Because surely you don’t think that getting Establishment Democratic support from the mainland comes free, do you?

With corruption running rampant through the ranks of the Democrat party in Washington, Hawai’i Democrat candidate Ed Case looked the other way when he hired Washington political consultant Fred Yang of Hart Research to do his polling. Yang has previously worked for disgraced former Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich.

Before you dismiss that language (ultimately from the HI GOP) as being just a bit overheated, check out what the well-known right-wing mouthpiece Huffington Post said about Yang, back when he was better known as ‘Advisor B:’

A partner in a prominent, Washington-based political consulting firm is among those secretly recorded discussing ways Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich can cash in on President Barack Obama’s old Senate seat. Frederick S. Yang, a top executive at Peter D. Hart Research Group Associates, is identified by prosecutors in the Blagojevich criminal complaint as “Advisor B,” Michael D. Ettinger, a lawyer representing the governor’s brother, said Thursday. Robert Blagojevich, who has not been charged with a crime, runs his brother’s campaign fund.

[snip]

The intercepted discussions between Yang, who has not been charged, and the governor involved ways to secure Blagojevich a high-paying union job or persuade Obama to name him secretary of Health and Human Services in exchange for Valerie Jarrett’s appointment to succeed Obama in the Senate.

[snip]

In a Nov. 7 recorded conversation characterized by prosecutors, Yang told Blagojevich he “should leverage the President-elect’s desire to have ‘Senate Candidate 1′ (Jarrett) appointed to the Senate seat in order to get a head position” with a union organization called Change to Win.

(Links via @PatrickRuffini & Hotline On Call) ‘Change to Win’ is otherwise known as ‘front group for SEIU:’ it sometimes seems like you need a scorecard to keep track of who is who – and who is playing who – in Democratic party politics. Reid Wilson of Hotline thinks that this helps Case; I think that helping Case is irrelevant to the decision. No matter what the special election results are, Ed Case will be running for this seat in the general election, and he’ll be doing it with the endorsement of the mainland Democratic party. They expect something back for that; and plugging into the cozy network of favors and quid pro quos like this will do a lot to reassure Democratic party elites that in the future it will be business as usual in HI-01.

And never mind what the Democrats actually in Hawai’i think…

Moe Lane

PS: Yes, I’m writing this with malice aforethought. I’m still right.

PPS: Voting for Charles Djou (R) cuts this Gordian knot in two.

Crossposted to Moe Lane.