Love me I'm a liberal...ayers

From the MrZine,08/31/06, blurb written by bo's bestest buddy...in his own words, he lets us know where his heart and mind is...check out the site that on the right, promotes socialism.

http://mrzine.monthlyreview.org/ayers310806.html

Love Me, I'm a Liberal
by William Ayers

Upon returning from summer break, I found a surprising letter awaiting me written by three colleagues from another university, two of whom I'd known and worked with for decades. The letter simultaneously informed me about a conference my friends were organizing and explained -- with some anguish I think -- that I would not be welcome there.

They note that we're living in troubled times, that calculated appeals to fear rule the day, and that they hope to counter all of that. Ironically, fear is stamped all over the letter.

I'm reminded of when Abbie Hoffman and Jerry Rubin were hauled before the fearsome House Committee on Un-American Activities, refused to bow, and helped to laugh it out of existence. Or when the universities were cowed by a bullying government into banning the DuBois Clubs -- a handful of students in the youth-wing of the CP who were attacked by Richard Nixon for intentionally creating a front group that would dupe people because it rhymed with the Boys Clubs -- and we members of Students for a Democratic Society signed up en masse and swelled their membership a hundredfold.

I find myself sitting here humming Phil Ochs' brilliant "Love Me, I'm a Liberal."

Different times demand different responses, of course, but to claim the mantle of "social justice" while practicing this kind of exclusion is unacceptable.

Their letter to me and my response to them are reproduced below. I've edited out identifiable references to my colleagues in order to protect the . . . well, you decide, let's just say their privacy. I can be reached at billayers.org, or bayers@uic.edu. Onward!

William Ayers
Distinguished Professor
University of Illinois at Chicago

Dear Bill,

This is an unusual letter for us to be writing and for you to receive. We count you among the most noted progressive educators in the country with a deep commitment to teaching for social justice. Yet, after extended deliberation and discussion, we find ourselves in a real quandary. Because of current . . . times, we cannot invite you to an event we are planning for progressive educators. Because we know and deeply respect you and your commitment to teaching for social justice, we felt that an explanation was in order.

Next spring, we will host an event . . . to honor Bob Moses and progressive education. Bob is to receive the . . . John Dewey Prize for Progressive Education. This prize is . . . "to honor significant achievement in progressive education for the purpose of making society more just." In an era of increasing standardization and heightened inequities, we want to shine a bright light on the ideals of progressive education and remind the public that there is another model for education that attends well to the needs of every child. It is our intention to invite other progressive educators to this convening and to create a significant news and media event honoring the ideals of progressive education [and] the work of Bob Moses. . . .

It is because of our commitment to educate the public and to undertake what is primarily a symbolic project that we cannot risk a simplistic and dubious association between progressive education and the violent aspects of your past. We believe, of course, in your right to express your views, then and now. This is not about curtailing your expression. Rather, in this age when Google summarizes instantly, and often shallowly, who we are, it is about trying to say as clearly as possible what we are arguing for. If we, as educators, want to engage the learner, in this case the public, where they are, then we have to find ways for the public to see progressive education not as radical or threatening but as nurturing and familiar, connected to the very best aspects of their own learning experiences. For the last five years local and regional news organizations have taken the "liberal" . . . faculty . . . to task. It is an environment that we have challenged when key principles were involved, defending and maintaining our . . . commitment to social justice against the state bureaucracy. This event, however, is a celebration honoring two educators' accomplishments and positively promoting progressive education. We don't want a shallow press to prevail. We want to engage the public with as little interference as possible.

One major reason for presenting a prize at this time is that progressivism, and progressive education in particular, have been greatly weakened by a broad and calculated appeal to our fears in this changing world. We want to reinsert into the civil dialogue that progressive education stands upon its proven record and can be a viable alternative when our mood turns away from fears and towards hopes. First, we need to get ourselves back to the table, and then position ourselves as polite in our discourse before celebrating the breadth of expression within progressive education. Coming from behind may well demand such strategic thinking, whether is satisfies all of our passion or not.

We hope this letter finds you well and that you understand and possibly appreciate this decision.

Sincerely,

"Lauren" and the organizers

August 29, 2006

Dear Lauren,

You have, of course, no obligation to include me in the progressive education conference you're organizing, certainly not in your deliberations about my suitability to attend. I'm tempted to say, with apologies to Groucho Marx, that I wouldn't want to attend any progressive education conference that would have me.

Chances are I'd have never heard of the conference had you not written, and in any case wouldn't have given a second thought to my presence on or absence from the guest list. But since you've opened this in the way you have, since you've outlined your thinking on the matter and invited me to understand and possibly appreciate your decision, I feel I must respond.

Your hope to position progressive education "not as radical or threatening but as nurturing and familiar" is in some ways a fool's errand. Of course, no one argues that the progressive movement should threaten students or teachers or citizens -- progressive education does indeed hold the hope of realizing a humane and decent education for all within a revitalized politics and a more authentically democratic society. But progressive education, if it means anything at all, must embody a profound threat to the status quo. It is a direct challenge, for example, to all the policy initiatives that deskill and hammer teachers into interchangeable cogs in a bureaucracy, all the pressure to reduce teaching to a set of manageable and easily monitored tasks, all the imposition of labels and all the simple-minded metrics employed to describe student learning and rank youngsters in a hierarchy of winners and losers. It's a threat to all that, and more.

But here we face a contradiction at the heart of our efforts: the humanistic ideal and the democratic injunction tell us that every person is an entire universe, that each can develop as a full and autonomous person engaged with others in a common polity and an equality of power; the capitalist imperative insists that profit is at the center of economic, political, and social progress, and develops, then, a culture of competition, elitism, and hierarchy. An education for democracy fails as an adjunct to capitalism just as an education for capitalism fails to build either a democratic ethos or a participatory practice. We must engage, then, in the arena of school and education reform as we struggle toward a world fit for all children -- a place of peace and justice, joy and balance. The two are inseparable.

And so I believe that progressive education must be part of a radical movement if it is to be worthy of the hopes and dreams of those who fight to bring humanistic alternatives to life. I mean radical in the sense that Ella Baker, one of the unsung mothers of the Civil Rights Movement, used the word. She called herself a radical, and she explained that radical meant "going to the root." Little reforms here and there never add up unless we get to the core of the problems we face, she argued, analyze our situations, connect the struggles as we work for more fundamental change.

Charlie Cobb, who co-wrote Radical Equations, was also the author of the original proposal for Freedom Schools in the South more than forty years ago. The brief he wrote claimed that while Black children were denied many things -- decent school facilities, honest and forward-looking curriculum, fully qualified teachers -- the fundamental injury was "a complete absence of academic freedom, and students are forced to live in an environment that is geared to squashing intellectual curiosity, and different thinking." Cobb called the classrooms of Mississippi "intellectual wastelands," and he challenged himself and others "to fill an intellectual and creative vacuum," and to encourage people "to articulate their own desires, demands and questions." He was urging students to confront the circumstances of their lives, to wonder about how they got to where they were, and to think of how they might change things. He was crossing hard lines of propriety and tradition, convention and common sense, of course, poised to break the law and overthrow a system. His proposal was designed to plow a deep and promising furrow toward the new -- more than radical, this was insurrection itself, progressive education linked to radical politics.

Of course, we are required now to make our own contributions in our own time and place; the pathway, the content, and the curriculum must be of, by, and for this moment and this community. We might take inspiration and attitude, sustenance and stance from the Mississippi experience, but only as an orientation toward launch, toward imagining and trying to bring to life something entirely new.

Finally, you refer to "the violent aspects" of my past. As you know I've written extensively about politics and protest as well as my own involvements, about the dual responsibilities to act and to doubt, and about the impossibility of claiming a high moral stance while sitting on the sidelines. I've accounted for my actions during the US assaults on Vietnam and against the Black Freedom Movement -- which is what I assume you're referring to -- and paid the price asked of me by the legal system. And I've said often that our society ought to engage in a truth-and-reconciliation process concerning those terrible and wondrous times; in other words, I'm happy to stand up, tell my story, admit my mistakes, and take responsibility -- shoulder-to-shoulder with everyone else, including war criminals, politicians, soldiers, officers, frat boys, students, scholars, citizens. Absent that, you seem to say that I have some uniquely dreadful behavior to account for, and I politely disagree.

I worry that you're imagining a progressivism divorced from politics, the larger world, and any real hope of transformation -- a timid, tepid, soft and servile thing. And I worry that your attempt to cleanse your conference of the likes of me has no end: you'll have to cut out the Marxists and the socialists, of course, anyone who writes critically about capitalism and education, then the militants, the noisy anti-racists, the pushy feminists, the gays and lesbians, anyone who refers to "social justice" -- a term under steady attack from the powerful just now. I'm reminded of the last presidential election when several presumably well-meaning liberals asked, in effect, if women would please stop talking so loudly about (or getting) abortions, if gays would please get back in the closet, and if Black people and Mexicans might stay out of sight for a few months so that "we" can win this thing, and then everything will somehow be alright. It's not only unprincipled, deeply cynical and cowardly, it's suicidal, a slippery slope with lots of miserable historical precedent.

So, while I think I understand what you've said, no, I don't appreciate it. I don't rationalize it. I don't endorse it. And I refuse to participate in portraying myself as a pariah. So invite me.

Sincerely,

Bill
Bill Ayers William Ayers is Distinguished Professor of Education and Senior University Scholar at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and author of Teaching Toward Freedom:Moral Commitment and Ethical Action in the Classroom (Beacon) and Teaching the Personal and the Political (Teachers College Press).

Now you tell me...is this the kind of friends you have hanging around you? You need to really look at who the little o has held hands with...and if you think this is something...you ain't seen nothing yet...

What does he mean?

If you think for one moment Obambi doesn't mean what he said...

A direct quote from his book, audacity of hope, obambi states,

“I will stand with the Muslims should the political winds shift in an ugly direction.”

And just to think, this man wants to be President of the United States and "change the world"...FOREVER!

How did we get here, but more importantly, where are we going?

Whatever you do today, please pass this information around...do your part and wake up America, or at the very least, get them to thinking of where they are headed, because things are changing

Again, I reference this post with many thanks to Pamela Geller of Atlas Shrugs blog. I am so moved by each of her posts, they are thoroughly researched and vetted, which I do rely on. She and I think alike, and what is rather interesting, thinking the same thing at the same time.

Pausing to ask "How did we get here"? Is this point in time that our way of life will be changing forever?

Go to Atlas Shrugs through link in right column, to get the links to Bezmenov's you tube videos, that my faulty little dial-up can't access...duh!

YURI BEZMENOV: Ideological subversion is the process which is legitimate and open. You can see it with your own eyes.... It has nothing to do with espionage.

I know that intelligence gathering looks more romantic.... That's probably why your Hollywood producers are so crazy about James Bond types of films. But in reality the main emphasis of the KGB is NOT in the area of intelligence at all. According to my opinion, and the opinions of many defectors of my caliber, only about 15% of time, money, and manpower is spent on espionage as such. The other 85% is a slow process which we call either ideological subversion, active measures, or psychological warfare. What it basically means is: to change the perception of reality of every American that despite of the abundance of information no one is able to come to sensible conclusions in the interest of defending themselves, their families, their community, and their country.



It's a great brainwashing process which goes very slow and is divided into four basic stages. The first stage being "demoralization". It takes from 15 to 20 years to demoralize a nation. Why that many years? Because this is the minimum number of years required to educate one generation of students in the country of your enemy exposed to the ideology of [their] enemy. In other words, Marxism-Leninism ideology is being pumped into the soft heads of at least 3 generation of American students without being challenged or counterbalanced by the basic values of Americanism; American patriotism.



The result? The result you can see -- most of the people who graduated in the 60's, dropouts or half-baked intellectuals, are now occupying the positions of power in the government, civil service, business, mass media, and educational systems. You are stuck with them. You can't get through to them. They are contaminated. They are programmed to think and react to certain stimuli in a certain pattern [alluding to Pavlov]. You can not change their mind even if you expose them to authentic information. Even if you prove that white is white and black is black, you still can not change the basic perception and the logic of behavior.



In other words [for] these people the process of demoralization is complete and irreversible. To rid society of these people you need another 15 or 20 years to educate a new generation of patriotically minded and common sense people who would be acting in favor and in the interests of United States society.

I you possibly think your grandchildren and great-grandchildren won't see America become the new Russia, think again.

Obambi has bought and sold the White House to the highest bidder, and if you don't believe it, just WATCH. Answer this question, how do you buy the Presidency? Try raising $160,000,000 in one month, for what? The infiltration and saturation of the sheeple's mindset to PROVE "The One" is the "The One"...NOT!

Do yourself a favor, the next movie you should rent from Netflix is "Wild In The Streets", a sixties cult classic that now, makes me shudder. Your reading list should include Mein Kampf; The Coming Age of Barbarianism, by Constance Cumby (written in the 80's and can probably found at Abebooks.com; Google her for videos); George Orwell's, "1984" and Aldous Huxley's, "Brave New World".

Where's the tape? and UPDATES

I know the image is disarming and it should be. But this is some of o's commie youth gangs idea of how they feel about McCain, conservatives and the great American Way of life. Let me tell you, there are more horrible, filthy pictures out there...all from his "brown shirts" who worship o.

Well, 17 days out from the election and no tape has been produced by the API for Michelle Obama's admission of o's adoption by Indonesian Muslim, Lolo Soetoro.

Other bloggers have been doing their best to get the information out, just no luck...well that is except Pamela Geller's Atlas Shrugs blog. She's reported that a "friend" of o's has scrubbed the records in Indonesia with lots of money in tow.

Not to dispair, there are pictures of o's school registration document which shows his name as Barry Soetoro and religion, muslim.

If you haven't been keeping up with the latest, o has assembled his transition team and picked a venue for election night. Grant Park and Hutchinson Field in Chicago will be hosting his election night victory....not (puleez not!)

We are also still waiting to hear from the Judge in the matter of Berg's case in the Federal District Court of Pennsylvania. From research, no news is good news. Plus, nothing has been heard from the State of Washington on the similar case filed out there.

I signed a petition, listed on America's Right blog, to our two Mississippi Senators Cochran and Wicker. The petition requests the judge to bring forth his rulings prior to the election. We still have until January 20th, before o is sworn in and before a Constitutional crisis would occur.

I need not tell you that many are distressed at what is occurring within our hallowed ground. Now, more than any time in history, have we felt the pains of birth...the birth and take over of our freedoms by socialist/communist terrorists.

Shocking News - Michelle Obama Rants, what's so bad about husband being adopted by Soetoro

What's so bad about Obiden holding dual citizenship in United States and Indonesia?

Well, to qualify for POTUS, you must be a US citizen...not holding two, count 'em, two!

As stated before, America's Right, texasdarlin.wordpress.com, API (African Press International), among many other sites are reporting the same.

API, the daily online news channel, posted the following interview on their site today,

Accusing API of colluding with American internet bloggers in an effort to bring down her husband, Mrs Obama said she decided to call API because of what she termed, API’s help to spread rumours created by American bloggers and other racist media outlets in their efforts to damage a black man’s name, saying she hopes African Media was mature enough to be in the front to give unwavering support to her husband, a man Africans should identify themselves with.

When API told her that our online news media was only relaying what the American Bloggers and other media outlets had discovered through their investigations, Mrs Obama was angered and she came out loud with the following: “African press International is supposed to support Africans and African-American view,” and she went to state that, “it is strange that API has chosen to support the racists against my husband. There is no shame in being adopted by a step father. All dirt has been thrown onto my husband’s face and yet he loves this country. My husband and I know that there is no law that will stop him from becoming the president, just because some American white racists are bringing up the issue of my husband’s adoption by His step father. The important thing here is where my husband’s heart is at the moment. I can tell the American people that My husband loves this country and his adoption never changed his love for this country. He was born in Hawaii, yes, and that gives him all the right to be an American citizen even though he was adopted by a foreigner; says Michelle Obama on telefon to API.”

This is a very interesting turn of events. The American man Dr Corsi was recently reported to have been arrested in Kenya because there was fear that he might reveal information on Obama when he wanted to hold a press conference in Nairobi.

The question now is why he was arrested and who ordered his arrest. Was Obama’s hand in this in any way? We will never know the truth but what is clear is that Dr Corsi was seen as a threat while in Kenya.

When API asked Mrs Obama to comment on why Dr Corsi was arrested by the Kenyan government and whether she thought Kenya’s Prime Minister Mr Raila Odinga was involved in Dr Corsi’s arrest, she got irritated and and simply told API not to dig that which will support evil people who are out to stop her husband from getting the presidency.

When asked who she was referring to as the evil people, she stated that she was not going to elaborate much on that but that many conservative white people and even some African Americans were against her husband, but that this group of blacks were simply doing so because of envy.

On Farakhan and his ministry, Mrs Obama told API that it was unfortunate that Mr Farakhan came out the way he did supporting her husband openly before the elections was over. That was not wholehearted support but one that was calculated to convince the American people that my husband will support the growth of muslim faith if he became the president, adding “even if my husband was able to prove that he is not a Muslim, he will not be believed by those who have come out strongly to destroy his chances of being the next President. Do real people expect someone to deny a religion when 80 percent of his relatives are Muslims?; Mrs Obama asked.

Mrs Obama asked API to write a good story about her husband and that will earn API an invitation to the innoguration ceremony when, as she put it , her husband will be installed as the next President of the United States of America next year.

We are now attempting to verify the actual taping of such statements made by MO and will be updating as soon as it becomes available.

API has listed its phone number on their site http://africanpress.wordpress.com/2008/10/15/shocking-development-mrs-obama-decides-enough-is-enough-my-husband-was-born-in-hawaii-and-adopted-by-his-step-father-does-that-make-him-unpatriotic-she-asks-on-a-direct-telephone-to-api/

MIA - Missing in Action

I must first apologize for not posting sooner. But first a hat tip to Shy Guy from Pamela Geller's blog, Atlas Shrugs, for the exaggerated Dollar Bill.

However, this past week has been the most crucial in my lifetime. No, I didn't lose in the stock market, but because I am a news junkie, staying focused on my alternate form of communication, the Internet...as located in the backwoods, where the sun don't shine, and no cable exists, the Internet is my only access to real news. Cable news is junk, pushing what THEY want you to hear...well, WTF? It doesn't take a genius to figure out that what we've seen is a economic disaster for so many un-deserving folk.

Well, no my hands weren't paralyzed, but my brain has been...as I don't know where to start. I can't begin to tell you what is out on the NET. A lot of junk to be sure...and then again, a mass of food to digest.

I must tell you that the blogs I have listed to the right, are my most faithful "go to" places for REAL TRUTH.

First of all, let me give Kudo's to both Pamela Geller of Atlas Shrugs and Jay Schneider of America's Right, and let us not forget Philip J. Berg, Esquire, of Obama Crimes.

Thank God they are all out there fighting for all of us...to get the truth out.

Pamela Geller was out on the streets of New York City filming the Islam day parade and goings on there. Please go to her website for that footage. However, this is what she posted on the 13th

I recently had a phone conversation with my cousin, a newly retired attorney who spent most of his working life as a banking regulator and was at the top of the heap when he left. For decades, all he did was interact with banks, savings & loans, mortgage lenders - and ACORN. He is a fine, scrupulous man who never discussed issues he dealt with at work, but now retired he felt at liberty to talk.

My dear cousin told me in unambiguous terms that the entire subprime mortgage phenomenon, which precipitated the worldwide financial crisis, was basically an affirmative action program pursued by liberal politicians and "community organizers" who imposed their "affordable housing" agenda on our financial system via legislation, leaning on banking executives, and using Fannie and Freddie as facilitators, regulatory muscle and as a Potemkin proxy for US government backing. He wasn't just making an assertion, either. Cousin Richard peppered our conversation with inside anecdotes to illustrate the point, including one instance of a major financial center bank writing ACORN a million dollar check just to get them off its back.

Have you read anything about this in "the media" other than inklings in the WSJ and on Fox? Have the normally inquisitive, risk-averse business writers at the NYT done any features - even to throw us off the scent (as they did with Ayers)? And hey, how about that business channel, CNBC? The answer is no, because so much of the real story leads to Obama, his Chicago years, his associates, supporters and his party. No time for that now. Not in the middle of a presidential campaign.

What we have here is a conspiracy of silence being imposed by "the media," an embargo on the truth to keep it from sullying their Anointed One. Only way I can think of for the average citizen to run the blockade is through the Internet where, if you look, there is plenty of alternate information, such as this this startling video - which Time Warner (CNN) attempted to suppress. Take a look at this and this too. Then push the word digitally to an ever widening circle of friends, acquaintances and family. If you have other ideas and better resources, employ them. But let's face it, today, without an honest, independent press, we are underground pamphleteers..

And so here's another reason - and one of the best - to keep Obama and his clique as far away from the Oval Office as possible. In the space of a few short months, and with one wave of his magic wand, Obama has effectively corrupted the nation's entire media establishment. If he should take over the White House, the whitewash of President Obama will likely continue and cause even more damage to our democracy. Since the nations' mass media has become the propaganda arm of the Obama campaign, there's every reason to believe, with so much invested, it will continue to aid and abet the Obama White House too. "Agents of change," indeed. Dan Friedman NYC

If you have read anything about ACORN, you will note that they are behind and responsible for fraudulently signing up nearly 70,000 felons in Florida to vote, raided their Las Vegas offices and signing up dead folks in Pennsylvania.

What is more absurd? Yours and my tax dollars fund this group of insurgents! You want change in our country? Oh, you'll get change...with Obiden. I am certain, without a doubt, should this schister steal the office of POTUS, we will be shoved into socialism, fascism, and the ultimate, communism.

And if you are so nieve to think so...our government has taken stance to totally nationalize our banking system. Are we so gullible to take this lying down?

Just this evening, Katy Curic showed a piece from the internet, showing Jimmy Kimmel's girlfried, whore, Sarah Silversteen, telling the voting college age students to go and visit their grandparents in Florida, whom they haven't seen in years, to vote for Obiden? It is called something like "get out the schlep vote".

Yes, the country we hold so near and dear to our hearts is falling down around us.

The question is, Will there be blood in the streets? I can only hope and pray not.

This community organizer, BO, was called by Louis Farakhan, the head of the Nation Islam of the US, our savior.

Not my Savior, not by a long shot! Wake up!

RNC puts the facts out there

On the eve of the second debate, I wonder just what I am sensing is correct.

From earlier postings, I have surmised that with the ebb and flow of financial disaster "embracing" our lives, this Presidential race is the most important one ever.

I just can't imagine how our country has gone to one of FREEDOM to one embracing socialism, marxism, and ultimately communism. I must admit, I am worried as all the evidence of the blind sheeple being led into a far greater mess than what we are in now.

FROM THE RNC:

The Obama Ayers Relationship


The Relationship Between Barack Obama And Bill Ayers Is Much More Extensive Than Obama's Campaign Is Willing To Admit

Obama's Top Campaign Staff Have Attempted To Downplay The Relationship Between Obama And Bill Ayers:

Obama Spokesman Robert Gibbs Said That Obama And Ayers Weren't Close And That Obama Was Only 8 Years Old When Ayers Was Bombing Buildings. Robert Gibbs: "If you read the article ... it says these two men weren't close, this man isn't involved in our campaign. Bill Ayers is somebody that Barack Obama said his actions were despicable and these happened when Barack Obama was 8 years old." (FOX News' "FOX & Friends," 10/6/08)

Gibbs Has Also Limited The Relationship Between Obama And Ayers To Serving On Two Boards Together. John Roberts: "Barack Obama knew Bill Ayers and had contact with him between 1995 and 2005. Exactly what was the nature of the relationship?" Robert Gibbs: "Well, John, as The New York Times reported this weekend, they served on two boards together during that time period." (CNN's "American Morning," 10/6/08)

Even Obama Has Previously Referred To Ayers As "A Guy Who Lives In My Neighborhood" And Not Someone He Exchanges Ideas With "On A Regular Basis." Obama: "George, but this is an example of what I'm talking about. This is a guy who lives in my neighborhood, who's a professor of English in Chicago who I know and who I have not received some official endorsement from. He's not somebody who I exchange ideas from on a regular basis. And the notion that somehow as a consequence of me knowing somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago, when I was 8 years old, somehow reflects on me and my values doesn't make much sense, George." (Sen. Barack Obama, ABC Democrat Candidates Presidential Debate, Philadelphia, PA, 4/16/08)

But Obama's Connections With Bill Ayers Are Much More Extensive Than He Or His Campaign Staff Is Willing To Admit:

In 1995, During Obama's First State Senate Campaign, William Ayers And Wife Bernadine Dohrn Hosted A Meeting Of Chicago Liberals At Their Home For Obama, Which One Attendee Said Was Aimed At "Launching Him." "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. ... 'I can remember being one of a small group of people who came to Bill Ayers' house to learn that Alice Palmer was stepping down from the senate and running for Congress,' said Dr. Quentin Young, a prominent Chicago physician and advocate for single-payer health care, of the info rmal gathering at the home of Ayers and his wife, Dohrn. '[Palmer] identified [Obama] as her successor.' ... Dr. Young and another guest, Maria Warren, described it 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.'" (Ben Smith, "Obama Once Visited '60s Radicals," The Politico, 1/22/08)

From March Of 1995 Until September Of 1997, Obama And Ayers Attended At Least Seven Meetings Together Relating To The Chicago Annenberg Challenge. (Chicago Annenberg Challenge, Board Of Directors Meeting, Minutes Of The Board, 3/15/95, 3/31/95, 4/13/95, 6/5/95, 9/30/97; National Annenberg Challenge Evaluation Meeting, List Of Participants, 5/24/95; Chicago Annenberg Challenge, Chicago School Reform Collaborative Meeting, Minutes, 10/23/96)

* NOTE: Bill Ayers Was Asked To Help Obama Formulate The Chicago Annenberg Challenge By-Laws. (Chicago Annenberg Challenge Board Of Directors Minutes, 3/15/95)

In 1997, Obama Praised Ayers' Book On The Juvenile Justice System. "The two men were involved in efforts to reform the city's education system. They appeared together on academic panels, including one organized by Michelle Obama to discuss the juvenile justice system, an area of mutual concern. Mr. Ayers's book on the subject won a rave review in The Chicago Tribune by Mr. Obama, who called it 'a searing and timely account.'" (Jo Becker and Christopher Drew, "Pragmatic Politics, Forged On The South Side," The New York Times, 5/11/08)

* Obama On William Ayers' "A Kind And Just Parent: The Children Of Juvenile Court": "A searing and timely account of the juvenile court system, and the courageous individuals who rescue hope from despair." (Chicago Tribune, 12/21/97)

"[Obama And Ayers] Have Also Appeared Jointly On Two Academic Panels, One In 1997 And Another In 2001." (Russell Berman, "Obama's Ties To Left Come Under Scrutiny," The New York Sun, 2/19/08)

From 1999 To 2002, Obama Served With Ayers On The Board Of Directors For Woods Fund Of Chicago. "[Ayers] served with [Obama] from 1999 to 2002 on the board of the Woods Fund, an anti-poverty group." (Timothy J. Burger, "Obama's Chicago Ties Might Fuel 'Republican Attack Machine'," Bloomberg, 2/15/08)

* During The Time Obama And Ayers Served Together On The Woods Fund, Ayers Was Quoted Saying "I Don't Regret Setting Bombs ... I Feel We Didn't Do Enough." "'I don't regret setting bombs,' Bill Ayers said. 'I feel we didn't do enough.' Mr. Ayers, who spent the 1970's as a fugitive in the Weather Underground, was sitting in the kitchen of his big turn-of-the-19th-century stone house in the Hyde Park district of Chicago." (Dinitia Smith, "No Regrets For A Love Of Explosives," The New York Times, 9/11/01)

* NOTE: Obama, Born August 14th, 1961, Was 40 Years Old When Ayers Was Quoted. (Obama For America Website, www.barackobama.com, Accessed 10/6/08; Dinitia Smith, "No Regrets For A Love Of Explosives," The New York Times, 9/11/01)

* While Obama And Ayers Were Serving On The Woods Fund Together, Ayers Posed Standing On An American Flag For An Article In Chicago Magazine Entitled "No Regrets." (Marcia Froelke Coburn, "No Regrets," Chicago Magazine, 8/01)

Obama And Ayers Are Neighbors In Chicago's Hyde Park Neighborhood. "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." (Scott Shane, "Obama And '60s Bomber: A Look Into Crossed Paths," The New York Times, 10/4/08)

* Obama Spokesman Ben LaBolt Told The New York Times That Last Year Obama And Ayers "Bumped Into Each Other On The Street In Hyde Park." "[Obama spokesman Ben LaBolt] said they have not spoken by phone or exchanged e-mail messages since Mr. Obama began serving in the United States Senate in January 2005 and last met more than a year ago when they bumped into each other on the street in Hyde Park." (Scott Shane, "Obama And '60s Bomber: A Look Into Crossed Paths," The New York Times, 10/4/08)

* Neighbors Have Said "It's Only Natural" That Obama Would Know Ayers, Who Often Opens His Home For Gatherings, As Obama And His Wife "Are A Part Of Our Neighborhood And Part Of Our Social Circle." "Since coming out of hiding in 1980, the couple have raised three boys in Chicago and become part of the fabric of their liberal South Side neighborhood. Neighbors said it's only natural that Obama would know Ayers and Dohrn, who often open their homes for gatherings filled with lively discussions about politics, arts and social issues. Obama and his wife 'are part of our neighborhood and part of our social circle,' said Elizabeth Chandler, a neighbor of Ayers'." (Trevor Jensen, Robert Mitchum and Mary Owen, "Bill Ayers' Turbulent Past Contrasts With Quiet Academ ic Life," Chicago Tribune, 4/17/08)

Ayers' Organization, The Weather Underground, Was A "Violent Left-Wing Activist Group":

"William Ayers ... [Was] A Founding Member Of The Group That Bombed The U.S. Capitol And The Pentagon During The 1970s." (Russell Berman, "Obama's Ties To Left Come Under Scrutiny," The New York Sun, 2/19/08)

* Ayers' Group, The Weather Underground, Is A "Violent Left-Wing Activist Group." "Senator Obama's ties to a former leader of the violent left-wing activist group the Weather Underground are drawing new scrutiny as he battles Senator Clinton for the Democratic presidential nomination." (Russell Berman, "Obama's Ties To Left Come Under Scrutiny," The New York Sun, 2/19/08)

The Weather Underground Produced A Manual Which Begins, "We Are A Guerrilla Organization. We Are Communist Women And Men, Underground In The United States For More Than Four Years." "The coalition was said to be a violence-prone faction inspired by the Weather Underground's ''Prairie Fire,'' a guerrilla warfare manual published in 1974. The manual begins, 'We are a guerrilla organization. We are Communist women and men, underground in the United States for more than four years.'" (Paul L. Montgomery, "2 Women In Brink's Case Identified With Weathermen From Start In '69," The New York Times, 10/ 22/81)