Interesting Money Bundlers For Obama: Part One

For a guy who lies when he says he doesn’t take money from Big Business and lobbyists, and has raised more than $200,000,000 from “the little guy,” Barack Obama surely has some very interesting friends bundling money for him. It’s nearly overwhelming. So I thought I would do this in a kind of series and start with Bundler Frank Clark.

As you can see here, Clark is known has been known as a Lobbyist for Commonwealth Edison. He also has bundled $200,000 in contributions for Barack Obama’s campaign. Now that by itself would be interesting, but it also seems that Clark is yet another one of those people with a politically incestuous Chicago trail.

Clark is currently CEO of Commonwealth Edison. If that doesn’t ring a bell for you, Commonwealth Edison is the same company that boasts the well-connected Thomas Ayers as its former CEO. Mr. Ayers also served as Chair of the Board of Trustees of Commonwealth Edison after his tenure as CEO, so you can easily imagine he had a hand in selecting Mr. Clark as CEO.

Thomas Ayers was also the father of that fine upstanding citizen, “Guilty as hell. Free as a bird” domestic terrorist Bill Ayers. Isn’t that a coincidence? I guess Chicago is a small world for sure.

As a relevant side note, it seems that Mr. Thomas Ayers, who died last year at the age of 92, was also a friend of the infamous famous Mayor Richard J. Daley Sr. in the 60s. According the the blog of a former member of the 1960s SDS, “He was always a man pulled between his role as a representative of big business and advisor to the Daley machine, and his basic values of equity and fairness…“.

It seems that, besides having connections with the Daley Machine, Mr. Ayers was a bit of a community activist himself, but in a much nicer way than his son was. Instead of blowing up buildings and killing and/or paralyzing people in terror, Thomas worked peacefully on civil rights. That’s why during the 11 years that his slime ball son was a fugitive, Bill was estranged from him–until of course Bill needed his Daddy to get him out of trouble. Most of us recognize that scenerio in smaller ways, don’t we? As parents, many of us rescue plenty of “independent” “upscale” Obama supporters regularly, generally financially.

Anyways, as I mentioned, Chicago is a really small world isn’t it?

As an additional side note, given the longstanding relationship between the Ayers family and the Daley family, it is suddenly more than understandable why the current Mayor Daley would speak out in defense of Bill Ayers when his terrorist activities resurfaced as pertinent to Barack Obama and their ongoing friendship. It also certainly helps to punctuate why hanging out with the connected Bill Ayers would be key to an ambitious Chicago politican who wants to Pass-Go-And-Collect-$200 in a hurry– and get to the Oval Office by skipping as many steps as possible. Look how well things worked out for Barack with Commonwealth Edison to the tune of $200,000!

Back to Mr. Clark, and in keeping with the small, politically incestuous world of Chicago, this successor to Mr. Thomas Ayer’s Commonwealth throne is also a Corporate Officer of Exelon. In case Exelon doesn’t ring a bell, they are also one of Barack Obama’s top 10 contributors.

Exelon is in the energy business, including the nuclear type. So you can imagine that Exelon makes neighboring residents a bit nervous sometimes, specifically when there’s a leak. It seems that hasn’t been in the habit of reporting leaks to surrounding living things. Not wishing to glow in the dark or succumb to cancer and other deadly diseases often associated with this kind of thing, Exelon’s neighbors begged Barack Obama to craft a bill that would force Exelon to stop this secretive habit that could be dangerous to people’s health. They wanted Barack Obama to ensure that Exelon was required by law to notify neighbors in the event of a nuclear incident. You can understand why this might be important to adults, children and other living things, right?

Loveable, honest Barack Obama promised he would take care of the unreported nuclear leak problem and sponsored a bill to make it mandatory for Exelon to notify living things around them if they ever had another incident. The problem is, by the time the bill got passed, “mandatory” became “voluntary“. The new bill removed all language mandating prompt reporting and simply offered guidance to regulators, whom it charged with addressing the issue of unreported leaks.

So now all of Obama’s consituents who live near Exelon can rest easily knowing that nothing has changed. But it has worked out really well for Barack Obama–to the tune of $200,000 in bundled contributions from Frank Clark.

It’s good to know that Barack Obama would never endanger the health and welfare of his constituents for money, isn’t it?