Obama: making friends and influencing people?

This may put a dent in the campaign plans of the "Messiah", right? From Drudge:

Less than two months after ascending to the U.S. Senate, Barack Obama bought more than $50,000 worth of stock in two speculative companies whose major investors included some of his biggest political donors, the NYT will splash on Wednesday Page Ones.

The paper claims, according to newsroom sources: One of the companies was a biotech concern that was starting to develop a drug to treat avian flu. In March 2005, two weeks after buying about $5,000 of its shares, Obama took the lead in a legislative push for more federal spending to battle the disease.

The paper's Mike McIntire and Chris Drew get front placement [side by side with Libby Coverage] for details of Obama's most recent financial disclosure:

It shows that he bought more than $50,000 in stock in a satellite communications business whose principal backers include four friends and donors who had raised more than $150,000 for his political committees.

A spokesman for Obama says the senator did not know that he had invested in either company.

Yeah, I make it a point to be clueless about where hundreds or thousands of my investment dollars go, too. Anywho, I'm sure this whole avian flu drug thing was just a big coinkidink.

In fairness (via Hot Air)...:

The fact that his broker was investing in companies in which his supporters owned shares and which stood ready to benefit from DHS pork is shady, but without some evidence that Obama was secretly steering him to do so there doesn’t seem to be much here. According to the Times, the pharmaceutical company never did get money for its avian flu drug (although it got money for other drugs) and the fact that Obama took a net loss on the investments is going to make it hard to sell to the public as proof of dirty dealings.
...
Still, though, it’s nice to see the hem of the Messiah’s garment with a little dirt on it, especially since this isn’t the first sketchy deal he’s been involved with. One more strike and Hillary’s people will have themselves a bona fide trend to work with. Then it’ll get nasty, and then it’ll get awesome.

As a sidebar, The Street.com had this story on Monday morning, and the NYT didn't pick it up until today.