“My bosses aren’t interested in tackling the story.”  That’s what a top investigative reporter at a major Chicago newspaper said when I asked why the story of Annabel Melongo – former Save A Life Foundation employee turned whistleblower – wasn’t being covered. “We’d have to spend a lot of time to get it right.” The reporter explained how, with a limited staff of investigative reporters tasked to write one “investigative story” each week, there aren’t enough resources to focus on the Melongo case.

And besides, it’d be “covering ground on someone else’s story.” In other words, bloggers have already told the what of Melongo’s incarceration in the Cook County Jail – a nasty place – under a $300,000 bond for “eavesdropping.” The reporter was right about that. But ferreting out the why of her imprisonment as she awaits trial is a different task.

If the Chicago print reporters were interested, they’d follow the money. If resources are so tight, here’s an economical way to do it:

First, add up all the government grants listed by the Chicago suburb-based Save A Life Foundation (SALF) in their Form 990s. That’s the yearly paperwork that 501(c)(3) nonprofits submit to the Illinois Attorney General (AG) and to the IRS. A simple email FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) request to the AG for SALF’s 990’s from its birth in 1993 until it folded last year takes a minute, and the information is free. Their reported government grants total $7,850,777.

Next, add up the dollar amounts of state and federal grants obtained via FOIA requests and email exchanges with agency officials. That number is considerably more than $7,850,777.

So what’s up with the discrepancy? (more…)

In his March 12, 2010, interview with FOX News’ Greta van Susteren, former Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich described a conversation he said he had with Rahm Emanuel concerning a replacement for Obama’s Senate seat.  His comments on that subject are within 1:09-3.29 of this video.

Blago’s words came in the context of discussing former Congressman Eric Massa’s allegation that Emanuel lobbied him in a shower while both men were naked. Suggesting this episode displayed Emanuel’s tactics, Blagojevich said,

I chose Rahm Emanuel. He was my first choice to help us pick a United States Senator. I wanted him to make a deal with the Democratic House Speaker here in Illinois. In exchange for me appointing his daughter he would stop blocking a public works bill that would create jobs. He would stop blocking healthcare expansion for fifty to three-hundred thousand people. And a written promise not to raise taxes on people.  Rahm was the guy I chose to make that deal happen. And was about to do it and then everything changed when they came and arrested me.

The Illinois House Speaker in Illinois is Michael J. Madigan. He’s been Speaker since 1982, and chair of the Illinois Democratic Party since 1998. Here’s some of what the Chicago Tribune knows about him: (more…)