The American Spectator

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"I had no contact with the governor or his office and so I was not aware of what was happening," Barack Obama told reporters today in the wake of the Blagojevich arrest, the Chicago Tribune reports.

But Jake Tapper notes that on November 23, Obama adviser David Axelrod was singing a different tune. "I know he's talked to the governor," Axelrod said  on Fox News Chicago in response to a question about Obama's involvement in filling his Senate seat (see the 1:20 mark of the video below).

Furthermore, in the excerpt of the indictment that has been promoted as clearing Obama (in which Blagojevich uses a colorful Oedipus slur to describe the President-elect), the governor laments that Obama wants his preferred candidate appointed, but that he won't give him anything in return. Of course, everything Blagojevich said needs to be taken with a certain grain of salt, but this nonetheless does raise questions as to how Blagojevich would have known about Obama's preferences, or his unwillingness to deal. Also, it raises a question as to whether Obama knew that there was dirty dealing going on over his Senate seat, and said nothing.

Politicians often get themselves in trouble not by the act itself, but by subsequent denials. We'll know more in the coming days and weeks, but I wonder if Obama will come to regret his blanket statement today that, "I had no contact with the governor or his office and so I was not aware of what was happening."