Posted on 02/22/2008 10:11:55 AM PST by mnehring
They mean terrorists — we’re talking about the Weathermen here, and Obama’s host that day is on record as wishing he’d set more bombs back when — but Politico’s in for a round of especially obnoxious shrieking from the left for even running this so they probably figured they’d throw them a bone by using “radicals” in the headline instead. Here we find ourselves returned to the argument over Ron Paul accepting money from Nazis: How much knowing contact with scumbags is too much knowing contact with scumbags? The New York Sun’s already been over most of this ground, including the $200 contribution from Ayres to Obama’s campaign and the obligatory denunciation of the Weathermen by Team Barry, but the ‘95 visit is a new detail. Proof that Obama’s a bomb-tossing commie? Er, no. Proof that Obama’s not above schmoozing bomb-tossing commies — excuse me, reformed bomb-tossing commies — to advance his political career? Evidently.
It’s too old and the contact is too slight, I think, to do the Messiah any damage (although the GOP will certainly try), but here’s an intellectual exercise for you in the same vein as my McVeigh analogy in the Che flag post. As you read, substitute McCain and, say, Eric Rudolph for Obama and Ayres and see if you think you’ve got a story the media might take some interest in. If you must, imagine that Rudolph’s been reformed when all the key incidents occur.
In 1995, State Senator Alice Palmer introduced her chosen successor, Barack Obama, to a few of the district’s influential liberals at the home of two well known figures on the local left: William Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn.
While Ayers and Dohrn may be thought of in Hyde Park as local activists, they’re better known nationally as two of the most notorious – and unrepentant — figures from the violent fringe of the 1960s anti-war movement…
Dr. Young and another guest, Maria Warren described [the event] similarly: As an introduction to Hyde Park liberals of the handpicked successor to Palmer, a well-regarded figure on the left.
“When I first met Barack Obama, he was giving a standard, innocuous little talk in the living room of those two legends-in-their-own-minds, Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn,” Warren, wrote on her blog in 2005. “They were launching him–introducing him to the Hyde Park community as the best thing since sliced bread.”
Contacted by e-mail, Warren declined to describe the meeting further and later blogged of her concern that Republicans would use accounts of the event for “left-baiting.”.
“Left-baiting” meaning “complaining about the would-be president gladhanding terrorists.” Although he has said he’d meet personally with Ahmadinejad, without preconditions, once in office, no? So, give him points for consistency.
Incidentally, Young’s now concerned that Obama is too conservative. Exit question: Could Obama not have known who Ayres was?
Yep, I thought Malkin had a good take on the earlier Politico story. The comments on this article at Hot Air are pretty good as well.
Here is more on the Ayres-Obama friendship. Claims it is a longstanding relationship.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/larry-c-johnson/no-he-cant-because-yes_b_87036.html
Do you think the left/dems/libs really care? Moveon.org have issued their marching orders, millions of mindless robots will do what they are told...because Obama is not Bush. That’s all they care about, end of story.
Mix in a bit of James H. Cone and Charles Barron.
William Ayers is a professor at the University of Illinois, Chicago campus. I believe he is in “childhood education”, and Bernadine Dohrn is a professor at Northwestern University and teaches law. At least they were a few years ago. Nice to think your children are learning from them!
It was very interesting to see Ayers’ picture on the cover of the Sunday Tribune glossy insert on about September 14, 200l, promoting his new book about his glory days as one of the Weather Underground. In the 60s I had labelled him as a terrorist. He is still one.
I think, ironically, the NY Times had a story on this creep, stating he didn’t think they went far enough in the ‘60s—it was in their September 11, 2001 edition, which means it was there on the newsstands the morning of the attacks.
As a totally separate issue from what I think of Obama - it would be interesting to talk to the Weathermen and see if they learned anything from the fall of Saigon and how the civilians were treated by the communists. Or what they think of Mao now that all those deaths and tortures are documented. Even Deng Xiaoping distanced their government from Mao urging the people to “seek truth from facts.”
Naw, they don’t learn from history. My friend thinks Marxism will work, ‘it just hasn’t been done right.’
Leftwingers will overlook or justify the atrocities committed by communists because the end goal is so noble.
I wonder whatever happened to the Che/Cuban flag flap?
>>Naw, they don’t learn from history. My friend thinks Marxism will work, ‘it just hasn’t been done right.’<<
And thus you get Jay Leno saying that with Fidel’s retirement, Raul Castro is now the most powerful socialist outside of California.
The story says that these two guys..."...disappeared in 1970, after a bomb — designed to kill army officers in New Jersey — accidentally destroyed a Greenwich Village townhouse, and turned themselves into authorities in 1980. They were never prosecuted for their involvement with the 25 bombings the Weather Underground claimed; charges were dropped because of improper FBI surveillance."
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