Barack Obama And Former Weatherman William Ayers: The Facts

[Adelante]

The Associated Press has issued a Fact Check following up on last night's debate:

Fact check: Obama’s connections to former member of Weather Underground

-snip

THE FACTS:

Ayers was part of the Weather Underground, a radical group that claimed credit for explosions at the U.S. Capitol, the Pentagon and more. Originally known as the Weathermen, the group took its name from a Bob Dylan lyric: “You don’t need a weatherman to know which way the wind blows.”

In 1970, a bomb the group was making — to use against an Army base — exploded at a New York town house, killing three members. Ayers fled and spent years as a fugitive. He met and married fellow fugitive Bernadine Dohrn during that period.

The two surfaced in 1980. Ayers had been charged with various offenses stemming from demonstrations in Chicago in 1969, but those charges had been dismissed for prosecutorial misconduct. He never faced any charges related to the town house explosion. Dohrn pleaded guilty to two counts of aggravated battery and two counts of bail-jumping in connection with a 1969 anti-war protest.

Ayers now teaches at the University of Illinois at Chicago, and Dohrn heads the Children and Family Justice Center at Northwestern University. Ayers has advised Chicago Mayor Richard Daley on education issues.

Ayers and Obama both served on the board of directors of the Woods Fund, a Chicago-based charity that focuses on developing community groups to assist the poor. A variety of business executives, journalists and academics serve on the board.

When Obama was organizing his first race for the state legislature, the incumbent lawmaker he hoped to replace introduced him to her supporters and urged them to back Obama. One introductory event took place at the home of Ayers and Dohrn.

Ayers contributed $200 to Obama’s legislative campaign in 2001, but there is no other sign that he has actively aided Obama’s political career.

Please read all of it

http://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/2008/04/fact_check_obama_and_former_ra.php

[redqueen]

1. Heheheh... the desperation of Hillary's campaign (& the GOP & the M$M)

in their trying SO HARD to push this story... it's frickin great.

:D

[Adelante]

4. Fucking McCarthyites nt

[redqueen]

14. Yeah... I was pretty pissed this morning...

but after reading about how those shameless, soulless whores were booed off the stage and out the doors... and realizing that this really is just their last and most transparent attempt to try to maintain their stranglehold on OUR power... I'm pretty confident their days are numbered.

The sad desparation displayed by their insistence on hammering on BS that people have already rejected says volumes.

The only thing that worries me is... what will they try next?

[Adelante]

16. I think this was their biggest shot

The Clinton campaign has been trying to get the media to push this for months. Now the right wing is hot on it. The debate, though, was the greatest opportunity for Hillary. But. They got nothing and I am happy as can be the AP picked it up.

[redqueen]

18. Yup! Clinton & the RW... united at last.

I'm sure some of the undecideds who aren't yet fed up with distract-o-tron BS will eat it up with a spoon... but in addition to just not being yet fed up with the BS, they'll also have to be:

- not too terribly hurt by the spikes in gas prices
- not personally affected by the subprime fiasco
- not personally affected by recent mass layoffs
- etc., etc., etc.

In other words, the pool of "comfortably clueless" voters is shrinking FAST. Obama's "not this time" mantra speaks to everyone who's got a reason to want to ignore / be done with the BS. :)

[jasmine621]

37. Once again, it was not Hillary who brought this subject up.

If anything is fair game to throw at Hillary, including baking cookies and serving tea, Obama should take the hits like a man and stop being a whimp. He cries racism when it suits him, yet he uses the race card when it is to his advantage. He cries foul when Hillary makes points about issues concerning him when she is asked questions, yet he brings up things about Hillary when no question was asked about what he tosses out. He is not someone I trust in the WH.

[redqueen]

38. You enjoying being on DU so far?

You sure have been busy!

:hi:

[Adelante]

40. Please, do you think we didn't notice?

Clinton Camp Pushes O-Bomber Links: Ignores Her Own Radical Ties

By JUSTIN ROOD
Feb. 22, 2008


The Hillary Clinton campaign pushed to reporters today stories about Barack Obama and his ties to former members of a radical domestic terrorist group -- but did not note that as president, Clinton's husband pardoned more than a dozen convicted violent radicals, including a member of the same group mentioned in the Obama stories.

"Wonder what the Republicans will do with this issue," mused Clinton spokesman Phil Singer in one e-mail to the media, containing a New York Sun article reporting a $200 contribution from William Ayers, a founding member of the Weather Underground, to Obama in 2001. (Obama's ties to the radical group first surfaced last week in a Bloomberg News article.)

In a separate e-mail, Singer forwarded an article from Politico.com reporting on a 1995 event at a private home that brought Obama together with Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, another former member of the radical group.

Opting to leave any attacks on the issue to the GOP may be wise, as attacks from Clinton could backfire. In his final day in office, President Clinton pardoned another one-time member of the Weather Underground, Susan L. Rosenberg, after she had served 16 years in prison on federal charges.

-snip

And in 1999, President Clinton also pardoned 16 violent Puerto Rican nationalists responsible for more than 100 bombings of U.S. political and military installations, after they promised to renounce violence. The attacks reportedly killed six people and wounded dozens more. In justifying the pardons, President Clinton noted none of the men had been convicted of crimes that resulted in death or injuries.

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/Story?id=4330128&page=1

[Adelante]

45. The Boston Globe did a timeline article today

It makes no mention of the Clinton campaign's role in furthering the development of this story, so I emailed the reporter with the above, noting the date of February 22, 2008.

Here is the Boston Globe piece from today:

How Obama and the radical became news

It began as a blog entry in 2005 from a woman to the left of Barack Obama. It turned into a conservative cause célèbre. Then it entered the mainstream consciousness in a prime-time debate on ABC.

-snip

When Obama became a presidential contender, it was conservatives who picked up on the story. On Feb. 2, conservative British writer Peter Hitchens mentioned Ayers in a piece titled "The Black Kennedy: but does anyone know the real Barack Obama?" in the London Daily Mail. A week later, a mention of Ayers appeared in an anti-Obama blog known as Rezko Watch.

Soon, the story turned up in the mainstream American press: in the Bloomberg news service, a Washington Post blog, and the New York Sun. An overview of the Ayers-Obama connection, published on Politico.com on Feb. 22, circulated widely on the Internet.

At that point, conservative bloggers began to question whether the major media organizations would challenge Obama on the relationship.

http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2008/04/18/how_obama_and_the_radical_became_news/?page=full


So, according to this, a right wing Brit was first to raise Obama-Ayers in February, followed closely by an anti-Obama (pro-Clinton) site, and two weeks later by Politico, with Bloomberg and WaPo in between. On the date of the Politico piece, February 22, ABC published the information that the Clinton campaign was pushing Obama-Ayers with the media.

The notion that Clinton was not the first is silly. The Clinton campaign and the right wing started pushing this bilge at nearly the same time. Conservative bloggers started raising hell after the Clinton campaign managed to drum it up in the press.

[Bensthename]

2. Why would you post such garbage?

There is nothing bad in it any where.. Though you try to portray the fact that there is..
Why?

[Adelante]

5. Pardon me?

[Bensthename]

7. Can you answer the question. What is your beef with this?

[Adelante]

9. I have NO beef with it

Or I wouldn't have posted it.

[Bensthename]

17. Ah, that's cool.

It looked to be another "gotcha" game.. But if you were just getting some info out there on this guy then sorry about that.

People do need to read that and understand that this story has no legs. Now it will be another vague story out there against Obama that most will have no idea the truth on this. And just because the mods brought it up in poor taste.

Sorry again for jumping on your good intentions.

[rinsd]

3. Hannity has been plugging this one for some time.

A coworker here has been bringing it up.

On edit: Don't like this move by the Clinton campaign at all.

[PM7nj]

6. So... Hannity is a dick.

He has also pushed the "Hillary killed Vince Foster" shit.

[Bensthename]

22. I can listen to Limbaugh over Hannity. Hannity is the scum of all scum.

[rinsd]

23. I dislike scream radio in all its forms.

[Bensthename]

24. Me too, but out of curiosity when no good songs are on I'll scan

through the hate radio just to hear what crap they are spewing.. I can't listen long though or I get too mad.

[rinsd]

25. I had the worst time driving to Phoeniz with a friend earlier this year

For about 50 miles the ONLY thing the radio picked up was Mike Savage :puke:

[Bensthename]

28. Oh noo. He is a screaming maniac, I feel for yah..

He tells good stories of when he was a kid. But his view of the world and America is awful.

[JoFerret]

31. The GOP will be playing this crap big in October

either for Obama associating OR Pres. Clinton for pardoning. (I am glad he did personally.)

[rinsd]

33. Yup, fits the weak on terra meme.

[JoFerret]

39. Best it's dealt with now

...as much as it can be. Imo.
So rather than rant about it getting the facts and then the story is a way to go.
this is too delicious a stick to beat dems with.
And if they can make a paraplegic Vietnam veteran into a coward they are capable of trying anything with their incessant drumbeat of association and niggling. It's why the flag crap has resonance. And it truly is crap.

Whoever is our nominee in the fall they are going to get a full frontal onslaught from the GOP regime.

[MH1]

42. Hannity was ECSTATIC on the radio this afternoon.

Well I only listened to about 5 seconds or so but it was enough to hear him bragging about starting to "have an influence and help America". :puke:

Thank you for recognizing that Clinton's using this is a bad deal.

[JoFerret]

43. He is an idiot. Stop listening to him and his ilk

They are poisoning your brain.

[cali]

44. thanks. I know this won't be a popular sentiment here

but I admire Ayers. Not what he did in the sixties, but his work on early childhood ed. he's well respected in the field.

[crankychatter]

8. Are you NOW, or have you ever BEEN a boogeyman from the subconscious of a Republican?

ya know? who really gives a fuck?

the Yippees became stock brokers and sociology professors.

The SDS is reborn now... and just as fun as before.

They were always liberals in my book... the Weathermen should've laid off the amphetamines but again... who cares?

[Bensthename]

10. THERE IS NOTHING BAD IN THIS STORY FOR OBAMA.. GET OVER IT.

[NYCGirl]

12. No, there isn't. That's why the OP posted it. NT

[Adelante]

13. Are you a fucking idiot?

[redqueen]

15. ...

:rofl:



:hug:

[Bensthename]

20. I apologized above. I thought it was more "gotcha" bs. Sorry man.

[Adelante]

27. I apologize for getting pissed off

I usually try to watch my temper better :hi:

[Bensthename]

30. ah, I started it..

No biggy..

[BlooInBloo]

11. Manufactroversy #12.

[susankh4]

19. Thanks for the clarification.

It will help the educated among us, defend Mr. Obama.

[Blue-Jay]

21. It's raining men!

Wait.... Did I just think of the wrong disco group?

[crispini]

No, but you made ME think of that damn "Raining McCain" parody

Here, now you can poke your eyes out with a fork too:

http://youtube.com/watch?v=TNTPqG6ZECU

[Blue-Jay]

32. Yeah I saw that. That older woman has invisible legs.

She could parlay that into a successful life of crime.

[Major Hogwash]

26. So, Obama was 10 years old when this happened, yet they blame him for knowing the guy.

Geezus, this is ridiculous.

[AtomicKitten]

29. Alas, if only facts would sate the Clinton horde.

I thought Obama did a spectacular job pointing out that Bill Clinton pardoned two of the perpetrators which is infinitely more relevant to the discussion, gotcha or otherwise.

K&R

[Texas Hill Country]

34. they are also neighbors and have lots of friends in common.

[crispini]

36. Oh, BFD.

You wouldn't believe all the fruitcases that live in my neighborhood and whom I have friends in common. SO WHAT?

Honestly. :eyes:

[BlueIdaho]

41. Guilt by association?

So fucking what? Obama is guilty of what exactly? Knowing people? Perhaps you are too young to remember the 50's, Joseph McCarthy loved that kind of shit - he even had trials about who you knew. Perhaps you are too young to remember the 60's. LOTS of young people were pissed off then, LOTS of us felt we had to actively work against the corporate war machine committing acts of civil disobedience and you know fucking what? WE STOPPED A WAR.

In the 60's eight year old kids were not involved - they were at the playground. Near as I can tell Ayers is not a fugitive on the run and he has "paid" his debt to society so why don't you try thinking like a Democrat instead of a neo-conservative?

Obama knows people... Hrumph!

[kwassa]

46. desperation to create a link and some mud

[marions ghost]

35. snore

:boring:

wake me when it's over....