Once, about fourteen years ago, I knew a lot about American History. But even during those months of immersion study for the AP test, I didn’t know much about anything after WWII. Back then the test focused on the Civil War and Robber Barons and the Great Depression. Go ahead, ask me anything about J.P. Morgan. Anything.
But the Vietnam war? Basically I know that my dad got an academic(?) deferment and that Jane Fonda was against it. So when I heard the soundbites about President-elect Obama’s ties to William (Bill) Ayers during the election, I tuned them out. But references to the “Weather Underground” struck me. Wouldn’t that make a great title for a children’s book?
Anyway, Bill Ayers has an op-ed piece in today’s New York Times. He says that the media painted him as an “unrepentant domestic terrorist” during the campaign, an invented character that is “not even close” to what he really is.
Since I know as little about the Vietnam War and anti-war demonstrators as anyone who’s seen Forrest Gump possibly could, here’s how Bill Ayers describes himself and the actions of Weather Underground, a group he co-founded in 1970:
The Weather Underground went on to take responsibility for placing several small bombs in empty offices — the ones at the Pentagon and the United States Capitol were the most notorious . . .
The Weather Underground crossed lines of legality, of propriety and perhaps even of common sense. . . . We did carry out symbolic acts of extreme vandalism directed at monuments to war and racism, and the attacks on property, never on people, were meant to respect human life and convey outrage and determination to end the Vietnam war.
Peaceful protests had failed to stop the war. So we issued a screaming response. But it was not terrorism; we were not engaged in a campaign to kill and injure people indiscriminately, spreading fear and suffering for political ends.
So, what is Bill Ayers?
1) He admits to placing bombs. Non-fatal bombs, and anyway, peaceful demonstrations hadn’t worked. What’s a conscientious protester to do? Besides, terrorism isn’t about non-fatal bombs, it’s about “spreading fear.” Unh. What, exactly, is the point of a bomb if it is not death and it is not fear? Isn’t fear the APPROPRIATE RESPONSE to random bombs? Perhaps they should have tried sparkly fireworks if all they wanted was to make a statement.
2) He says terrorism is “for political ends.” How is the end of a war not a “political end”?
3) He differentiates between targeting property and targeting people. This argument is tragically, tragically flawed. What if a Pentagon secretary forgot her purse and returned to get it before going home to her family? How lucky was it that no one died in those offices where people worked every day?
Is Bill Ayers not an “unrepentant domestic terrorist”?
terrorist = risks or destroys human life for political ends
domestic = in the U.S.
unrepentant = (Ayers says his “real regret” is that “the antiwar movement” was unsuccessful) = unwilling to ‘fess up, even as your own facts condemn you.
What I’d really like to know is if, in his job as professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago, Bill Ayers is so removed from independent, critical thinkers that he could write a piece like this and consider it at all persuasive. Wouldn’t a first-year composition student point out the glaring contradictions and self-serving rationalizations?
Does he not have a working dictionary to define complicated terms like “terrorism” and “domestic” and “unrepentant” for him? Let me help a professor out, Dr. Ayers. Try dictionary.com.
Jane
p.s. I’ve got a fun post coming about falling in love with my family at the dinner table last week. It’s cheerful and moving and mommy-grateful-loving. I just had to get this off my chest first. Thanks for bearing with me. (or if not, you know, whatever). Love you!
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Ah, you had to be there. Lots of booze, marijuana, free sex, and up pops a leader to say “This way!” and thousands of us followed, to “kill” the freeway, “occupy the business ed department, trash the admin building, until “BLAM!,” and tear gas, when most of us felt that was going a bit too far, so we melted back into the background, leaving the leaders to take the blame.
Hey Grampa, thanks for commenting on this horribly sad orphan of a post. I’m sure you’re right that being there would be helpful in understanding the whole thing, but it’s interesting that Ayers didn’t mention any drugs or sex or even booze in his article. Maybe he forgot about those parts?
Read John Murtaugh’s account of the night the Weather Underground attacked his family.
http://www.city-journal.org/2008/eon0430jm.html
If that’s not Terrorism, I don’t know what is.
Great post Jane! My history classes were just as you described, as though nothing after WWII mattered. Mr. Ayers does not sound repentant at all and needs to do some serious self-examination.
I read Ayers piece before reading your blog post this morning, and I agree that Ayers arguments about being an “unrepentant domestic terrorist” are weak. I think his larger point, however, is that Obama was unfairly linked to him in an ugly and unwarranted political attack.
One tragedy of this past campaign is that William Ayers was made into a major player at all. The attempts to link him to Obama were malicious, unwarranted, and politically motivated. Had we been talking about issues and policies rather than engaging in scare tactics and demonization, his name would never even have come up.
Thank you, Jane, for this post. I wish more people would take the time to understand what is going on around them. It appears that Mr. Ayers has deluded himself into thinking that what he and the Weather Underground did was right. I haven’t read his piece in the NY Times, but it sounds like he forgot to mention the the WU people that tried to kill a New York State Supreme Court Judge and his family. They knew there were people in the home when they set the bombs. Mr. Ayers may not have personally set those bombs, but he is morally just as responsible as those from his group that did. He is clearly unrepentent and has a deep hatred for America. Senator Obama points out that he was eight years old when Mr. Ayers was setting bombs. True, but his association with Mr. Ayers points to his lack of judgement and conscience. We are often judged by the company we keep which may sound unfair, but we choose to associate with those whom which we are comfortable with, share a common bond with, or can help us in our endevours. Whatever the motive was that caused Senator Obama to associate with Mr. Ayers it points to lack of judgement and character.
My thoughts on this post are mostly in relation to how our history education failed us. I know next to nothing about anything between WWII and the first Gulf War. Part of that is my own fault, because I could pick up a book and teach myself, but in 13 years of public education and 4 years of BYU I was never required (or even recommended) to study anything from that period of time.
Oh and the actual point of your post, was totally spot on.
Josh — you’re absolutely right. Ayers’ arguments against his being linked to Obama were quite persuasive, much more so than his attempted amelioration of WU’s reputation. And I agree that he shouldn’t have been mentioned (although I am glad to learn a bit more about our history
, but, I think both sides are quite good at raising spectre’s from the other sides’ past.
If Obama was 8 when bombs were being set off, and if their ‘association’ was as tenuous as they both described, then it’s probably not pertinent to Obama’s character.
I thought Ayers’ last line “And let’s hope we might now assert that in our wildly diverse society, talking and listening to the widest range of people is not a sin, but a virtue” was quite moving.
I read some of the comments to the op-ed piece in the NYTimes, and one of the most interesting was from a self-described liberal who, oh, here it is:
“Bill –
You still don’t get it.
You were less than effective. Your were counter-effective. Your craziness helped turn America strongly to the right and delivered 40 years of Republican ascendancy. I’ve been waiting my entire adult life for the conservative era to end (which I’m hoping it now has), and I hold you and your buddies partly responsible. I understand your position on Vietnam — I share it. But if anything, your actions prolonged the war. I would respect you a lot more if you just admitted it.
— Charlie, Ellicott City, MD”
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