Well, unless you just woke up from a coma in the past few hours, you already know about the situation in Chicago with Illinois Governor, Rod Blagojevich and his Chief of Staff, John Harris, being arrested today by the FBI on federal charges of fraud. The allegations include the governor attempting to auction off Barack Obama’s now-empty Senate seat, among many other things.

From the Chicago Sun Times today:

A 76-page FBI affidavit alleges that Blagojevich was intercepted on court-authorized wiretaps during the last month conspiring to sell or trade Illinois’ U.S. Senate seat vacated by Obama for financial and other personal benefits for himself and his wife.

At various times, in exchange for the Senate appointment, Blagojevich allegedly discussed obtaining:

• A substantial salary for himself at a either a non-profit foundation or an organization affiliated with labor unions.

• Placing his wife on corporate boards where he speculated she might garner as much as $150,000 a year.

• Promises of campaign funds — including cash up front.

• A cabinet post or ambassadorship for himself.

On Dec. 4, Blagojevich allegedly told an advisor that he might “get some (money) up front, maybe” from Senate Candidate 5, if he named Senate Candidate 5 to the Senate seat, to insure that Senate Candidate 5 kept a promise about raising money for Blagojevich if he ran for re-election.

In a recorded conversation on Oct. 31, Blagojevich claimed he was approached by an associate of Senate Candidate 5 as follows: “We were approached to ‘pay to play.’ That, you know, he’d raise 500 grand. An emissary came. Then the other guy would raise a million, if I made him (Senate Candidate 5) a Senator.”

And as usual, The Smoking Gun has the complete rundown, including this:

Attached to the U.S. District Court complaint is an FBI affidavit, excerpted below, alleging that Blagojevich was caught on wiretaps noting that the Senate seat “is a fucking valuable thing, you just don’t give it away for nothing.” He was also recorded saying that unless “I get something real good,” he would appoint himself to the vacancy. “I’m going to keep this Senate option for me a real possibility, you know, and therefore I can drive a hard bargain. You hear what I’m saying. And if I don’t get what I want and I’m not satisfied with it, then I’ll just take the Senate seat myself.” According to surreptitiously recorded conversations, Blagojevich spoke with associates about the possibility of trading the Senate post for either an ambassadorship or a Cabinet post. The politician, according to the affidavit sworn by FBI Agent Daniel Cain, “analogized his situation to that of a sports agent shopping a potential free agent to various teams.” During a wiretapped November 10 call, a frustrated and financially strapped Blagojevich referred to Obama as a “motherfucker” and said that he would not appoint an ally of the President-elect to the Senate vacancy if “I don’t get anything.” Referring to Obama, Blagojevich exclaimed, “Fuck him. For nothing? Fuck him.” In a November 11 conversation, Blagojevich remarked that he knew Obama wanted Valerie Jarrett, a longtime confidante, to succeed him, “but they’re not willing to give me anything except appreciation. Fuck them.”

Any knowledgeable, thinking American (well, at least 47 million of us) know that nothing good comes out of the Chicago political machine. The sheer arrogance that all Chicago politicians display, including the Chosen One himself, is just astounding. I won’t go further into detail here on my blog, as it’s covered quite extensively on other sites and in all forms of media.

I wonder just how far this investigation is going to go – in fact, I’m HOPING it will indeed go “that” far. I don’t think I need to explain to you what I mean, either. Something or someone has got to bring this runaway train to a stop, and hopefully the wheels will fall off on their own.

As a very, VERY serious post-script question: Do you people realize just how many Chicago politicians are being brought in to the Obama Administration? Do you really? We all should be extremely worried and nervous about that one very fact.