What is it With Obama, his Friends and Grandmothers?

Barack uses his grandmother as a prop to excuse his twenty-year relationship with a racist preacher and his buddy Alexi is attempting to steal a grandmaother's home with the help of some of his mobbed-up buddies.

Obama Still Allied With Granny Grifter - Part II

According to Michael Sneed's Friday Chicago Sun Times column Barack Obama is continuing to use Illinois State Treasurer Alexi Gianoulias in his Presidential campaign. As Flying Debris has pointed out here, here, here, here, here, here and here, that as a private citizen Mr. Gianoulias was involved as a bank loan officer in a $1 million scam that could ultimately defraud an 87 year-old woman of her home near the edge of Chicago's Greek Town. Mr. Gianoulias was working for his family bank, the Broadway Bank of Chicago when the bank made the $1 million loan to a woman who could not afford to repay the loan (as Alexi admitted under cross examination), could not fill out the loan forms and who had felons as co-signers, including one convicted of bank fraud. The felons ended up taking the money and now the Gianoulias family bank is suing the woman to take her home.

Apparently the Gianoulias family bank had a previous relationship with one of the co-signers, Michael "Jaws" Giorango, including the mortgage they held on the Miami hotel that he used as part of a nation wide prostitution ring. Here's what the Sun Times found last year:

Earlier, Giannoulias also had tried to distance himself from the loans, saying they occurred in the 1990s, when he was not a full- time employee at the bank. But subsequent reports revealed that Giannoulias had overseen $11.8 million in loans to a firm run by Giorango and Stavropoulos last year when Giannoulias was senior loan officer. Some of that money was used to buy a riverboat casino marina in Myrtle Beach, S.C.

When the Broadway Bank sued the victim of the mortgage fraud and tried to take her home Alexi Gianoulias claimed in court that he did not remember most of the specifics of the loan in question. That is despite the fact that the loan involved an 83 year-old woman who could not fill out the forms and a couple of felons including a man convicted of bank fraud, one would hope that an arrangement like that is unusual enough to remember. Considering the millions of dollars involved it strikes me that there is a lot more here than we currently know.

Last month Alexi spent the better part of a week at the Obama Chicago Volunteer Headquarters doing some "phonebanking". Well Alexi has been trying to find a gym in Las Vegas so that he and Barack can play basketball before the Caucus Saturday morning. Here is what Sneed wrote Friday:

$$$: State Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias was last spotted trying to set up a Saturday morning basketball game in Las Vegas so Barack Obama could loosen up on primary day.

Of course Alexi should help Barack, they're friends and Alexi owes his current position to Obama and his very strong "rock star" support for the Gianoulias candidacy while many of the specifics surrounding the fraudulent bank loan were publicly known. Flying Debris featured an Obama/Gianoulias commercial from 2006 in this post. This is another example of the caliber of the people around Obama, it is also an example of poor reporting by the press.

Obama Still Allied With Granny Grifter Part I.

Obama Still Allied With Granny Grifter - Part 1

Illinois Senator and Presidential Candidate Barack Obama (D-IL) has continued his alliance with Illinois State Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias, who recently testified in an outrageous lawsuit that centers on his actions while working at his family's business, the Broadway Bank here in Chicago. Mr. Giannoulias represented the bank five years ago as they made a $1 million loan to a woman in her 80s who could not fill out the loan agreement, in Mr. Giannoulias' own words she could not afford the loan that was co-signed by felons with convictions for bookmaking, prostitution and get this, bank fraud. This case was known during both the 2006 regular election and the primary election, despite knowledge of this outrage Senator Obama chose to put his own "rock star" name behind the candidacy of Mr. Giannoulias and frankly that endorsement is why Alexi was elected.

In this post I wrote:

Mr. Giannoulias' family bank the Broadway Bank in Chicago made a $1 million loan to an 83 year-old woman who could not fill out the loan form and who was brought to the bank by two felons and another person. One of those men had twice been convicted of bank fraud. Mr. Giannoulias admits that he knew that the felons were involved and that in his own words "I'm not sure it would be a prudent loan." Well sure, the loan payments were $9,845 per month while the bank's own loan documents show that Ms. Billings had an income of about $10,000 per month.

This is an outrage because Mr. Giannoulias helped to facilitate the fleecing of an older woman and now his family bank is suing to take the woman's home. Additionally Mr. Giannoulias testified in court that he did not remember many of the issues surrounding the loan. So he doesn't remember anything about two felons and an elderly woman who couldn't fill out the loan forms who borrowed $1 million from his family bank. His testimony begs the question, is the guy incompetent or did he perjure himself? It also begs the question, what the heck kind of Community Banking is his family involved in? This case has been publicly known and the local media has largely ignored the issue and they have also ignored the involvement of Barack Obama in this man's career. What the heck is Senator Obama doing? Just this week the Obama campaign has continued to align itself with a man involved in that mortgage scam by featuring Mr. Giannoulias at the hometown Chicago campaign headquarters ("Chicago Volunteer Headquarters") in what the Chicagoist ironically described as "celebrity phonebanking" for the next few evenings.

The Granny-Grifter will be at Obama's "Chicago Volunteer Headquarters" Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday and in another ironic use of the term "celebrity Phonebanking" Rep. Janice Schakowsky (D-IL) will join Giannoulias on Wednesday evening. The irony comes from the fact that during the months preceding Ms. Schakowsky's initial primary run to replace retiring twenty-four term congressman Sidney Yates her husband, Bob Creamer committed a massive check-kiting fraud that used multiple banks in three states in order to keep his salary as the head of a charity intact. Anne at the Backyard Conservative summed up Rep. Schakowsky pretty well just the other day.

This should be outrageous to anybody who has dealt with elderly family members, imagine if your mother or your grandmother was the victim of this scam involving mobsters and a politician. Barack Obama is just another part of the crooked Democratic scam politics that is Chicago.

Obama Still Allied With Granny Grifter Part II.

Barack Obama Supporter Involved in Mortgage Fraud

Not only has Illinois State Treasurer Alexi Giannoulias and his family supported Senator Barack Obama (D-IL) financially but Senator Obama returned the favor by helping Alexi, a banker to mobsters, get himself elected as State Treasurer. The Giannoulias family must have been ecstatic to get this sap off of the family payroll. Where does it stop with Obama's bad judgement?

See Flying Debris take on these two here, here, here and here.

Democratic Culture of Corruption: Illinois Dem Part of Mortgage Scam

The Illinois State Treasurer, Alexi Giannoulias testified in a mortgage fraud suit yesterday and he pulled the Sgt. Schultz Defense, "I know nothing, I see nothing, I say nothing!" Flying Debris wrote about Alexi the, ahem, banker here more than nineteen months ago. Alexi (if I may call him that) was once a loan officer at his family's bank, the Broadway Bank here in Chicago. While there he approved a loan that anybody with half of a functioning brain would have recognized as fraudulent. Mr. Giannoulias is a man who has supported and has received support from Democratic Presidential primary candidate and Illinois Senator Barack Obama (D-IL). Mr. Obama has received money from the Giannoulias' and he helped raise funds for this disgraceful man's State Treasury run.

Alexi agreed that his family bank would write a mortgage for get this, an 83 year-old woman who could not fill out the forms, who did not have the means to repay the loan and the loan was cosigned by people with a history of bank fraud, prostitution charges and bookmaking. One of the men in question is named Michael “Jaws” Giorango he is a man Alexi described as "a good person." Well the money is gone and somehow I doubt that the octogenarian went on a million dollar spending spree, rather I suspect that the mobsters who Alexi thought were good co-signers (especially the one with a record of multiple bank frauds) probably spent the funds.

To paraphrase Paul Simon (the musician not the late Senator) on the subject of Alexi Giannoulias - "still pimping, after all these years, still pimping after all these years," to the tune of Still Crazy After All These Years.

It is also notable that the blue-state Chicago Sun Times consigned the linked article that makes a local Democrat look terrible to page 8 while featuring Dennis Quaid, his lovely wife and the terrible story of his children on the front page.