Make room under the bus William Ayers, Jeremiah Wright, Tony Rezko, Fr. Pfleger, and Kwame Kilpatrick! Barack Obama has another friend of dubious moral character in the news.
Meet Larry Walsh:
Two FBI agents spent more than an hour in the Will County Office Building on Wednesday morning as part of an investigation into an elected official.
That person seems to be Will County Executive Larry Walsh. Matt Ryan, his chief of staff, also is part of the probe, sources say.
The official apparently is Walsh. Ryan has -- or had -- some relationship with Smith Dawson and Andrews, the lobbying firm hired in 2006 at a rate of $10,000 a month to help Will County snare more federal grants and funding. The association is related to his work with the lobbying firm Performance Communication Group.
... The lobbying firm has secured quite a bit of federal funding for the county, including money to clean up and modernize the water and sewer system in Joliet Township's Ridgewood neighborhood; to do engineering work at 143rd Street and Interstate 355; and to add laptop computers to the squad cars driven by Will County police.
Not only did Obama serve with Walsh in the Illinois Senate and endorse him for his current position, he sent some of his campaign volunteers to work for Walsh in 2004:
Obama is banking on 13,000 volunteers to hand out 2 million campaign fliers and make thousands of phone calls. Many of them will be deployed in Obama's political base, working precincts in African American, Latino and lakefront precincts in the city and suburbs. But the campaign is also planning to send volunteers to help Bean in her challenge to Crane, state Sen. Larry Walsh in his campaign for Will County chief executive officer, state Rep. Lisa Dugan in her re-election bid in Kankakee, Michelle Bromberg in her North Shore challenge to Republican state Rep. Beth Coulson and Democrat Patrick Ouimet in his challenge to Republican state Sen. Pamela Althoff in McHenry County.
The the Chicago Tribune reported the two were poker buddies. According to the local press, Walsh was recently campaigning for Obama in rural Illinois.
But I'm sure that Obama's association with Walsh gives you no more insight into his personality and ethics than do his other associations. That said, Walsh is reportedly under investigation for his associations with the lobbying firm Smith Dawson and Andrews, which was hired by Will County to secure earmarks in Washington right after Walsh took office.
According to Obama's website, the senator requested at least $6 million or so in earmarks for Will County in 2006-2007.
