Times Covers Ayers and Obama

The New York Times finally brings up Bill Ayers and Obama’s connection to him.  Of course, they attempt to cover for Obama, but at least they mentioned it. 

At a tumultuous meeting of anti-Vietnam War militants at the Chicago Coliseum in 1969, Bill Ayers helped found the radical Weathermen, launching a campaign of bombings that would target the Pentagon and United States Capitol.

Twenty-six years later, at a lunchtime meeting about school reform in a Chicago skyscraper, Barack Obama met Mr. Ayers, by then an education professor. Their paths have crossed sporadically since then, at a coffee Mr. Ayers hosted for Mr. Obama’s first run for office, on the schools project and a charitable board, and in casual encounters as Hyde Park neighbors.

[...]

A review of records of the schools project and interviews with a dozen people who know both men, suggest that Mr. Obama, 47, has played down his contacts with Mr. Ayers, 63. But the two men do not appear to have been close. Nor has Mr. Obama ever expressed sympathy for the radical views and actions of Mr. Ayers, whom he has called “somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago, when I was 8.”

[...]

That attitude is widely shared in Chicago, but it is not universal. Steve Chapman, a columnist for The Chicago Tribune, defended Mr. Obama’s relationship with the Rev. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr., his longtime pastor, whose black liberation theology and “God damn America” sermon became notorious last spring. But he denounced Mr. Obama for associating with Mr. Ayers, whom he said the University of Illinois should never have hired.

“I don’t think there’s a statute of limitations on terrorist bombings,” Mr. Chapman said in an interview, speaking not of the law but of political and moral implications.

“If you’re in public life, you ought to say, ‘I don’t want to be associated with this guy,’ ” Mr. Chapman said. “If John McCain had a long association with a guy who’d bombed abortion clinics, I don’t think people would say, ‘That’s ancient history.’ ”

The Ayers story is really very simple.  Obama had a multi-faceted relationship with him.  Obama chose to have such a relationship knowing that Ayers is an unrepentant domestic terrorist.  This reflects on Obama’s (a) judgment and/or (b) character. 

1. We all knew the McCain camp would try and pull a Ayers. But nothing like sleeping with a guy who hates the USA - Todd Palin.

   “If Palin is going to say this, it is now perfectly legitimate to point out that she repeatedly courted a secessionist group founded by someone who openly professed hatred of the American government, cursed our flag, and wanted to secede from the Union. Sarah’s husband, Todd Palin, was a member of this group, which continues to venerate that founder to this day, for years.

   As you already know, the group is the Alaska Independence Party, which sees as its ultimate goal seceding from the union. Todd was a member, with a brief exception, from 1995 until 2002, according to the Division of Elections in Alaska.

   And though Sarah Palin herself was apparently not a member of this group, there’s no doubt that she repeatedly courted this secessionist organization over the years. In 1994, Palin attended the group’s annual convention, according to witnesses who spoke to ABC News’ Jake Tapper. The McCain campaign has confirmed she visited the group’s 2000 convention, and she addressed its convention this year, as an incumbent governor whose oath of office includes upholding the Constitution of the United States.

   The founder of the AIP was a man named Joe Vogler. Here’s what he had to say in a 1991 interview, only a few years before Palin attended its convention: “The fires of hell are frozen glaciers compared to my hatred for the American government.”

   He also said this: “And I won’t be buried under their damn flag. I’ll be buried in Dawson. And when Alaska is an independent nation they can bring my bones home.”

   Posted by on October 05, 2008 at 0656 hrs




2. The Palin story is really very simple. McCain is so erratic that he doesn’t care that we would have someone in the White House who IS a PROVEN member of a successionist organization based on hatred of the United States. Just who IS sleeping with the enemy~

   Posted by on October 05, 2008 at 0816 hrs




3. A wise man once said to remove the log in your own eye before pointing to the splinter in someone elses eye

   Posted by on October 05, 2008 at 0829 hrs




4. Bill Ayers and his wife, Bernadine Dohrn, are the lowest. No need to recount their history and “non-rehabilitation”. It’s all been covered at length. But as for Ayers “connection” to Obama, what’s that saying about trying to prove something out of whole cloth? This is a real stretch.

   Posted by on October 05, 2008 at 0832 hrs




5. In light of Palin’s past association with the Alaskan Independence Party, for instance, couldn’t she just as easily (and more fairly) be accused of “palling around with separatists”? Indeed, her husband’s a card-carrying member of that party, so she could even be said to be “sleeping with separatists.”
   
   And as for John McCain, if we’re going to talk about past associations, let’s compare Bill Ayers with Charles Keating. Ayres is an english professor who last engaged in illegal activities when Obama was 8 years old. His association with Obama is tenuous at best. They live in the same neighborhood and have served together on a few charitable boards. There is exactly zero evidence that Obama shares any of Ayres’ radical views (and not much evidence that Ayres still does either).
   
   Charles Keating is a convicted felon who swindled tens of thousands of people--mostly elderly--out of their life savings and cost the federal government billions of dollars. McCain and Keating were not mere acquaintances (like Obama and Ayres), but had a close personal relationship. Keating befriended McCain in 1981 and helped him launch his political career. He contributed $112,000 to McCain’s first two congressional campaigns. While in Congress, McCain took nine trips to the Bahamas with Keating on Keating’s dime. He didn’t report any of these trips as he was supposed to under congressional rules. And most importantly, when Keating’s savings and loan was under federal investigation, McCain and four other Senators went to bat for him and held highly improper meetings with federal regulators.

   Posted by on October 05, 2008 at 0923 hrs




6. I would prefer Obama to have had nothing to do with Ayers. But the link is tenuous. Palin’s husband is questionable, but it’s more complicated. She can’t choose his beliefs but she might be a positive influence on him. On the other hand one of my worries about her is that she’s impressionable. I think McCain and his team will have to keep an eye on her. She seems to lack judgement sometimes (for example hanging around anti-semites). I think it’s innocent but all the more reason to keep a close eye on her!

   Posted by on October 05, 2008 at 1040 hrs




7. Im guessing that joe six pack wont care about keating, probably wont understand the alaska seperatists.
   But know about terrorism and that ayers will be more harmful.
   Just my two pennys.

   Posted by on October 05, 2008 at 1046 hrs




8. Ah....great. Another long diatribe trying to equate the Alaska Independence Party (AIP) with some real domestic terrorists (Ayers/Dorhn)

   In 1990 the Alaska electorate wasn’t happy with either the D or R candidates for Governor.  With that background, extremely popular former Governor Wally Hickel came back out of retirement in September to run as a third party candidate. 

   Hickel however could not get access to the ballot.  He formed an alliance with the AIP party and the AIP candidate stepped down to let Hickel run on their ballot.  Hickel won the three person election and again served as Alaska’s Governor from 1990-94.  During that time, the AIP gained a ton of members not because these people all realistically wanted to secede from the US, but because it was viewed as Hickel’s party, and the party in control of State government. 

   Now you may ask why there are any “radicals” in Alaska who want independence at all, you need to be reminded of the fact that Alaska wasn’t made a State until 1959.  There are many people there who lived there before Statehood.  What AIP has asked for was a simple public vote as to whether Alaska should have joined the US.  A vote they never got to make.  As far as I know, no one has bombed UW math buildings, shot at the Police or done anything resembling violent acts. 

   Since the Daily Kos crowd seems so troubled by this, I thought details needed to be brought to the lower 48.  How do I know all this?  I lived there briefly during Hickel’s second run as Governor while a member of the AIP.

   When we see Todd Palin’s wiki entry with things like this under Ayers then we can talk:

   “....Later in 1969, Ayers participated in planting a bomb at a statue dedicated to police casualties in the 1886 Haymarket Riot. The blast broke almost 100 windows and blew pieces of the statue onto the nearby Kennedy Expressway........Ayers participated in the bombings of New York City Police Headquarters in 1970, the United States Capitol building in 1971, and The Pentagon in 1972, as he noted in his 2001 book, Fugitive Days.......

   .....In the months before Ayers’ memoir was published on September 10, 2001, the author gave numerous interviews........The reporter quoted him as saying “I don’t regret setting bombs” and “I feel we didn’t do enough”, and, when asked if he would “do it all again” as saying “I don’t want to discount the possibility.....”

   Posted by on October 05, 2008 at 1142 hrs




9. To me someone who plants a bomb knowing it will destroy but not caring who or what is the most despicable form of human scum.

   The mere association with such scum is also despicable.

   Now name one violent act of the AIP.

   Posted by on October 05, 2008 at 1713 hrs




10. Agreed, even trying to equate the two is pure lunacy.  I am taken aback that anyone could possably justify it in their own minds let alone be so stupid as to try to articulate it to others.

    Posted by on October 05, 2008 at 1914 hrs




11. You must be new here, Jay. 

    Don’t worry.  You kinda get used to it.

    Posted by on October 05, 2008 at 1923 hrs




12. Yes, one presidential candidate has a good relationship with an unrepentant criminal, someone who had planned firebombings and assassinations of his political enemies, and who was actually convicted of related crimes. That candidate is John McCain.

    I can’t wait to see your condemnations of McCain’s judgement and character.

    Posted by on October 05, 2008 at 2101 hrs




13. Agreed, even trying to equate the two is pure lunacy.  I am taken aback that anyone could possably justify it in their own minds let alone be so stupid as to try to articulate it to others.

    Agreed, trying to equate Obama’s aquaintance level association with someone who engaged in terrorist activities when he was 8 years old with Palin’s marriage to someone who was an active participant in an organization that wants to pull out of the Union is completely insane.

    Watching McCain reach this level of filth is depressing.

    Posted by on October 05, 2008 at 2131 hrs




14. Obama’s relationship with an unrepentant terrorist has been left unexplored for far too long.  The NYT finally ran an article and tried to minimize this relationship, and the media lemmings will now try to do likewise.  It’s left to the McCain campaign to educate America.

    Drill, baby.  Drill.

    Posted by on October 05, 2008 at 2159 hrs




15. Yes, one presidential candidate has a good relationship with an unrepentant criminal, someone who had planned firebombings and assassinations of his political enemies, and who was actually convicted of related crimes. That candidate is John McCain.

    Steve-O:

    Just WHO is the unrepentant criminal who planned fire bombings and assassinations and was convicted with whom McCain has a good relationship?  (yes placement of the commas makes all the difference in the world, or are you trying to condemn McCain for acting in accordance with the Laws of Land Warfare as established in the Geneva conventions?)

    Posted by on October 07, 2008 at 0444 hrs




16. Click on the link, and you’ll see that it’s G. Gordon Liddy. Liddy proposed firebombing the Brookings Institution, assassinating NY Times columnist Jack Anderson (and Howard Hunt, when he was flipped by Watergate investigators), and kidnapping antiwar activists. The only scheme he carried out, to my knowledge, was the Watergate break-in, for which he was convicted and served a prison sentence. Now he has a radio show, where he’s urged the murder of federal agents, named his practice targets “Bill” and “Hillary”, and so on. He’s openly expressed admiration for Nazis. And McCain calls him a good and principled man!

    I condemn the past actions of both men. I believe that Bill Ayers should have served time for his crimes. But it’s worth noting that once Bill Ayers reformed, he became an education expert and has sat on the board of charitable organizations with both Republicans and Democrats, while Liddy remains a kook.

    Posted by on October 07, 2008 at 0718 hrs




17. Here’s what we know for sure:

    The economy is in the tank, and the question isn’t whether we’re in a recession, it’s how long and how deep the recession is going to be.

    We’re fighting a war on two fronts, in Iraq and in Afghanistan/Pakistan. In Pakistan, al Qaeda has reconstituted itself and is stronger than at any time since 2001. Also in Pakistan-nuclear weapons.

    The American public, by comfortable margins, supports Barack Obama’s positions on the best ways to handle the most pressing issues facing the country.

    QED The McCain campaign has absolutely nothing but this fear-mongering and spreading of smears upon which to base its campaign.

    Posted by on October 07, 2008 at 1648 hrs




18. We also know that Obama’s calculated run to the middle is diametrically opposed to how he would govern.  A leftist who associates with radical leftists is not who we need in the White House over the next four years.  McCain needs to make this case over and over.

    Posted by on October 07, 2008 at 2006 hrs