The Chicago Tribune has these rather eye-opening details on Blago-gate:

Obama said Thursday he had never spoken to Blagojevich about the Senate vacancy and was “confident that no representatives” of his had engaged in any dealmaking over the seat with the governor or his team. He also pledged Thursday that in the “next few days” he would explain what contacts his staff may have had with the governor’s office about the Senate vacancy.

Emanuel, who has long been close to both Blagojevich and Obama, has refused to respond to questions about any involvement he may have had with the Blagojevich camp over the Senate pick. A spokeswoman for Emanuel also declined to comment Friday.

One source confirmed that communications between Emanuel and the Blagojevich administration were captured on court-approved wiretaps.

Another source said that contact between the Obama camp and the governor’s administration regarding the Senate seat began the Saturday before the Nov. 4 election, when Emanuel made a call to the cell phone of Harris. The conversation took place around the same time press reports surfaced about Emanuel being approached about taking the high-level White House post should Obama win.

Emanuel delivered a list of candidates who would be “acceptable” to Obama, the source said. On the list were Obama adviser Valerie Jarrett, Illinois Veterans Affairs director Tammy Duckworth, state Comptroller Dan Hynes and U.S. Rep. Jan Schakowsky of Chicago, the source said. All are Democrats.

Sometime after the election, Emanuel called Harris back to add the name of Democratic Atty. Gen. Lisa Madigan to the approved list, the source said.

Well, no wonder President-elect Obama in his initial response went from “we” to “I” had no contacts with Blago. It would have been nice had he been immediately forthcoming about his closest advisor and Chief of Staff’s discussions about the empy seat. The conversations are on tape so we will learn precisely what Emanuel said, whether he was horse-trading or simply issuing the “approved list,” and whether he was confronted with any demands that did — or should have — sent him scurrying to the authorities. But the pretense that the transition team was removed from the Senate seat determination is, not surprisingly, gone.

For now, we have many more questions than answers (ranging from who compiled that list to how much Emanual related to the President-elect about Blago’s demands), but sooner rather than later the President-elect will need to provide that full accounting of  his team’s contacts, something he promised this week. There is added urgency to that task now that we know Blago did indeed deal with Obama’s inner circle.