Bill Brady, Barack Obama's Poker Buddy: 'Socialist With Everyone's Money But [His] Own'

Bill Brady, Barack Obama's Poker Buddy: 'Socialist With Everyone's Money But [His] Own'

Right now, the state of Illinois is getting to know Bill Brady, the upstart right-wing Republican for governor who's taken a double-digit lead over incumbent Democrat Pat Quinn.

But Brady comes to the governor's race from the Illinois State Senate, where he represents the Bloomington area. From 2002 to 2004, he served in the Senate alongside a Senator from Chicago by the name of Barack Obama.

David Remnick's new biography of the President, "The Bridge: The Life And Rise Of Barack Obama," mentions that the two were not only Senate colleagues, but also poker buddies. And NBC Chicago's Ward Room discovered, in reading the book, that Brady had a choice quip for the future POTUS describing his accumulation of wealth at the table.

From "The Bridge," page 301:

[Obama] was a cautious player, folding hand after hand, waiting for his moment to bluff or go big on a good hand ... Obama's caution, hidden behind a cloud of cigarette smoke, could be maddening. One Republican, Bill Brady, of Bloomington, told Obama, 'You're a socialist with everybody's money but your own.'

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