Marathon Pundit: A curious story about Illinois politics

The early front-runner in the 2004 Senate Democratic Party was Blair Hull. His campaign imploded when messy details of his divorce became public.

Barack Obama won that primary and you know the rest. This morning the Chicago Sun-Times has some juicy tidbits about Ald. Dick Mell, who is the father-in-law of disgraced former Governor Rod Blagojevich. Mell was a Hull supporter, but the paper is reporting that Mell was paid to work on that campaign.

Hull's campaign fund didn't pay Mell directly. Instead, Mell was paid by a political consulting company owned by Fred Lebed, the right-hand man of embattled Sen. Roland Burris. Lebed's company was working for Hull, and Mell was a "subcontractor," Lebed said.

There appears to be nothing illegal about that arrangement. But -- apparently in the wake of Blagojevich's Dec. 9 arrest -- federal authorities have asked questions about it, according to John Ruff, a Lebed and Burris associate who recently broke ties with both men because of the furor over Burris' Senate appointment by Blagojevich.

Ruff said that, in conversations with Lebed in late January, Lebed told him he'd been asked to provide documents to a federal grand jury to explain payments his company made to Mell.