I should probably get this out while it is still fresh in our minds. Being an Illinois resident and viewing the local news I may have observed a few additional things that may not have made it to the national media. I haven't seen this particular cause-and-effect relationship possibility mentioned on the main stream media or the internet, so I guess it falls on me to bring it up:
On December 8, 2008 Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich gave an official ultimatum to a major US Bank, on December 9, 2008, less than 24 hours later, he was effectively dismissed as governor.
A company in Chicago, “Republic Windows and Doors”, went out of business and laid off its employees. The unionized employees were furious siting their contract called for two months of severance pay which they had not been given. As a result, they occupied the building, maintaining a 24 hour vigil. This scene became a regular “feature” on the local news.
The company said they didn't have the money, and that Bank of America would not give them a loan to handle this. This is when Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich jumped in an said (paraphrasing) “If Bank of America didn't give them a loan, then the state of Illinois would not do business with them anymore.”
Less than 24 hours later, early in the morning, Blagojevich was arrested and booked by the FBI for “selling Obama's senate seat”.
Now on December 8, seeing Blagojevich give the ultimatum, was exciting or dramatic. A governor of a big State confronting a major bank – sort of like the irresistible force meeting the immoveable object or something. Government going up against a bank. At the time I was thinking that the next few months were going to be fascinating to see how that played out. Get the popcorn out.
Now Blago's ultimatum may not have even been reasonable. He was asking them to give a loan to an insolvent company – not good business practice. Also it may not have even been Bank of America that was responding, but another bank not wishing to allow this precedent setting action.
In Illinois there are several ex governors in jail. This suggests there are a lot of illegal things that go on that the people don't know about. Probably a lot of Illinois politicians that have something on their head, such that if they do wrong, their issue can be called up and they can be removed from office.
In fact, I would wonder that if he hadn't given the ultimatum, he might still be in office and we would not even know about him “selling Obama's senate seat”.
But still this is just speculation, and perhaps the ultimatum and subsequent arrest were just a coincidence.
Minimally, the “selling Obama's senate seat” fiasco kept the “government vs bank” meme out of the media.
(FWIW)
Namaste, Mark
I think what you have qued us into is just one small peak of a very large iceberg. As the old, old radio programs title went, "Who knows what dark lies in the heart of men" (somewhat paraphrased. LOL)
I recently came across a video that puts Blagojevich in a better light than my original prose did. It shows the speech that he gave the day before he was arrested. Now, more than a year later, with our 20-20 hindsight it is clear that he had remarkable foresight. He was talking about banks getting bail out money and not using it to help people before most of those complaints actually started coming out.
Here is the link in case I screw up the embedding of this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XKL8BpgJexg
Use above if below doesn't work
LAL - Mark