Fannie Obama

Barack tries to make John McCain look like his politics is from the dinosaur era because of the lobbyists in his midst. But Obama is no different. Consider the man chosen to oversee his VP search committee, James A. Johnson, former Fannie Mae CEO and consummate Washington insider.

The Wall Street Journal reported Saturday that Johnson had received mortgages worth more than $7 million from beleaguered lender Countrywide Financial, including at least two loans below market average. The article noted that the transactions may have been perfectly aboveboard -- but several could prove too cozy, depending on how much they overlapped with Johnson's Fannie Mae tenure.

What's that old expression about glass houses?

The Republican National Committee responded as if it had won the lottery. "Barack Obama routinely rails against lobbyists and corporate insiders, yet his campaign is stocked with both. Now it turns out that the man leading his vice presidential selection team is receiving highly questionable loans," spokesman Alex Conant declared in a statement. "With millions of Americans struggling to pay their mortgages, it raises serious questions about Obama's judgment when we learn members of his campaign leadership are receiving favors that the average American would never get."

Is this silly politics? No sillier than Barack pretending to be Mr. Clean!

Sen. John McCain piled on during an interview this afternoon with Carl Cameron of Fox News. "I think it suggests a bit of a contradiction, talking about how his campaign is gonna be not associated with people like that. Clearly he is very much associated with that," McCain said, according to statement circulated by his campaign.

And if Barack's campaign has to point back at John McCain's behavior to prove that Barack isn't any worse than McCain, well then, the point goes to McCain, doesn't it.

Obama spokesman Tommy Vietor shot back, "It's the height of hypocrisy for the McCain campaign to try and make this an issue when John Green, one of John McCain's top advisors, lobbied for Ameriquest, which was one of the nation's largest subprime lenders and a key player in the mortgage crisis.

Did he say Ameriquest? The slimy company that Barack's buddy, fellow Chicago Harvard alum, new kinda politics partner, Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick used to be on the board of? Better leave that one alone, wouldn't you say?