Richard Whalen

New national polls of Democrats show Senator Barack Obama is the frontrunner for the presidential nomination. The New York Times/CBS News and USA Today/Gallup polls put his lead in double digits.

But a new headache for Senator Obama has surfaced that could have devastating impact on his presidential campaign. According to the The Times of London a British-Iraqi billionaire lent millions of dollars to Obama’s fundraising effort only weeks before an imprudent land deal.

The Times reports: “The money transfer raises the question of whether funds from Nadhmi Auchi, one of Britain’s wealthiest men, helped Senator Obama buy the mock Georgian mansion in Chicago where he lives. 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 $US 3.5 million.”

“Three weeks later, Senator Obama bought a house on Chicago’ South side, while Mr. Rezko’s wife bought the garden plot next door from the same seller on the same day, June 15….

“Ms. Rezko, whose husband was widely known to be under investigation at the time, sold a 3m strip of her property to Senator Obama seven months later. Senator Obama says his involvement in the land deal was a “boneheaded mistake,” and he paid $US 150,000 to charity as a public atonement….

“Ms 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 to The Times…. Mr. Rezko has been indicted for allegedly scheming to pressure companies seeking business with the state of Illinois for contributions to the campaign of Governor Rod Blagojevich.”

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

We know less about Barack Obama and his political connections than we have known about any other candidate for the presidency in the past half century. In their final debate, Clinton wanted everyone to know that she believes the press is tougher on her than on Barack Obama. According to the New York Times “She made her case by citing a sketch on last week’s Saturday Night Live that showed mock debate moderators grilling her stand-in….but fawning over the Obama character.”

Obama’s media honeymoon may be over. A veteran journalist who covers Obama regularly provides this snapshot: “He’s not at all as he appears on television. He’s cold, distant and tightly wound. But when the red light goes on the TV cameras, he’s all charm and self-discipline in his choice of words.”

This story is not going away. The Rezko-Auchi connection is sure to trigger overdue press scrutiny when Rezko’s trial begins on March 3. Obama’s name could figure in the trial although he is not accused of any wrongdoing.