Antoin “Tony” Rezko, a political operative and former power broker from Illinois, has just been convicted on 16 of 24 federal corruption charges. Link: Daily Herald.

Why is this of interest? Rezko is a friend and close associate of Presidential Candidate, Barrack Obama. The conviction follows closely on the heels of Obama claiming the Democrat nomination yesterday.

Rezko allegedly has numerous connections to both Obama and to Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich, a Democrat who ran on a reform platform after former governor, George Ryan, was convicted of corruption charges. Blagojevich claims no involvement with Rezko and claims he has done nothing illegal, however, he is under federal investigation himself.

It will be very interesting to watch, over the next few days, how this story will play out. Pay attention to how the Obama campaign will shift spinmeisters into overtime to distance the candidate from Rezko. Let’s see how the McCain campaign handles this conviction or what they may, or may not, do with it.

Even more interesting to see is what Hillary Clinton does with this story.

Nothing even close to this has ever happened before. This story is big, it is going to get bigger, and we’re all in a position to watch history being created.