blagojevich did to earn her commission, it's clear Rezko approached her husband about key jobs and appointments. On Jan. 20, 2003 -- a little more than a month after the transaction -- Blagojevich's chief of staff faxed to Blagojevich's house a list of people Rezko wanted appointed to state boards and commissions.

[...]

Of the 19 people on the document, 10 wound up being appointed by the governor to a state board or commission -- or got a spouse named. Others wound up with contracts underwritten by taxpayers, or their children got state jobs amid a Blagojevich hiring freeze.

Besides helping people on Rezko's wish list, Blagojevich hired two former Rezko employees to high-ranking state agency directorships starting in late January 2003.

Rezko and Patti Blagojevich had a "business relationship dating back to 1997," about the same time that Allison S. Davis, Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.)'s former boss, teamed up in the real estate development business with Rezko.

Read the rest of the article for more details.

Auchi's lawyers threaten to sue Evelyn Pringle (Updated)

About a week ago, Evelyn Pringle, the author of the Operation Board Games, Curtain Time for Barack Obama, and Pringle Cliff Notes series of articles, received word from web sites that carried her articles that they had been contacted by Iraqi-British billionaire businessman Nadhmi Auchi's attorney, Alasdair Pepper, with threats to sue. Her emailed response follows after the jump.

Pam Geller at Atlas Shrugs reported June 24, 2008, that blogger A Jacksonian also received a threatening letter telling him to remove a June 10, 2008, article regarding a "dirty money trail" between Obama, convicted political fixer Antoin "Tony" Rezko and Auchi.

RezkoWatchers may recall that RW received a similar threatening email on February 9, 2008. The RW response is posted here. Larry Johnson at No Quarter received a similar letter on February 14, 2008, likewise claiming that Johnson's blog contains "highly defamatory and false allegations" about Auchi.

Other intimidating letters and lawsuits issued on Auchi's behalf have resulted in articles published in the UK's The Guardian/Observer and other European media outlets to be webscrubbed.

---

Date: Sat, 21 Jun 2008 14:11:25 -0700 (PDT)
From: Evelyn Pringle
Subject: I want you to stop threatening to sue over my articles
To: Alasdair.Pepper @ carter-ruck.com

Dear Mr Pepper:

Although you have never informed me of your client's objections to my articles, it has been brought to my attention that you are attempting to intimidate sites that publish my work by threatening to sue them for defamation.

I ask that you cease this tactic immediately. Your actions are not only violating my right to free speech but they are also adversely affecting my business relationships and livelihood.

I will gladly defend any action filed against me in the US by your client. However, in order to sue me he would have to appear here before a jury and you and I know he is not allowed in this country. Therefore, your actions represent harassment and unlawful intimidation of a professional journalist.

If I get any more reports that you are trying to sabatoge my relationships with publications, I will contact the US attorney, Patrick Fitzgerald and the US Department of Justice to seek legal advice on how to put a stop to your illegal conduct.

I will be forwarding a copy of this email to all of the sites that publish my work.

If Mr Auchi was allowed in this country, I would be the one filing a law suit against him.

Truly,

Evelyn Pringle

Update: Freddy Gray, Eye Spy. The Audacity of Auchi, The American Conservative, June 27, 2008.