Ron Radosh

November 15th, 2008 3:02 pm

Ayers on Good Morning America - a response

This morning Bill Ayers appeared on ABC TV’s “Good Morning America.” Newsman Chris Cuomo did a respectable job in questioning him. But, although he was tough by TV news standards, he did not know enough about the specifics of the events of the 60’s or the actual role played by the Weather Underground to challenge Ayers effectively on key issues.

Even if he had, the very nature of TV news gave Ayers a major victory. Speaking in a soft and calm voice, viewers could not help but wonder how this seemingly rational, calm and soft-spoken man could have been accused of terrorism. Indeed, Ayers painted himself as a valiant and militant anti-war activist who joined thousands of other Americans in protesting an unjust war. When asked about his own group’s terrorism, he tried to turn the tables by reiterating that the United States had been engaged in a war of terror against the citizens of Vietnam, killing thousands of innocent civilians in the process of waging the fight. Thus, without answering the question of whether he had indeed engaged in terrorism, Ayers laid the moral culpability for terror on the United States, which he obviously believes has still not answered for its own war crimes.

Aside from claiming that during the Vietnam War “any “despicable,” acts were those “being done by our government,” he added, “I never hurt anyone.” Cuomo did not raise the issue of the violent attacks on people that took place after the group’s October 1969 “Days of Rage,” in which a Chicago city official, Richard Elrod, was beaten up and paralyzed. Their own attacks were not terrorist, Ayers argued, since he never killed or injured anyone. I guess he has a rather selective memory. As for ABC, they might have had their researchers dig a bit deeper before Cuomo did his interview.

The truth is that since the organization, and not its individual members took credit for violent acts that did in fact hurt people, we do not know whether Ayers in particular set off some of the bombs that caused severe injuries to many. We do know that he was one of the Weather Underground’s leaders, and his orders and leadership led to these serious acts of terror.

Cuomo lost an opportunity to challenge Ayers on terrorism when he failed to bring up the accidental bombing of a Greenwich Village townhouse that killed some of his own comrades, including his former girl friend Diana Oughton. That bomb was meant to be exploded at a dance to be held for new GI’s and their dates at Fort Dix in New Jersey. Cuomo should have asked Ayers: “What if your comrades had not crossed some wires, and the bomb went off as scheduled in Fort Dix? The force of the explosion shows that hundreds if not more would have been killed. How do you justify such a plan, which you and others in the group sanctioned?

Cuomo also brought up Ayers relationship with Barack Obama. Here, Ayers challenged what he called a “dishonest” narrative “meant to demonize me.” When Cuomo read from Ayers own new afterword to the new paperback edition of Fugitive Days, in which Ayers writes that Obama was a “neighbor and family friend,” Ayers downplayed that Obama was a “family friend,” and tried to say that he knew him only from serving on the Woods Foundation board with Obama. Cuomo lost another opportunity by not following up on Obama’s agreement to fund Ayers’ own radical education projects; nor did he note that the office Obama had while at the Foundation was literally next door to Ayers office for the project that Woods was funding. Clearly, Ayers was lying when he told Cuomo that he only knew Obama in “a professional way on the same level of…thousands of other people.” The evidence indicates the opposite.

Ayers also disingenuously made an oblique reference to McCarthyism, without using the word. When asked about whether or not Obama might have been influenced in any way by Ayers, he answered by saying that “I don’t buy the idea that guilt by association should have any part of our politics.” The classic definition of McCarthyism- and Ayers uttered an aside about how it so often has damaged America in the past- was that innocent people were victimized because of associations they may have had with others. The real question that was raised during the campaign, however, was again regarding Obama’s funding of Ayers own projects, which were extremist radical projects meant to indoctrinate American young people in left wing ideas. If Obama did not agree with this project, why did he pass on funding them? Or, did he misunderstand Ayers’ intent? Obama has not answered these questions to date.

On that front, Ayers tried to argue that all his work and books in the past years have been on childhood education. But as has been shown by his appearance alongside Hugo Chavez in Venezuela and by his statements that Ayers’ intent was to duplicate in the US what Chavez has attempted in his country—to produce a group of young people who work to overthrow capitalism and introduce a revolutionary socialist system at home.

At one point, Cuomo asked Ayers how a serious academic could have no real regrets about his violent past. Aside from misjudging Ayers as just a serious academic, the question brings to mind the well known quote from George Orwell, that some ideas are so stupid that only an intellectual could believe them. Bill Ayers is just the kind of person Orwell was talking about.

Note: I originally wrote this one hour after Ayers’ interview was broadcast on Friday. The blog was not posted until Saturday night or early Sunday because of technical problems. Keep that in mind when reading it. Thanks. Ron

73 Comments

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Nov 15, 2008 - 11:19 pm 2. Pajamas Media » Rebutting Bill Ayers:

[...] Read the entire post here. [...]

Nov 16, 2008 - 2:06 am 3. C. Siegel:

Cuomo had a copy of “Prarie Fire” the violent Weatherman manifesto IN HIS HANDS, and asked Ayers about the dedication of the book to Sirhan Sirhan, the murderer of Robert Kennedy. He only asked Ayers about the dedication, which Ayers sidestepped, leaving aside the entire vile and violent content of the book. Did Cuomo read that book at all? Did he even read Collier and Horowitz’s essay on Weatherman in “Destructive Generation”?

Those who do not remember history are condemned to do slipshod interviews, Mr. Cuomo.

Nov 16, 2008 - 4:39 am 4. Brian Richard Allen:

It’s very likely that ABC and Cuomo did their homework well enough but that their purpose was to praise the mobbed-up Marxist murtadd Muslim, B Hussein bin B Hussayn bin Hussayn Muhummad Ubama’s, Ayatollah, Ayres, not to bury him.

And to flog both his books and his boss.

Brian Richard Allen
Los Angeles - CalifUBAMAcated 90028

Nov 16, 2008 - 4:51 am 5. big mistake:

Ayers - duplicate in the US what Chavez has attempted in his country—to produce a group of young people who work to overthrow capitalism and introduce a revolutionary socialist system at home.
Never happen Bill!
Read this:
CARACAS VENEZUELA— President Hugo Chavez threatened Saturday to imprison the popular governor of Venezuela’s western Zulia state for allegedly plotting to kill him.
Too many of us old Vietnam/Gulf War/Iraq/Afghanistan Vets still carrying our weapons.

You try any overthrowing.

LOCK AND LOAD!

Nov 16, 2008 - 5:12 am 6. Dark Helmet:

This scum, who calls our soldiers mass murderes, should be ending his days in a small cell. People who hate President Bush enough will believe anything. Even the facts about obammy mammy and the kind of traitors he keeps company with.

liberalism is a mental defect. They need to all be removed from the voting process. A simple reality test at the booth would work, in F*ing english.

Nov 16, 2008 - 6:45 am 7. PRODOS:

I just finished watching the online video of Chris Cuomo interviewing William Ayers:

http://abcnews.go.com/GMA/Politics/story?id=6251086&page=1

What I found most interesting was how matter-of-fact Ayers is about his view of America as essentially a terrorist state.

As an ex-Commie myself, his strung-together cliches had an old, almost comfortable feeling about them.

His views may be “radical” in one sense - in the sense of being counter to American Ideals (which, by the way, are the truly radical ideals!)

But he’s far from new or original. The same, tired, murky, boring old Neo-Marxist BS.

Here is Bill Ayers’ blog, with his November 2006 speech in Venezuela:
http://billayers.wordpress.com/2006/11/

Some excerpts:

“Capitalism promotes racism and militarism – turning people into consumers, not citizens … Venezuelans have shown the world that with full participation, full inclusion, and popular empowerment, the failings of capitalist schooling can be resisted and overcome. Venezuela is a beacon to the world in its accomplishment of eliminating illiteracy in record time, and engaging virtually the entire population in the ongoing project of education … Viva Presidente Chavez! Viva La Revolucion Bolivariana! Hasta La Victoria Siempre!”

Hey!

I think he’s talking about change Obama can believe in!

Nov 16, 2008 - 7:00 am 8. Mary Grabar:

Yes, we need to keep the First Amendment strong for rebuttals like this. The ignorant masses (including most of my college students) surprisingly believe the mainstream media and MoveOn. Keep saying it, Ron!

Nov 16, 2008 - 7:18 am 9. adam d.:

The election is over and nobody is watching, so Ayers doesn’t have to convince anybody of anything. He only has to submit to what can be described for a record as a tough interview so that later on the matter can be dismissed and so that anyone who raises it can be labeled a crank, repudiated, and so on.

Better to stick to the ideas on this one and simply work to block their implementation if and as those efforts unfold.

Nov 16, 2008 - 7:44 am 10. Allison Kaplan Sommer:

Nov 16, 2008 - 7:51 am 11. Tina Trent:

Thank you for telling the truth.

Nov 16, 2008 - 9:10 am 12. Ellis Amdur:

Ayers recently gave another interview, with Amy Goodman, along with his wife, Bernadette Dohrn - I saw a small portion on public access TV a couple of days ago. Here they were much more triumphalist, framing all their activities as a fight for freedom against an oppressive state. I’m sure the complete interview can be accessed. It, too, deserves a detailed analysis.

Nov 16, 2008 - 9:12 am 13. Big Al:

thank you

Nov 16, 2008 - 9:56 am 14. BC:

Isn’t it well past the time to let this dog die in peace? That whole Vietnam era stuff was from a different place with different issues. Imagine taking the worst anger you can find by anyone over Bush and Iraq, multiplying it by at least 10x, and have it spread all over the country. Unless you were there when it happened, it’s pointless to try put the actions of actions of the anarchists (which they were, not terrorists) like the Weather Underground and the SDS into today’s context. (I find it amusing and telling that the new “Weather Underground” is all about, well, the weather: wunderground.com)

Americans were being killed in Vietnam at sometimes in the order of hundreds per week. The average US casualty rate from 1967 through 1969 approached 1100/month on *average” with the casualty rate peaking in 1968, where US military deaths averaged over 300 per *week*.

The US government, from LBJ through Richard Nixon, lied their butts off about what was really going on. The Vietcong “Tet Offensive” at the beginning of 1968 actually ended up being a big military defeat for Vietcong, but it had a major bad effect on the US — according to the news and Pentagon reports leading up to that, everything was under control, and the enemy was in retreat. But the supposedly almost defeated enemy somehow was able to launch a massive, large scale surprise attack at the end of January.

It was then the US public started realizing that they had been lied to all along. And when US casualties starting mounting, and and reports of massacres committed by US troops started, like that at My Lai in March of 1968, combined with the assassinations of Martin Luther King and then Bobby Kennedy that same year, then well….

This isn’t excusing any bad behavior, but it was an insane time then, especially during 1968. So taking the behavior of young, extremely angry people at that time, like Ayers, and trying to place 9/11 values on it is just being utterly ignorant of history. And trying to make a BFD out of what every credible source had as only casual interactions related to community projects decades later between now college professor Ayers and Obama is no more than malicious ignorance.

Nov 16, 2008 - 10:00 am 15. sonoffar:

Ayers is a lier, a conspirator to murder, a terrorist, and a scum of the first order, all basic information that most people are aware of. What about ABC, and Cuomo? Are we to believe that ABCor even Cuomo, have no access to the research material available on Ayers, Obama, the Weathermen, and the 60s? Despite all the accusations and innuendo to the contrary, the American public didn’t just fall off the turnip truck.
ABCs time spent with Ayers is just more of the same ol same ol that the major media outlets have continualy used to cover for and support President Elect Obama. The fact that Ayers is along for the ride may be coincidense or the fruits of a good scheme by Ayers. Time will tell all things.
For now Ayers should be ostracized from society, the nation and perhaps from existence. I suspect, instead he will serve in a nice well paying cabinet position and die an old man with lots of fun memories and a big smirk on his face.

Nov 16, 2008 - 10:25 am 16. BackwardsBoy:

Did you really expect someone from the MSM to ask Ayers any hard questions, like his plans to overthrow our country with the help of Russia and Cuba and exterminate 25 million Americans?

Nov 16, 2008 - 10:30 am 17. Vinny Vidivici:

Ayers’ is the sort of punk who could only exist in the West. A silver-spooned, wet towel-snapper with parental authority issues and a serious case of moral confusion. But for his wealth and privilege, and fashionable politics, he’d be sharing a cell with Ted Kaczynski. That he’s accepted within the academy says more about the profound decadence of the academy anything else.

Not to compare Ayers with Ghandi, but we’d never have heard of either of them had they lived in Ayers’ beloved Cuba or the Soviet Union. Notice how tinker-toy revolutionaries like Ayers’ and the wanna-be tough guys at Black Bloc never show up at places like APEC Summits in Shanghai because then they’d chance to go toe-to-toe with the pointy end of a genuine police state. No plastic handcuffs, miranda rights, press conferences featuring activist lawyers and lenient judges to sneer at while charges are reduced or dismissed. Much easier to be ‘brave’ and ’speak truth to power’ when The Man won’t harm a hair on your head.

I’ve spent enough time in the police states and the more Hobbesian neighborhoods of this planet to know that the high-chair bangers of the Boomer Left have always been dangerously naive. But when Ayers told the reporter hounding him outside his house a few weeks back to get off his private property or he’d call the cops, the Boomer Left’s essential fraudulence was on display.

Nov 16, 2008 - 10:39 am 18. tmoreland:

“Did you really expect someone from the MSM to ask Ayers any hard questions, like his plans to overthrow our country with the help of Russia and Cuba and exterminate 25 million Americans?”

Believe it or not, CNN actually reported that “Chicago gave William Ayers its Citizen of the Year award in 1997 for his work on an education project.”

Only in this country could that happen. Citing the prior quote, along with the things pointed out in Mr. Radosh’s article, Bill Ayers should have been appearing in front of a firing squad, not on Good Morning America.

Nov 16, 2008 - 11:21 am 19. Suzi:

All the MSM is doing is helping paint a blurring watercolor of who this man is and was. His ‘plan’ is actually coming to fruition, as he’s starting to see the ‘younger generation’ finally coming into bloom with the ideas and ideals of his radical past. How exciting for him, and how lovely for a major outlet like Good Morning America to help with the destruction of our country. What will the show call itself after Ayers and Obama and all their minions have their way?

Nov 16, 2008 - 12:20 pm 20. David Thomson:

“Aside from misjudging Ayers as just a serious academic…”

The same also holds true for the intellectually shallow Barack Obama. The president elect is incapable of realizing that Bill Ayers’ educational doctrines severely harm minority students. Obama has literally, although I’m sure unintentionally, has set back the educational progress of black children in the Chicago area by perhaps a couple of decades. Instead of receiving a desperately needed education—they were trained to become Saul Alinsky styled radical leftists. Obama possesses a second rate intellect. He is not even close to being ready for prime time. Obama is nothing more than the second coming of Chauncey Gardner.

Nov 16, 2008 - 12:30 pm 21. B Dubya:

Over the next four years, the Left and the MSM will work very hard to “rehabilitate” Ayers and Dohrn into a kind of fluffy, hip, radical chic. Just like Che is held in such high reverenace on the left, so are these two.

Of course, the Argentinian was noteworthy only for having developed a taste for shooting kneeling Cubans in the back of the head in his stint as gaoler for Fidel, but what the hell? Ayers and Dohrn are basically just two more bank robbers, hiding under ideological ghillie suits.

Now hear this. There will be an accounting. All debts will be paid. No amount of propaganda and “information management” is going to stop that.
In the next four years, the fellow travellers will show their real hand. In the end, not even the most deluded fools will be able to deny or mistake it for what it is.

I see sea changes on the horizon.

Nov 16, 2008 - 12:41 pm 22. David Thomson:

Please also note that Sarah Palin did not receive such soft balls thrown down the middle of the plate during her interviews with Katie Couric and Charlie Gibson. They were trying to destroy her. The MSP (main stream propagandists) are only interested in rehabilitating the vile Bill Ayers—or at least limit the harm he can cause to Barack Obama.

Nov 16, 2008 - 12:50 pm 23. AnonymousPatriot:

Let’s face it; each successive American generation is half as tough and twice as lazy as their parents were.

An ignorant pacifist populace is exactly what ultra-radical left wingers like Ayers like and want.

This way, by the time the people figure out what’s happening, it’s too late- the radicals have taken over.

Whether or not this will actually result in a bloody revolt is hard to say, but I would argue that if the Obama administration begins to attack the Second Amendment, it would be a omen of said revolt.

Nov 16, 2008 - 1:35 pm 24. Gordon Plumber:

What about John McCain’s “good friend” who is he “proud of”, convicted terrorist G. Gordon Liddy?!!!

Obama condemned Ayer’s previous acts, committed *decades* before he met him as “deplorable”. McCain is “proud” of Liddy, who as recently as 1994 instructed his listeners to *kill federal agents*! Who is “palling around with terrorists” again?

Then there is Palin, married to a *separatist*! Hello? Where are the details of Palin’s involvement of the AIP, whose America despising rhetoric makes Wright sound like Uncle Sam?!!!

Then there is the *Saddam Hussein Lobbyist* McCain hired to work on his transition team!

As for the “Liberal Media” - where do dittoheads learn all the lies and idiot slogans they parrot?: the *Media*! Hannity, Limbaugh, Coulter, etc etc etc

Who do you think you’re fooling?

Nov 16, 2008 - 2:17 pm 25. Jeff:

Don’t know what it will take the mainstream press to investigate the Ayers-Obama connection more thoughtfully and closely. Ayers initially said he spoke with Obama almost daily, and Michelle Obama spoke with Dohrn.

There are a lot of rumors out there with loose ends. Instead of trekking to Alaska; maybe the mainstream media ought to be in Hyde Park trying to find out what’s true and not true.

As conservatives, let’s give Ayers a pass on his radical terrorism of the 60’s. However, we should not give him a pass on the radical Marxism he teaches in the classroom, the revisionist history he plies in his books and speeches.

He is more of a threat to the Constitution than any judge sitting on the court today.

Nov 16, 2008 - 3:15 pm 26. Ellis Amdur:

the other interview with Ayers/Dohrn http://www.democracynow.org/

Nov 16, 2008 - 3:18 pm 27. Roark:

Ayers should be rotting in a solitary cell somewhere until he dies and goes to hell.

Nov 16, 2008 - 5:38 pm 28. zopilote:

The media is making a hero out of a terrorist. One of these days
he will be regarded as someone who just wanted to make America
a better place.

When will we see the first Ayers T-shirt…a la Che?

The country is truly on a path of self destruction.

Nov 16, 2008 - 5:40 pm 29. American Glob:

This piece of human filth on GMA was a blatant attempt to “normalize” Bill Ayers and remake his image.

Watch them do the same for ALL of BO’s questionable friends.

Nov 16, 2008 - 5:41 pm 30. Rubicon:

Comparing America’s attempt (at the invitation of the free people of South Vietnam) to come help them, to the terrorist attacks of the Weatherman, is simply utter nonsense.
Ayers justifies killing capitalist pigs based on his belief that socialism is the utopian system that will save the common man. But Ayers, in his sole opinion, convicts others for their beliefs & he wants us all to blindly accept that the acts of others are criminal acts, compared to those crimes the feds had evidence that he participated in killings, directed killings, approved killings, or committed actual killings.
In short, and typical of the radical left which is now the mainstream Democrat party, we are to accept as just “their” actions, & according to “them” we are to accept as logical that others actions are criminal.
Murder is murder.
Ayers is the type who would convict someone for defending themselves with lethal force, but justify killing those who stand in the way of or speak out against his ideals.
Deaths in Vietnam were atrocious. However, America even then did its very best to avoid civilian casualties, no matter what hype you have been fed. Were there despicable acts, yes. Name one war where such have not happened, by BOTH sides.
Ayers wants us to accept that violence as part of his idea we should all be good little lockstep socialists is acceptable, but he wants us to condemn anyone who does not subscribe to such oppressive views & acts to preserve what they believe in.
Hugo Chavez & his thuggish acts are destroying Venezuela. The people there object & are only now coming out to demand change from the socialist camp of oppression Chavez tries to erect there.

Nov 16, 2008 - 5:59 pm 31. Cat:

Well the left will now start to love him just like Che. Maybe MSM could interview Osama and who knows the tingling feelings the left will get. Good Morning America and the rest are full of newspeople that just want to look good but are pretty stupid when it comes to interviewing. I’m sure they all became good friends with Ayers the terroist.

Nov 16, 2008 - 6:40 pm 32. Gordon Plumber:

Hilarious to note that not one of you “patriots” has the spine to address or even acknowledge my previous post.

If Obama’s fleeting acquaintance with Ayers is supposed to be “palling around with terrorists”, then you’d think you people would be *far more alarmed* over McCain’s good friend G. Gordon Liddy, convicted domestic terrorist and one of modern history’s most despicable enemies of democracy. Obama condemned Ayer’s previous acts. McCain says he is “proud” of Liddy, who advocates *killing federal agents* on his radio show.

Not surprising that not one of you ranting dunderheads has the spine to address that one. Or McCain hiring Timmons, a *Saddam Hussein* lobbyist. Or the Palin’s involvement and membership in the treasonous AIP, who want to *leave the USA* because they *hate America*.

I predict that you people will continue to ignore Liddy, Timmons and the AIP because you are liars and intellectual cowards.

There is obviously a lot more solid evidence of both McCain and Palin not only palling around with, but being close personal friends of and married to terrorists. Palin is married to a *separatist*. McCain has appeared on Liddy’s show and said he is “proud” of him.

This information is widely available, which is why your ranting about Ayers in the face of Liddy, Timmons and the AIP just makes you look like idiots.

Nov 16, 2008 - 7:49 pm 33. Dark Helmet:

gordon plumber,

If you want to rant about Liddy, who served his time for his ‘crime’ or the AIP movement, then start a blog and have at it. They are worth talking about. It’s not going the way you think it is though. This is about ayers and what a sack of shit he is. Trying to run a smoke screen doesn’t change that fact. Try staying on task, you might learn something. at least you’ll stop stacking apples in the oranges bin. Traitor.

Nov 16, 2008 - 9:30 pm 34. trangbang68:

Gordon Plumber, I was just getting ready to address your post.
Comparing Liddy with Ayers is foolish. Liddy while a bit of a macho man killed no one .He was convicted of his involvement in a second rate political burglary. You ought to read Ayer’s SDS comrade Carl Oglesby’s Yankee-Cowboy theory which postulates that Watergate was part of political conspiracies between different power elites in America. If true Liddy was a stooge in a bigger gang.
Ayers on the other hand was and is a neo Stalinist delusional revolutionary who advocated violent revolution in America and founded a group which murdered American policemen. I lived through the time on the Left and read many of the writings of these groups in “Ramparts”, the Black Panther newspaper and the underground press. These people while often inept were serious traitors. Both Obamas has long standing ties
with Ayers and Dohrn.
Palin is not and never was a member of the AIP. That is a lie. Obama was a member of the socialist New Party.
I don’t know who Timmons is,but I doubt he has the baggage of Ayers, Dohrn, Wright, Rezko,Gorelick, Raines, Jim Johnson and the myriad other shady characters in Obama’s rolodex.

Nov 16, 2008 - 10:33 pm 35. AnonymousPatriot:

Gordon Plumber,

Who do you think you’re fooling? Nice situational revisionist propaganda. Last time I checked, Mr. Liddy didn’t plan to bomb anyone or plot to kill 25 million of his countrymen like Mr. Ayers and his radical ilk did.

After Mr. Ayers was acquitted, wasn’t he quoted as saying “Guilty as hell and free as a bird,” right before he stomped on the American flag?

Here’s a little clue for you; if you look around the room and can’t find the fool, you’re it.

Nov 16, 2008 - 11:07 pm 36. adagioforstrings:

re: Gordon Plumber “If Obama’s fleeting acquaintance with Ayers”

According to the new book that Ayers was plugging in this interview, the Obamas are “family friends” of his.

Nov 16, 2008 - 11:17 pm 37. OmegaPaladin:

The moral equivalence here is utterly insane. Ayers is equivalent to a political goon who was involved in Watergate? What the hell? Since when was burglary and perjury equivalent to waging war on the United States? G Gordon Liddy is more like Sandy Berger - an agent of political corruption. Plus, you just asserted the link between Liddy and McCain. I’ve seen lots of stuff about Obama and Ayres, but this is literally the first time I’ve ever seen someone claim a McCain-Liddy alliance. After all this campaigning, only now is this coming out into the open? Got any evidence of this?

Nov 17, 2008 - 2:35 am 38. JFP:

Would you people please stop talking about Ayers as a terrorist? It’s NOT working. This is one reason the Republicans lost. Once it became clear that Plan A, that Ayers was a terrorist, wasn’t working, there was no Plan B to fall back on.

Here’s Plan B: “Prof. Ayers, you say that you are for social justice. Now, you and your wife are both professors, and you both come from wealthy backgrounds. Are you aware that there are lots of professors today like you, and there are also lots of people from poorer backgrounds who would like to be professors but can’t break in because of wealthy people like you. Are you willing to demand that colleges push for diversity in terms of not just race and gender but also class background? Are you willing to give up your job so that someone from a poorer background can take your place? If not, why not?”

That would have worked much better. It would have had liberals and leftists in a tizzy trying to figure out what to say and do.

Nov 17, 2008 - 5:49 am 39. Gordon Plumber:

LOL! Finally, some of you acknowledge (sort of) what I am saying.

DorkHelmet uses quote marks around the word ‘crime’ to try and insinuate that Liddy’s terrorist acts were not criminal at all, and calls me “Traitor”. Liddy is the Traitor, moron. Of course you have *no idea* what he did and *continues to do*, do you? So you agree that people should *kill federal agents* then. Traitor.

trangbang68 continues the cavalcade of clowns by suggesting that “Liddy while a bit of a macho man killed no one”. Well neither did Ayers. About Liddy he says, “He was convicted of his involvement in a second rate political burglary”. He also admitted to planning to kill a journalist and a janitor, as well as bombing the Brooking Institute and kidnapping protesters at the ‘72 Republican convention. As I stated earlier, he told his listeners in *1994* to *kill federal agents*, instructing them to “shoot for the head”. The man is *still a terrorist*.

Hilariously,trangbang68 also says, “Palin is not and never was a member of the AIP. That is a lie.” LOL! Todd Palin was a card carrying member of the AIP for *7 years*. Sarah spoke to them *this year*, telling them to “keep up the good work”. The AIP *despises America* and want to secede from the US.

Finally, AnotmuchPatriot reveals their woeful ignorance (or denial) by saying, “Last time I checked, Mr. Liddy didn’t plan to bomb anyone”. Obviously you haven’t done your homework. Liddy *did* plan to bomb the Brookings Institute, so you are either lying or you don’t have a clue what you are talking about. The rest of that idiotic statement reads, “or plot to kill 25 million of his countrymen like Mr. Ayers and his radical ilk did”. I have read everything available and nowhere have I seen this plan to kill “25 million”. Meanwhile, McCain’s “good friend” Liddy instructed his listeners to shoot federal agents in the head. He later updated that to the groin area. In 1994.

“Here’s a little clue for you; if you look around the room and can’t find the fool, you’re it.”

I have found a room full of fools. What’s your point?

Nov 17, 2008 - 6:14 am 40. RE:

Ayers is despicable and pathetic, but his apologists are even worse.

Nov 17, 2008 - 7:16 am 41. tmoreland:

“… from George Orwell, that some ideas are so stupid that only an intellectual could believe them. Bill Ayers is just the kind of person Orwell was talking about.”

and, so is gordon plumber.

some people are so ignorant, and so stupid, that they’re incapable of seeing how ignorant and stupid they really are. the only thing they have more of is arrogance.

as for “our side,” why even attempt to prop up gordon liddy or arguments about him? just because i’m catholic doesn’t mean that i try to justify the inquisition. gordon liddy was a two-bit criminal. just admit it, and move on.

don’t bother with gordon plumber’s vacuous arguments. only a fool argues with a fool.

Nov 17, 2008 - 7:34 am 42. Gordon Plumber:

“Ayers is despicable and pathetic, but his apologists are even worse.”

Liddy is despicable and pathetic, but his apologists are even worse.

Todd Palin is despicable and pathetic, but his apologists are even worse.

BTW: I am no Ayers “apologist”. I personally think the man is a “washed up terrorist”. Unlike Liddy, who is far from being washed up. He’s dirty as Hell actually.

The whole point being that you people live in glass houses. If you are going to rant on endlessly about Obama’s fleeting acquaintance with some washed up Hippie whose crimes were committed decades before he met him, then you look like *hypocrites* for *ignoring wholesale* McCain’s unrepentant friendship with Liddy or Palin being married to an *America hating separatist*. Not to mention McCain hiring Timmons, a former Saddam Hussein lobbyist.

Yes, Ayers is a twit. So what? As has been established, Obama barely knew the man. He also condemned Ayer’s previous actions, calling them “deplorable”. Meanwhile your hero McCain has said that he is “proud” of Liddy and has appeared on his radio show, even after Liddy told listeners to kill federal agents. Where is McCain’s rejection of Liddy’s crimes? Nowhere. Just like your own. It’s a tit for tat argument which you all will *lose every time* due to the *fact* that both McCain and Palin are far more closely involved with actual terrorists than Obama. Wake up!

Nov 17, 2008 - 7:38 am 43. Gordon Plumber:

“as for “our side,” why even attempt to prop up gordon liddy or arguments about him? just because i’m catholic doesn’t mean that i try to justify the inquisition.”

Hypocrite. Using your own transparently feeble reasoning, this article shouldn’t exist either.

In fact you just described exactly why I find your smearing propaganda attempts so laughable.

Just because Obama sat on a board with Ayers doesn’t mean he’s trying to justify Ayer’s actions from 40 years earlier either. Yet that has been a central plank of the loonie right’s ongoing smear campaign.

All your idiotic misquotes of authors and name calling doesn’t actually help your argument. You are flailing because you can’t even begin to refute the facts.

This is how you lost and will continue to do so.

Good luck with that.

Nov 17, 2008 - 7:45 am 44. payback:

I think Bill Ayers should be more concerned with the sons and grandsons of the people he killed and attempted to kill.

Now we know where you live Bill.

Nov 17, 2008 - 7:51 am 45. tmoreland:

gordon plumber: yes, i’ll have to admit i am a hypocrite, but not for the reason you cite. i don’t really want to silence you by ignoring you. i (and our side) need the comic relief. keep it up.

oh, and as a bonus for you, you’ll be able to point to how you smashed our arguments when you make application to be one of the executioners assisting “Russia and Cuba (to) exterminate 25 million Americans.”

Nov 17, 2008 - 8:32 am 46. trangbang68:

Gordon, I should take the advice of the poster above and just eat my cereal and ignore a fool like you, but what the heck.
Ayers is not just some guy that went a little overboard 40 years ago. He is every bit the same anti-American radical today. He believes that Hugo Chavez is on the right track and that the role of public education is to create a vanguard to destroy capitalism.
“As has been established, Obama barely knew the man” Established by who? You in your pea brain. The evidence points in the opposite direction. Michelle Obama and Bernadine Dohrn worked at the same law firm. Michelle was hired on the recommendation of Ayers’ father. Obama served on the board at the Annenberg Challenge on Ayers’ recommendation.
The AIP is part of a movement found in other sectors of the west where land owners ,ranchers and others resent government intrusion in land and water rights, etc. The one thing about them is they like other fringe parties were attempting to use the legitimate political process to gain power in their state. The Weathermen on the other hand were a fascist totalitarian group who believed in bombs not ballots. People died as the result of their actions. No one but an imbecile would try to equate Todd Palin with Bill Ayers. You give me Timmons, the friend of Saddam Hussein. I’ll up that with Raschid Khalidi, close friend and associate of Obama who was an actual PLO terrorist.
If I’m not mistaken the context of Liddy saying to kill federal agents was when Janet Reno violated the posse comitatus principles by using military forces to destroy the Branch Davidian cult in Texas after the FBI hostage rescue team murdered Randy Weaver’s wife and son in Idaho. It was an inflammatory time. If Liddy ’s statements went beyond rhetoric to actually advocating armed resistance to the government, the Clinton
Administration would have no doubt prosecuted him.
Gordon ,all I can say is you’re an ignorant fool with no sense of proportionality in your arguments. You think bluster and your inflated sense of your own smartness wins the day for you, but in reality you come off as a buffoon.

Nov 17, 2008 - 8:50 am 47. tanstaafl:

…Ayers painted himself as a valiant and militant anti-war activist who joined thousands of other Americans in protesting an unjust war.

It’s pretty appalling that the news hungry outlets give any sort of audience to Bill (and Bernadine) Ayers.

The best thing that can be said about him in these times is that he has mastered a few elements of the con artist. And, apparently, can con interviewers with the “charm” thing.

—to produce a group of young people who work to overthrow capitalism and introduce a revolutionary socialist system at home.

That’s the point, of Ayers’ (aka the education professor) more recent, less incendiary and less overtly violent forays and endeavors in American society. Get the minds young and teach ‘em the revolutionary concepts that will make Ché smile from the grave.

For the record (despite the charming Bill’s insistence) the Weather Underground’s bombing exploits of the 60’s and 70’s had far less to do with the Vietnam war, per se, than they did with destroying the disgusting American “capitalist” society.

Bill and Bernadine Ayers (older now, fewer drugs) shouldn’t be living in an upscale Chicago home, drawing salaries as university professors. They should be existing behind tall walls, ringed with barbed wire, depending on food provided by any remaining and willing relatives, like a Saudi prison.

Nov 17, 2008 - 8:50 am 48. kiwikit:

Don’t look now but the anti-American radicals have already taken over our beloved country: the media, the education system, the entertainment (?) industry, and now finally the government. I expect nothing but the worse from the socialist
neo-clintonistas. Political correctness has destroyed the value of truth and without that how can honest people survive?

Nov 17, 2008 - 9:02 am 49. Gordon Plumber:

tmoreland: I see you still are evading the facts and not refuting them, *because you can’t*. Another intellectual flyweight with nary a clue.

If you people represent the acme of loonie right thinking, then it will be a very very long time before anyone takes your “side” seriously.

Fact: McCain is a close personal friend of G Gordon Liddy, unrepentant convicted domestic terrorist. McCain is “proud” of the criminal piece of human garbage and has appeared on his radio show.

Fact: Sarah Palin is married to separatist. The AIP’s rhetoric is even more over the top in their hatred of America than Rev Wright ever was.

Fact: McCain hired a former Saddam Hussein lobbyist (Timmons) to work on his transition team.

Fact: before this election, none of you pinheads had even heard of Ayers. Where were your protests when he became a University Professor? How about when he was awarded Citizen of the Year? You let drug dealing nutjob Rush Limbaugh do your thinking for you.

Fact: because I dare to have a differing opinion, you have called me a “Traitor” and claimed I am “ignorant”, yet not one of you has the brains or the spine to refute *anything* that I have said.

Instead you cast feeble insults and instruct your fellow ditto heads to *ignore the facts* “stick your heads further up your asses, lest the *truth* make you actually *think*!”

What a joke. Not one coherent rebuttal between the lot of you.

Have fun being ignoramus hypocrites. Just don’t expect anyone with an IQ larger than their shoe size not to laugh at you, like this:

HAHAHAHAHA!

Tip: if your breath is making your pillow case stink, try turning it inside out.

Nov 17, 2008 - 9:09 am 50. Jennie Maroney:

I agree with everyone who said that Ayers and his wife should be in jail. Instead they are “respected” professors, but still perpetuating their radical ideas to their students. Why did Cuomo not bring up that photo of Ayers stomping on the American flag? Why did Ayers appear on ABC and not Fox News with Bill O’Reilly? It’s because he knew he could sweet talk his way around someone who obviously had not done his homework on this sorry excuse for a human being. It’s also clear that he and Obama and Rev. Wright share a great deal in common, and that is a hatred of America. And now he and his wife, Michelle, (”never proud of our country in my adult lifetime”) will be occupying the White House. Stop the world, I want to get off.

Nov 17, 2008 - 9:11 am 51. Karin:

Gordan Plumber seems to think that being a separatist is a vile thing. There will be many, many more of them if Osama turns hard-left totalitarian with this country. Why do you think gun sales have skyrocketed?

Anyway, I’m still angry at the electorate for saying “who cares?” about the Bill Ayers matter. I care a great deal, and always will. I don’t know, something about being in NYC on 9/11 makes me feel not too fuzzy warm toward terrorists.

Nov 17, 2008 - 9:18 am 52. trangbang68:

Talking to you Gordon reminds me of arguing with Jehovah’s Witnesses. They are stupidly brainwashed ,but are utterly convinced of their strong position. My dog makes more cogent arguments than you. Idiot.

Nov 17, 2008 - 10:34 am 53. trangbang68:

Incidentally, Einstein, I have known about Ayers since the late 1960’s.

Nov 17, 2008 - 10:35 am 54. trangbang68:

Fact: Writing “fact” in front of something doesn’t make it such.

Nov 17, 2008 - 10:36 am 55. rappleby:

I find it offensive and shameful that any media outlet would even dignify this terrorist with a sit down interview.

Nov 17, 2008 - 10:42 am 56. rappleby:

Gordon Plumber…your incoherent babble isn’t amusing or factual

Nov 17, 2008 - 10:44 am 57. Dana:

Plainly this monster doesn’t think that Sirhan Sirhan did anything despicable during the 60s so he dedicated his book to him.His lovely wife, one recalls, had no problem with Manson and his “family” either. Two psychopathic whack jobs got together and sometimes we see, also got together with our newly minted President-elect.How wonderful is America?

Nov 17, 2008 - 10:44 am 58. kevin c:

HERES WHAT SHOULD BE MENTIONED FURTHER. THE MORNING AFTER THE TOWNHOUSE IN GREENWICH VILLAGE BLEW UP, A CRANE OPERATOR WORKING ON CLEANING UP THE WRECKAGE OF THE TOWNHOUSE GOT THE CABLES SNARLED BY SOME DEBRIS. ALBERT SEEDMAN,THE THE NY CITY CHIEF OF DETECTIVES, RECOGNIZED SOMETHING WAS WRONG AND ORDERED THE EXCAVATION STOPPED. AFTER CUTTING THE CABLES AND CLEARING THE DEBRIS, THEY FOUND THE CABLES HAD SNAGGED AN ANTI-PERSONNEL BOMB COMPOSED OF 500 STICKS OF DYNAMITE STUDDED WITH 2000 11/2 INCH ROOFING NAILS. A BLAST OF THAT FORCE WOULD TURN HUMAN FLESH INTO SPAGHETTI FOR 1/2 MILE EITHER DIRECTION. THAT APPARENTLY WAS THE BOMB MEANT FOR FORT DIX. SO DONT LET ANYONE FOOL YOU ABOUT THE SCUMMY PUNK AYERS. HES PURE FILTHY 110% COMMIE FILTH AND DESERVES ONLY THE SAME FATE AS BEFELL HIS GIRLFRIEND OUGHTON AND THE DUMBASS BOMBER TED GOLD. PERSONALLY, ID LIKE HIME TO MEET JUDGE MURTAUGHS SON IN A CAGE MATCH. I DOUBT THE WIMP AYERS WOULD STAND A CHANCE.

Nov 17, 2008 - 1:28 pm 59. kevin c:

hey gordon THE COMMIE PIG SCUMBAG HATE AMERICA MONGER. MAYBE YOU SHOULD ASK YOUR PALS IN COMMIE SCUM LAND WHY AYERS DEDICATED HIS 1974 BOOK “PRARIE FIRE” TO THE MURDERER OF ROBERT KENNEDY,SIR HAN SIRHAN. ONLY A COMMIE PIG LIKE THE KENNEDY CLAN WOULD IGNORE THAT THE OBAMICOMMIE IS ASSOCIATING WITH A MAN WHO PRAISED THE KILLER OF THERE FATHER. AND BY THE WAY ,GORDON THE PINKO PUKE. LIDDY SERVED TIME FOR HIS CRIMES. AYERS GETS REWARDED WITH A PROFESSORSHIP AT A UNIVERSITY WHICH SEEMS TO HATE AMERICA. GO SMOKE YOUR DAILY KOOKS HANDOUT AND PERFORM LEWINSKYS ON SOROS. HE NEEDS THEM.

Nov 17, 2008 - 1:37 pm 60. Dark Helmet:

Apples and oranges, dumb ass.

Nov 17, 2008 - 1:46 pm 61. Gordon Plumber:

ROFL!

kevin c: glad to see that being a hate addled illiterate whack job doesn’t prevent you from posting. Maybe if you stopped drooling on your keyboard, the caps lock key wouldn’t stick so much.

Dork Helmet:
“Apples and oranges, dumb ass.”

A terrorist is a terrorist. Whether they are an Islamic militant, Kevin McVie, Ayers, McCain’s good friend Gordon Liddy, or Sarah Palin’s husband. I see that the AIP apologists here have never read anything about them. No surprise there.

You people are the reason that real Conservatives have abandoned the “Republican” party in droves.

As Sarah Palin said to the AIP earlier this year:

Keep up the good work.

Nov 18, 2008 - 7:51 am 62. zircon:

SHAME ON YOU GOOD MORNING AMERICA!!!!!!!!!!!!

How could you invite and give air time to Bill Ayers, a terrorist.

As the title of your show suggests, this is America. Land of the free.

You have lost me as a customer and all of your advertisers are also receiving letters from me regarding this despicable display of anti-Americanism.

Nov 18, 2008 - 8:17 am 63. Dark Helmet:

moron gor don

You can side step all you want. The facts are what they are. Delfecting and not dealing straight on with the issue proves you are unable to prove otherwise.

People like you are pathetic. You have so much invested in not dealing with the matter at hand, you are incapable of contributing to anything that is real.

My take is that you more than likely take it up the butt. There is no way to reason with someone who doesn’t know what they are suppose to do to be a contributing member of America. So run your little mouth, try and confuse the facts that ayers is a scum f*ing traitor and should be shot on sight. You’re just useless chatter.

Come back when you can take part in the thread rather than try a lame attempt to bullshit your way around it.

Nov 18, 2008 - 2:35 pm 64. Dave:

Only an idiot equates a dirt bag like Ayers with Sarah Palin’s husband. Last I checked, AIP was not committing terrorist acts and has always tried to push their agenda from with-in the law. I don’t agree or care much for the little I know about AIP, but if you cannot differentiate between the two, you are a intellectually and morally hopeless.

Ayers is shoveling the same tired, banal, marxist nonsense that has been his schtick for decades. That Obama would give this vermin access is sad and a huge reason for concern. Loyal Americans of both parties need to be watching very closely for the next 4 years.

Nov 18, 2008 - 2:42 pm 65. Dark Helmet:

delflecting is worse than deflecting by the way…..my spelling sux but the message is spot on. ayers is a criminal who hid behind the same law that he attacked.

Stick with that, we can debate all day. Otherwise, stfu.

Nov 18, 2008 - 3:16 pm 66. C'Ana:

What they had left out in all the ayers stuff, and cut off the fbi agent from saying on fox the first night he was speaking, was that rockefeller was the one they had found outside, about to walk into the door, back then when it had happened, there had been a big coverage of it by the then half controlled republican media networks.

He had been the one giving the wheather underground money. Also to note, his father had died under suspicious circumstances as well, and rockefeller was the prime suspect.

He had been stripped of his fathers companys, which had been given to a distaff member of the rockefeller family to control, as well as being disgraced, and thrown out of the republican party. He was also accussed of being a member of the American communist organization of the time. Considerinjg that he is now a democratic senator, and a religious christian zionist socialist communist, and one of the ones behind their current coup, i find it enlightening.

It gives more clarity as to why ayers had said he was guilty as hell, and free as a bird, only in America. Because of political expediancy, the repubs of the time had had to many of their own buried bodys to push it further then, and convict the bastards.And they wanted to track rockefeller and his associations in mexico/south America, which has something to do with the massive influx of immigrants we have been experiancing.

Also at the time, there was a big thing about how America will have to worry about the socialist communists along with the rest of what the media had presented at the time as well.

Along with that, consider who was really behind the subprime morgage crises, and who had profited from it the most.

What their trying to do, is make their radicals seem reformed to the public as fighters for socialist communist democracy, considering how they, with the help of the jews had played the repubs into the war to set it all in motion, and brought up the spectre of racism to help it along.

Obama is lieing through his teeth about his association with ayers. And the conspiracy is wide and well funded, we saw how the repubs jews had turned on their own party to set this up from that side as well. We must remember that it is jews who control the banks, and that they never could have pulled off the subprime stuff without their knowledge, and consent.

Tie that in with what they had done to get our loyal patriotic president into committing to war, and what the jews who control the goverment did to cover it up.

The dissent, and feelings of near civil war that had permeated the nation, and the hostile divisions betweeen the two partys of the senate/congress. And all the buttons that were being pushed to help all this along.

Ayers is small fry, but an important connection to it all, and those involved, and why it had been brought up to begin with.

Nov 18, 2008 - 3:53 pm 67. Ron:

Ayers and his wife are the white bread Manson Family. He makes as much sense , probably less, than Charlie.

Nov 18, 2008 - 8:51 pm 68. Donna V.:

Gordon has the usual juvenile mentality of a leftist. When a conservative points out that leftist “heroes” tend to be craven mass murderers (or would-be mass murderers), the Left’s (morally retarded) response is either A. “You’re lying!” (No matter how well documented the facts are), or B. “Your guy is just as bad, so there!”

Yeah, what would pinkos do without that old moral equivalence to fall back on? ‘Cause, sure, doesn’t everyone know that Todd Palin is just as awful as a guy who was planning to bomb Fort Dix and kill US servicemen and their dates? Why, gee, I bet Todd’s even shot a few moose in his time! (And is far more competent at it than Ayers, a spoiled rich boy, ever was at bombmaking.) Oh, yes, Todd’s just the same as Ayers - or even worse!

Gordo, your thought processes and arguments are as utterly and boringly predictable as snow in Minnesota in January.

Nov 18, 2008 - 9:03 pm 69. old vet:

Yeah!
Bill Ayers was a real hero for the left.
Fighting against the establishment and all that anti- USA crap.

Or could it be they all were cowards and knew if they were caught they would not have to serve in Vietnam?

I would have followed William Ayers,
a 90 day college wonder and rich little
Gung Ho Communists inspired officer into the jungle, and Fragged him.

Nov 19, 2008 - 4:39 am 70. Bart:

Gordon is the perfect example of the leftist ranters and socialist doctrinairs. All we need do is remember the infinity symbol of a lazy eight. People like gordon are stuck on the same path, forever walking forward without knowing where they are going. They keep crossing themselves at the intersection without recognizing they only recently crossed the same point, time and time again. Conclusion - he is forever stuck on zero, never moves forward, and deserves no attention what so ever. I think irrelevant comes to mind as well.

My response to Gordon is about as intelligent as one can be when answering any of his ill founded questions and accusations.

Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and blah.

Nov 19, 2008 - 8:51 am 71. Paul_Unalaska:

I’ve got to ask. Does anyone believe someone from ‘Good Morning America’ would possessknowledge or ask intelligent, engaging questions?

It’s a fluff piece ‘news’ show! As well as the Today Show and the rest of t.v. morning ‘news’. It’s the same reason why Couric is such an abysmal nightle news person. They’re airheads! Sadly, many many people get the days news from these bobbleheads.

The sheeple who stand outside these t.v. studios, waving at the camera with their handmade placards in tow and mundane banter if ‘fortunate’ to speak.. they frighten or creep you out too? hahaha

Those folks (as well as the hosts of these crapola programs) are as strange as those who wear the straw hat and perma-grin at both party’s conventions!

Nov 19, 2008 - 12:49 pm 72. Dyana:

Good Morning America??? We won’t watch it ever again! Diane Sawyer, we used to respect you, now we question where has the Americans moral compass disappeared to? Such dishonor of our nation, of truth and our Constitution,is the ‘trade-off worth it? We can only hope,that someone of honor and truth will come forth and that truth will set our chidren,
grandchildren and future generations free!

Nov 19, 2008 - 12:58 pm 73. Donna V.:

I would have followed William Ayers,
a 90 day college wonder and rich little
Gung Ho Communists inspired officer into the jungle, and Fragged him.

old vet, I don’t think it ever would have come to that. Take another look at Ayers in the ’60’s - a bigger twink I’ve never seen. He wouldn’t have made it though boot camp

I used to wonder why all the Uncle Ho fans and America-haters never had the guts to go join the NVA. (Give the traitor Taliban Johnny his due - at least he put his money where his mouth was.) Well, when you look at pictures of the SDS and Weather Underground the reason is obvious. They would have lasted about 2 seconds in a fight with American troops and they knew it. Hell, my aunt Mabel could have taken them on. So they had to sneak around at night and set bombs - and then run to daddy for help when they were caught.

Nov 19, 2008 - 6:59 pm