Prosecutors claim a greedy, power-drunk Alabama mayor, Larry Langford, accepted bribes totaling some $235,000 -- a chunk of it for upscale clothes and jewelry -- while serving as president of the Jefferson County Commission before he was elected mayor. In exchange, they say, Langford steered $7.1 million in bond business to a political crony's investment banking firm.
Langford who could be tossed out of office and go to prison if convicted of federal bribery charges, recently offered some advice to a new Birmingham City Council member.
"The illusion of power is the most dangerous drug on the planet," Langford said. "A little bit of power -- nothing intoxicates like it."
Last week's comment may sound a lot like the government's opening argument against Langford, 61, the most recent in a long line of prominent names in the state Democratic Party to face corruption charges. Jury selection begins Monday.
The bond deals Langford tried to make, and others, turned sour during the credit crunch and brought on a financial crisis that has pushed Alabama's most populous county to the brink of filing what would be the largest municipal bankruptcy in U.S. history. The current commissioners have repeatedly extended credit agreements as they struggle to pay back $3.9 billion.
Charged with multiple felony counts of bribery, conspiracy, fraud, money laundering and tax violations, Langford automatically would be removed from office if convicted of even one count.
Defense attorney Michael Rasmussen laughed at the possibility of a guilty plea, saying Langford "maintains he is innocent and expects to get a fair trial."
The government's key witnesses will likely be two former Democratic Party leaders indicted with Langford last year.
Montgomery investment banker Bill Blount, a former Alabama Democratic Party chairman, pleaded guilty in August to paying bribes to Langford, who is accused of accepting gifts including a Rolex watch, cash and loan payoffs at luxury clothing stores.
Lobbyist Al LaPierre, a former executive director of the state Democratic Party, pleaded guilty to being a middleman in the scheme.
Langford, also a Democrat, has argued that what the government calls bribes really were gifts between old friends. He says the charges were brought by a Republican prosecutor as part of a GOP plan to target him and other Alabama Democrats.
His argument is similar to that of former Gov. Don Siegelman, another Democrat convicted of bribery and other federal corruption charges in 2006.
A widespread probe of financial wrongdoing in the state's two-year college system also led to the downfall of its chancellor, Roy Johnson. He was once a powerful Democrat in the Alabama House who admitted getting some $1 million in kickbacks for himself, family and friends. He now awaits sentencing.
The executive director of the Alabama Democratic Party, Jim Spearman, agrees that Republican prosecutors seem to go after Democrats with special zest. But Blount and LaPierre haven't been associated with the party for years, he said.
"Democrat or Republican, I don't think anyone has a lock on ethics. You see all degrees of problems on all sides, and we need to clean it up," Spearman said.
Nearly two dozen people already have been convicted or pleaded guilty in an investigation of Jefferson County's tangled finances, including four other commissioners.
The trial, expected to last about two weeks, will be held 55 miles west of Birmingham in Tuscaloosa because of pretrial publicity.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/19/2009 00:00 ||
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#2
So what's the surprise? Another Alabama Democrat elected official being convicted of bribery. As that great late 20th Century philosopher, Gomer Pile, said, "Surprise, Surprise, Surprise".
Posted by: Deacon Blues ||
10/19/2009 7:55 Comments ||
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#3
But, but, it's in the job description - somewhere.
Posted by: Richard of Oregon ||
10/19/2009 11:38 Comments ||
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$235,000? Sounds like chump change. These guys are like two-bit whores. Really cheap.
The elaborate propaganda apparatus erected to support the Obama agenda is already at work spinning the downfall of the community organization into a vicious right-wing plot to destroy the presidency of Barack Obama, who sprouted from ACORN.
The group was cut off from some of its taxpayer dollars after conservative bloggers duped ACORN staffers into offering advice on setting up a child prostitution ring. ACORN had no defense -- it was caught on tape and posted on the Web.
But ACORN is too important to Democrats and Obama in particular to allow it to wither away. Much of the taxpayer money that funds ACORN's activism ends up benefiting Democratic interests
Stories are showing up about ACORN's diligent efforts to purge itself of bad apples. News reports document how ACORN's ability to help foreclosure victims has been hamstrung by the misdeeds of a few gullible staffers.
University of Northern Iowa professors substantiate the right-wing conspiracy by noting a flurry of negative stories about the group prior to the 2008 election. (It doesn't occur to the profs that this was when ACORN was caught registering cartoon characters and dead people to vote, which tends to make news.)
Expect soon a major national publication to go in-depth on ACORN's rehab. It's the pattern the Obama machine follows to push his major issues and marginalize his critics.
It starts with a barrage of e-mails from local residents who coincidentally get worked up about the same thing on the same day -- Rush Limbaugh is a racist, for example. Next comes op-ed pieces from left-wing opiners decrying Limbaugh's divisiveness. Then Limbaugh's face hits the cover of Newsweek as the personification of the right's evil intent.
Obama's conversion of his election team to a permanent network of campaign offices to advocate for his policies -- the latest opened in Detroit on Saturday -- is unprecedented.
The administration gets away with such ruthless manipulation of public opinion because the media are derelict in watch-dogging this White House and its backers.
Googling ACORN comes up with a lot of hits about how Republicans are trying to use the scandal to derail housing aid programs, and almost none about the inner workings of the group. ACORN's foibles didn't trigger anywhere near the frenzy of investigative reporting that Joe the Plumber did.
Similarly, you'll find a ton of stories debunking claims that health care reform will lead to death panels and rationing. But there's little critical analysis of Obama's assertion that the bill will save money.
This is more than a honeymoon with a new president. It's a torrid love affair that is eroding the media's credibility.
So of course ACORN can come back. With the press cozily tucked into bed at the White House, what's to stop it?
Posted by: Fred ||
10/19/2009 00:00 ||
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#1
Bet on it: ACORN will be back
Of course it will, Under another name, Obama still has another election to rig.
Posted by: Redneck Jim ||
10/19/2009 13:16 Comments ||
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Editorialist think that right-wing street activism is something new. They need to spend some time in a library.
This President promoted universal nuclear disarmament last month. That implies trust for North Korea, Iran, Libya, Venezuela, Cuba, Pakistan, ad nauseum. In my opinion, advocacy of total disarmament is an impeachable offense.
When inflation hits, every dollar in your bank account is worth less each day. Deflation is just the opposite: You put your feet up and watch your money grow in value. The latter is what is happening now to America's seniors. And politicians think they should not have to stand for it.
The other day, the federal government announced that for the first time since cost-of-living adjustments were begun in 1975, Social Security recipients will not get an annual raise in their monthly checks. This decision is not the result of a fit of fiscal austerity or a sadistic desire to punish old people. There won't be a raise to offset inflation for the simple reason that there has been no inflation to offset.
Last year, seniors got a big raise because consumer prices had jumped 5.8 percent in one year. In the following 12 months, though, the Consumer Price Index has dropped by 2.1 percent. So in the coming year, Social Security payments will stay the same and be worth more than they used to be.
But so what? Groups representing the elderly, like AARP, have come to regard the annual raise as a sacred birthright in good times as well as bad, and few in Washington want to argue with them. President Obama has proposed giving every Social Security recipient a tax-free $250 bonus in lieu of a cost-of-living adjustment. Congressional Democrats are all for it, and the Republican leadership sounds agreeable.
A consensus like that happens only when someone comes up with a simple, appealing and thoroughly horrendous idea. As it is, the cost-of-living rules are a great deal for seniors. Retirees get more money when prices rise, but they don't have to give any of it back when prices fall. The ratchet works only in their favor.
It's not easy to make a case for enriching seniors at a time when working-age Americans are suffering, but Obama and his allies are trying. The president insisted that "we must act on behalf of those hardest hit by this recession."
Who is he kidding? His policy would help those with the most protection. The people hit hardest by the recession are those who have seen their earnings vanish along with their jobs. Social Security recipients are assured of a stable stream of income even when companies are cutting payroll with a chainsaw.
Obama also claimed the help is essential because "countless seniors and others have seen their retirement accounts and home values decline as a result of this economic crisis." What's his excuse for singling out seniors? Most everyone with a house or a 401(k) has gotten whacked, and the government can't afford to help them all.
What no one mentions is that Social Security beneficiaries already got a bonus in the original $787 billion stimulus package, which provided them with payments of $250 apiece. That's the rough equivalent of a 2 percent COLA. If the president gets his way, they will get a total of 4 percent. That, in combination with the drop in the CPI, means they'll have about 6 percent more in inflation-adjusted dollars this year than last. Not many other Americans can say that.
The final pretext is that the payouts will provide "a boost to our economy," in the words of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi -- presumably because they will spur spending. Trouble is, giving people money doesn't mean they will head to Walmart. When the Bush administration sent out rebates, most of the cash apparently went to pay off debt or bolster savings, neither of which spurs the production of goods and services.
On the other hand, the mass paying down of debt and adding to savings probably softened the subsequent crash by a like amount. Not a bad thing, under the circumstances.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/19/2009 00:00 ||
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#1
Its not easy being/getting older. Betcha the (opinion) writer is a meer yoot! Seriously, the aches and pains which stop being occassional and start being constant do bring a sense of selfishness to the scene. I am 61 and on long term disability leave from my school teaching position due to a (near total) disintigration of the heel in my left foot. So what happens, I was in the middle of a cross walk two weeks ago and get slammed by a car in my right leg and foot. Un erringly, the vehicle in question was a delapidated 15 year old Pontiac - not an "E" model Mercedes. Also unerringly, the driver was destitute, devoid of both insurance and license. Last, the driver in question was not born in our once great nation - I will leave ethnicity to your imagination. Hint: Tucson is 50 miles north of Mexico Lindo.
Now i have quantitatively more aches and pains - so don't get all in a hissy fit over seniors scoring $250 from the Big "O". I'd gladly turn in the money for a decrease in aches and pains. I couldn't be a spoiled brat if I wanted to - my four step-children amply fit/fill that role.
#3
borgboy, while getting old is not for sissies,it should not automatically entitle you to a government handout. I am not getting a raise this year, and probably won't get one next year.
By the way, I am 61 also.
Posted by: Rambler in Virginia ||
10/19/2009 6:50 Comments ||
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#4
I've always had a problem with cost of living increases as they are divorced from the source from which the funding comes. If the average worker is not getting a COLA, his/her taxes [either directly or indirectly by inflating the monetary supply] have to be raised to cover the cost of the COLA for those who do. So the worker not only gets hammered by inflating prices in the economy diminishing their buying power, the worker also gets tagged further by an additional reduction created though the tax obligation to cover the COLA. A Value of Wages Index rather than a COLA would put both parties in the same economic boat. If wages aren't going up, then COLA won't go up. Maybe that would encourage those who receive to be interested in the status of the community as a whole rather than their own 'special interest'.
#5
I've been encouraging the various daughters, trailing and otherwise, to have at least four children apiece, so my grandchildren's tax burden is divided into smaller fractions. I know I'm not likely to get anything anyway -- I'm 48 -- but the tax burden on the young is only going to get worse. If I recall correctly, Medicare/Medicaid are already bankrupt, and Social Security will cross that line in a few years, barring painful changes.
#7
I'd be happy if they'd just pay me back for all the money they've been sucking out of my paycheck all these years...with interest if you don't mind.
#8
I know this is not a popular solution, as no one likes taxes, but it only seems logical these days: means testing. Just because millionaires and billionaires have paid into the system (modestly, only up to $104,000 income is taxable)they shouldn't get a monthly check. Many people live on only their SS check, never having made enough to stash away much, and putting Grandma out on the street if the kids aren't willing or able to take her in, isn't an acceptable alternative. They could also raise the limit on taxable income so those making good salaries subsidize the elderly more. We need the safety net but the same DC party assh*les have raided the trustfund to balance the Clinton budget and even LBJ used it to pay for Viet Nam. They just got caught in the market crash.
#9
I just hope all of you who are retired or nearing retirement have your 401k and other investments tied up in CDs, money market funds and other low-risk categories, not highly volatile instruments like stocks! A stock-heavy portfolio is only good when you're younger and your investments have time to recover from downtimes before you need the funds.
Posted by: Dar ||
10/19/2009 13:02 Comments ||
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#10
I assume that means testing is why I won't get anything, Lumpy Elmoluck5091. It's an easy, fairly invisible step. Easier than raising the retirement age or reducing benefits, both of which will no doubt happen eventually (sorry, borgboy), and probably sooner rather than later, given that this administration is determined to send the national debt to 80% of GDP.
#12
At some point the Federal government should make it legal for those over 65 (or whatever) to legally do drugs (sold by the Feds of course). The old hippies would then spend their savings and help the budget issues while at the same time drastically cutting their own lives short and solving a number of health care issues.
#14
What I don't understand is that we've got disinflation coupled with a devaluing dollar. How the hell does that happen? Is it that every other currency is just deflating faster than us?
I was never that good at math, but I've got the feeling I'm inverting a value somewhere.
Posted by: Mitch H. ||
10/19/2009 15:15 Comments ||
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#15
Rampant inflation will soon solve your delima.
#16
When the U.S. catches cold, the rest of the world gets Swine Flu, Mitch. As far as I can tell, we won't even know where the bottom is until the real estate derivatives unwind on the one hand, and the Democrats stop passing economy-changing bills on the other (health care, cap & trade, etc.).
#17
Daniel Patrick Moynahan, who was, and may God have mercy on his soul, the only Democrat I ever trusted, once stated right after he retired from the Senate, that the SS system could be fixed by cutting the tie to the CPI and using some other more realistic indicator as a COLA. He admitted that the SS was a wreck due to the faulty indicators that were being used to increase benefits.
D P Moynahan was the only person in the entire government who understood SS and all of its machinations completely and when he retired and died, there is no one left to publically voice a viable and logical critique of the system.
There has been no one since who can talk knowledgibly about it.
Posted by: James Carville ||
10/19/2009 17:05 Comments ||
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#18
#6 I'm 67/retired...Obama can take his $250 idea and stuff it...It fixes NOTHING...
Posted by crazyhorse 2009-10-19
He can 'stuff' my $250. as well. That's a whopping $500. up his worthless a**.
#19
I think that there has to be a combination of means testing, an increase in the eligible age and a new much more strict COLA mechanism if SS is going to survive in any form.
#20
Hellfish & Cornsilk,
Congratulations on being so precocious - it typically takes longer to accumulate the knowledge and wisdom to properly appreciate Rantburg.
#21
I'm old enough to remember when there was no COLA for SocSec and there was a debate in congress each year about how much to increase payments. Part of the argument for the COLA was to get the whores out from under the responsibility for the deficit and to keep the increases under control. But back then some elderly were eating dog food.
While I suspect the dog food stories were overly dramatic, there was much poverty amongst the elderly. Those times are returning. The socialized medicine Obama is installing will be used to gut Medicare more each year. I fully anticipate means testing for SocSec and for the floor to increase at COLA + 1. Within 25 years, there will be stories about the elderly eating dog food, but they'll just be boomers and the war will only be recently over, so no one will really care.
#24
D P Moynahan was the only person in the entire government who understood SS and all of its machinations completely
Interesting. I'm curious, though, and wonder if he rejected his own check. I know of only one politician who has done just that - and he's a Republican.
As a young Army lieutenant stationed in Germany, Bob McDonnell made the Guinness Book of World Records. He organized his hospital unit to carry a 120-pound woman on a stretcher on a record-breaking trek -- 93.4 miles in 32 hours.
Thirty-two years later, McDonnell is doing a different kind of heavy lifting, as he seeks to break Democrats' eight-year hold on Virginia's governorship.
Since word surfaced seven weeks ago of his controversial graduate-school thesis, McDonnell has sought to focus the campaign on jobs creation in an economy battered by a deep recession.
That strategy appears to be working. Recent polls show McDonnell with enough of a lead over Democrat R. Creigh Deeds, a state senator from Bath County, that he is cautioning supporters against overconfidence.
"I've told my staff to forget the polls," McDonnell said in a recent interview in Verona, at a picnic sponsored by U.S. Rep. Robert W. Goodlatte, R-6th.
"We've got a hard-working opponent. We are opposed by President Obama and Tim Kaine," the governor and chairman of the Democratic National Committee, "who have considerable resources. The only way we are going to win is to stay focused on our message and do an absolutely A-plus get-out-the-vote effort."
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
10/19/2009 00:00 ||
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The WaPo has thrown credibility to the winds in their pathetic efforts to drag Deeds across the victory line
Posted by: Frank G ||
10/19/2009 8:20 Comments ||
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#2
Keep talking, Deedsy-baby:
In Deeds Reality TV Creigh Deeds and Reporters Say
Q: But when you said, Im not going to raise taxes, what did you mean? You said in the debate, Im not going to raise taxes. What did that mean?
Deeds: What that meant in the general sense of the term, Im not gonna, Im not gonna raise general fund taxes. Um, I know were gonna have to raise money for transportation.
Q: So youll raise other kinds of taxes?
Deeds: I think I, I, I, I meant ... I meant what I said. I have no, um, plan to raise general fund taxes.
Q: So what kind of taxes would you raise?
Deeds: Were gonna, were gonna, were gonna ha ... everythings on the table when we consider how we raise money for transportation.
Q: Is the gas tax a general fund tax? Does the gas tax go into the general fund?
Deeds: The gas tax goes into the Transportation Trust Fund.
Q: So it would not then be covered under not raising general fund taxes.
Deeds: I think I made myself clear, young lady, I dont know.
President Barack Obama and former President Bill Clinton are lending their political star power to an unlikely Democratic bid to win a special congressional election in an area that's been a Republican bastion for more than a century.
The Nov. 3 contest in upstate New York's 23rd Congressional District, a sprawling, 11-county area where registered Republicans outnumber Democrats by 45,000, is shaping up as a test of a struggling GOP and a possible gauge of Obama's coattails.
Obama, who carried the district by 5 percentage points in his landslide victory in New York last year, forced the special election when he named the incumbent, Republican John McHugh, his Army secretary. The president will host a fundraiser for the Democratic candidate, Bill Owens, on Tuesday in New York City.
Continued on Page 49
Posted by: Fred ||
10/19/2009 00:00 ||
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It would be a safe seat if Republicans would put up a real conservative instead of a RINO.
* US DEBT > US$11,929,055,000,000
* US BUDGET DEFICIT > US$1,269,324,000,000
Numbers are in MILLIONS OF USD DOLLARS, which I interpete as meaning as US GDP-DEBT, etc are beyond QUADRILLION-LEVELS since USG Figures are "OFFICIALLY" ALREADY IN THE TRILYUHNS.
IMO ITS EITHER THE ABOVE OR THE "OFFICIAL" GDP + DEBT, ETC. NUMBERS AS OFTEN USED IN THE MSM-NET + USG ARE FUBAR > really Really REALLY R-E-A-L-L-Y RRREEEEAAAAALLLYYYY RRRREEEEEEEEEEEELL
LLLLLYYYY...........................@ FUBAR'ed.
D *** NG IT, MORIARITY, NO AMERICAN = AMERIKAN , of the USA = USSA, USRoA, WANTS TO BELIEVE HIS OWN GOVT IS LYING, + andor CAN'T AFFORD GOOD ACCOUNTANTS, ETC. NOW DO WE???
President Obama has distanced himself from scandal-tainted former Gov. Rod Blagojevich. But as an Illinois state senator, Obama went to bat for more than a dozen people to get state jobs or promotions in Blagojevich's administration, according to records obtained by the Chicago Sun-Times.
There's no suggestion the president did anything illegal.
Indeed, in seeking hiring favors from the governor, Obama was doing what many other Democrats were doing at the time, the records show.
Obama made his pitch for 16 people, according to the records. Five got hired.
The highest-paid? Two $75,000 administrators -- Laura Hunter, hired by the Illinois Department of Commerce and Economic Opportunity, and Michelle D. Jackson, by the Department of Children and Family Services. The others on Obama's list who got jobs: Mal Williams, a business manager for the Department of Human Services; Shneare Mitchell, an administrative assistant in the commerce agency, and Brian Wojcicki, a student worker with Central Management Services.
In a March 2008 Sun-Times interview, Obama said Blagojevich's staff approached him seeking job recommendations.
"I think we submitted just a list of people that were mostly, you know, some of them were people who'd sent us resumes in the past or other people we thought ... might be interested," Obama said. "But they weren't people who were connected to our political organization in any meaningful way. Or they weren't people I knew particularly well."
Among those Obama recommended was a former campaign consultant, Cynthia Kay Miller. She didn't get hired, though.
Another candidate the records show Obama recommended for a post as a state agency lawyer didn't make a good impression. "Failed to show up, cancel or confirm for ... interview," Blagojevich aides wrote. "Will no longer consider due to a lack of respect/professionalism."
Two of the highest-profile figures in the Obama administration also were identified as job sponsors by Blagojevich aides -- White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Clearly I'm missing something -- it looks like business as usual, to me.
Posted by: Fred ||
10/19/2009 00:00 ||
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Barack Obama is telling the feds to stop, like, totally freaking out, man, and take it easy on medical marijuana.
Two Justice Department officials told the Associated Press that the Obama Administration will be sending out a three-page memo on Monday instructing federal prosecutors, the FBI, and the DEA not to harsh the buzz of stoners who aren't breaking state laws. Fourteen states have active medical marijuana programs including the entire West Coast and much of New England.
Obama's memo doesn't mean the feds are completely cool with medical marijuana. The AP's sources describe the memo as a set of "prosecutorial priorities" that doesn't rule out going after pot growers and distributors who aren't breaking state law. Dope smokers who can't score a pot prescription or don't live in one of the hippie enclaves where medical marijuana is legal will still need to rely on shady delivery services and streetcorner hustlers.
This new policy may be limited, but it certainly makes things much more mellow for pot clubs than they were under the Bush Administration when DEA agents regularly raided medical marijuana operations. The different Presidential positions on pot aren't surprising considering the fact that weed was Obama's youthful drug of choice while Bush always preferred booze and blow.
#6
Always heard Obama was a stoner. Castrate smokers and the tobacco industry, but when it comes to getting spaced out on pot, its a go. What sick prick.
#7
if the gals on the View were stoned it might not be as bad as it is
Posted by: lord garth ||
10/19/2009 9:47 Comments ||
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#8
For once, albeit unintentionally, Obama may have a successful policy. This is because it, again unintentionally, recognizes federalism. Were Obama to be told this he would freak out, because that is the last thing he wants.
However, right now, it is the winning way to go. The pendulum has swung way too far on the side of centralized power, and is desperate to swing back in favor of federalism. Obama's other policies have pushed it beyond the breaking point. They will fail because it is out of control in that direction.
But recognizing, unintentionally, that marijuana is a State problem, *not* a US government problem, is just a hair's breadth back from the extreme of centralized power. As such, it is a major success for federalism, and invites more federalist efforts.
Hopefully Obama will try to follow up this success in other ways, preferring pleasure to pain.
#12
Anonymouse, you are right but by semi-legalizing it on the National Level it encourages states to follow suit. Once enough states have made the leap (assuming that happens) it would be easy to Federalize control again. Sort of like in a tug of war where you give a bit to off-balance your opponent then yank.
It also has two benefits that a fellow like Obama might like (a) Might drive police and others nuts (b) the policy should help him shore up the left wingnuts a bit.
#15
Not really, nor drunk drivers and we have a lot of pubs, the police just stop a lot of drivers and the courts are quite strict on drunk/drug driving (DUI). The U.K. police now have drug testing kits.
#17
Under influence of hashish (which I understand stronger than marijuana) you lose all caution, and everything is funny. Driving head on into another car would be an enormous joke.
#19
Many law enforcement folks are opposed to legalization for different reasons. I suspect they fear the ruined lives associated with drug use would be increased in numbers.
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
Prosecutors claim a greedy, power-drunk Alabama mayor, Larry Langford, accepted bribes totaling some $235,000 -- a chunk of it for upscale clothes and jewelry -- while serving as president of the Jefferson County Commission before he was elected mayor. In exchange, they say, Langford steered $7.1 million in bond business to a political crony's investment banking firm.
ACORN may be down, but don't count it out. 
When inflation hits, every dollar in your bank account is worth less each day. Deflation is just the opposite: You put your feet up and watch your money grow in value. The latter is what is happening now to America's seniors. And politicians think they should not have to stand for it.
As a young Army lieutenant stationed in Germany, Bob McDonnell made the Guinness Book of World Records. He organized his hospital unit to carry a 120-pound woman on a stretcher on a record-breaking trek -- 93.4 miles in 32 hours.
President Barack Obama and former President Bill Clinton are lending their political star power to an unlikely Democratic bid to win a special congressional election in an area that's been a Republican bastion for more than a century.
President Obama has distanced himself from scandal-tainted former Gov. Rod Blagojevich. But as an Illinois state senator, Obama went to bat for more than a dozen people to get state jobs or promotions in Blagojevich's administration, according to records obtained by the Chicago Sun-Times.
