When the incomparable Glenn Beck (Ch. 509, every night at 10.00 pm) sank his fangs into (ex)-presidential adviser, Van Jones, and shook him round like a lifeless rag-doll before dropping him down by the dustbins, I wondered who his next victim would be. As a lover of blood sports, which is why the slow, lingering, political death of 'ur wee Gordie' has me whinnying with pleasure, I could hardly wait to see who he would pick on next. Well, for a few days now he has swung his head this way and that, sniffing the air, dribbles of saliva falling from his jowels, but last night he pounced and, joy of joys, his victim is a woman!
Valerie Jarrett is, like Van Jones, an unknown to anyone not intimate with the details of the Obama court. For the benefit of Brit readers (oh dear, I just used a diminutive which Dr. 'Teabag' and other readers tell me is a racist epithet - how awful!) I can best describe the lady as a female consigliori to the Obama family. She has been at the president's side since his first days in Chicago and once used her influence to get his wife a cushy job in the City. She was herself the CEO of Habitat, not that ever-so-nice shop, but a huge property company and slum landlord in Chicago. This for-profit company, from which she, a Democrat who cares, er, ever so deeply for the plight of the poor, earned over a $1m a year, owns acres of public housing in the City which it has allowed to run into wrack and ruin. The Boston Globe described one estate thus:
About 99 of the units are vacant, many rendered uninhabitable by unfixed problems, such as collapsed roofs and fire damage. Mice scamper through the halls. Battered mailboxes hang open. Sewage backs up into kitchen sinks. In 2006, federal inspectors graded the condition of the complex an 11 on a 100-point scale — a score so bad the buildings now face demolition.
Now, changing the subject slightly, you, like me, might have wondered why Chicago, a city that is virtually bankrupt because of its inherent corruption, would attempt to host the Olympic games in 2016? You may also, like me, have been puzzled when the White House suddenly changed its mind, having originally stated that only the First lady would fly to Copenhagen to help pitch for the 'prize', and announced that 'The One', himself, would also fly out to twist a few Olympian arms. (Not one but two huge jets and all that carbon - poor old Al Gore must be blubbing in his bath.) So who changed his mind, and why?
Could it possibly be anything to do with the fact that whole tracts of Chicagoan property will have to be demolished and rebuilt with spanking new buildings thus producing huge windfall profits for the property owners? And who, sitting at the president's right hand fits that description? The stench of Chicago corruption now wafts down the elegant corridors of the White House.
If my American readers will permit a pathetic British attempt at an Americanism - go, Glenn, baby, go!- or something like that.
Additional: You can read Beck's script from last night's show here.
Nice!
What with that and his new “safe schools czar” turning out to be a little less than safe, it's all unravelling even faster than we dared hope...
Vetting, Dems: it's not just something for Fido to undergo.
Posted by: JuliaM | Thursday, 01 October 2009 at 17:53
But the august Oliver Kamm assures us that the Republicans will be in opposition for a very long time and he writes for The Times so he must be right - mustn't he?
Posted by: David Duff | Thursday, 01 October 2009 at 18:34
David
David
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2008/06/27/grim_proving_ground_for_obamas_housing_policy/>Here is the article from the Boston Globe with the paragraph that Mr Beck quoted. I’d call these higlights but the whole article is more and more of the same. The names are a who’s who of the Obama organzaton, olympic supporters for Chicago and some recently convicted of corruption.
And it has short video.
Grove Parc and several other prominent failures were developed and managed by Obama's close friends and political supporters. Those people profited from the subsidies even as many of Obama's constituents suffered. Tenants lost their homes; surrounding neighborhoods were blighted.
snip
Valerie Jarrett, a senior adviser to Obama's presidential campaign and a member of his finance committee. Jarrett is the chief executive of Habitat Co., which managed Grove Parc Plaza from 2001 until this winter and co-managed an even larger subsidized complex in Chicago that was seized by the federal government in 2006, after city inspectors found widespread problems
Posted by: Hank | Saturday, 03 October 2009 at 03:09