Playing with Fire
Sigh. Once again, the difference between theory and practice turns out to be bigger in practice than in theory. Or, put another way, despite knowing as an intellectual matter that the McCain campaign has nowhere to go but down in terms of strategy, it’s still something of an emotional shock to see McCain and Palin engaged in what actually looks like a premeditated attempt to incite violence toward their opponent. First, check out McCain’s reaction when he asks, “Who is the real Barack Obama?” and a supporter shouts back “Terrorist!” loud enough for the microphone to pick it up:
There’s also this from Dana Milbank’s piece in the WaPo on Palin’s appearance yesterday: In Fla., Palin Goes for the Rough Stuff as Audience Boos Obama.
“And, according to the New York Times, he was a domestic terrorist and part of a group that, quote, ‘launched a campaign of bombings that would target the Pentagon and our U.S. Capitol,'” she continued.
“Boooo!” the crowd repeated.
“Kill him!” proposed one man in the audience.
Palin continued with the same approach today: Obama Hatred On Display Again At Palin Rally, Supporter Screams “Treason!”
“[Obama] said, too, that our troops in Afghanistan are ‘air raiding villages and killing civilians,'” Palin said, mischaracterizing a 2007 remark by Obama. “I hope Americans know that is not what our brave men and women in uniform are doing in Afghanistan. The U.S. military is fighting terrorism and protecting us and protecting our freedom.”
Shortly afterward, a male member of the crowd in Jacksonville, Florida, yelled “treason!” loudly enough to be picked up by television microphones.
There’s video of the incident at the site if you follow the link.
So, what am I saying here? Politics famously ain’t beanbag; isn’t it fair for McCain and Palin to question Obama’s past associations and statements, even if they do so (as they are here) in a misleading manner?
Yes. But.
But the first: Even if you’re willing to believe that McCain and Palin weren’t intentionally provoking this reaction at first (which I guess I’ll give you, just for the sake of argument), they now have no excuse not to be aware of it. They are inciting crowds to express violent threats against Obama, and they know it. The question now is, will they continue to incite those threats?
But the second: What they’re doing here is being done in a particular context. McCain and Palin, by consciously choosing a strategy that involves whipping their most-ardent supporters into a violent frenzy, are opening a can of whoop-ass that taps into the ugliest currents of racist violence in our nation’s history. And yeah, I realize that having put all his chips in, having turned his campaign over to the same people who savaged him in 2000, having chosen to hazard his honor and reputation, McCain is not going to stop now. He’s going to go all the way, even if that means inciting what is, in essence, a lynch-mob mentality on the part of his followers.
But what does that really mean? Given the problems facing the nation, this sort of ugliness seems to me to be very unlikely to persuade the remaining persuadable voters. If anything, it is going to accelerate the movement of undecideds away from McCain. The only way I can see this whip-up-the-base strategy delivering the presidency to McCain is if he actually succeeds in inciting some crazed follower to assassinate Obama.
McCain knows those guys are out there. We all know it. We remember this incident from the DNC:
So, the ball’s in your court, McCain. Is this really the way you want to win the presidency? Are you really willing to sink that low? Because if you are, I’d like to suggest that the presidency, achieved in that manner, would not be worth the cost.
October 7th, 2008 at 12:29 pm
I thought to post this myself, but jbc beat me to it. It is a whip up the base and any-subject-but-the-economy twofer. They get to deny they meant anything of the sort and why by golly it’s offensive for you to suggest that ya betcha (wink). The Rs can’t talk about anything that matters: the economy, the wars, healthcare, or even trrrrrsm.
It is sad really that McCain chose to run this ugly a campaign. If he had ever been a ‘maverick’ (btw did you hear about the actual Maverick family in TX, the folks who the name came from – they refused to brand their cattle – they are making a stink about McCain claiming to be a Maverick [snicker]) IF he had run a Maverick’s campaign he would have selected a VP who wasn’t a radical right wing incompetent. Maybe even gone for Joe L or Kay Bailey Hutchinson (can’t select her without angering the anti-abortion crowd tho). He would have led on the economy and decent oversight and ethics reform and opposed the Iraq War (finish the fight in Afghanistan). Instead he has run a campaign of smears, outright lies and hail mary passes to the right wing masses.
Finally, crooksandliars has a story about a man shot three times for wearing an Obama t shirt (note, in London)
And yes jbc they are very much willing to sink that low.
October 7th, 2008 at 4:50 pm
I think it’s telling that this has been posted as long as it has and no one outside of Enkidu and myself – the two biggest crackpots on this blog outside of Knarlyknight – have even bothered to respond. but wait, here’s Knarly now…
October 7th, 2008 at 8:22 pm
It’s all backfiring. All of it.
October 7th, 2008 at 10:56 pm
and this is just the beginning, there a lot of McCain to burn until November 4th.
jbc – good post, entirely agree, and of course McCain’s actions have shown that he is willing to sink that low – he wants the presidency at any cost.
October 7th, 2008 at 11:22 pm
but don’t let that treachery take your eyes away from the standard dirty tricks:
from http://www.bradblog.com/?p=6480
October 8th, 2008 at 5:17 am
“…at any cost…DUNT DUNT DUNNNNNNNNNNT.”
You miss your cues sometimes, but at least you’re consistent.
October 8th, 2008 at 7:42 am
There was a story on one of the blogs yesterday, I can’t recall which one tbh, but the gist is that two voter registration drive guys were approached by two black guys, bling, tattoos, attitude. Of course the two guys were somewhat alarmed but held their ground and asked if these two were registered. Who wants to know? Well we want to register everyone to vote if eligible. And they go on to explain that this is one of the most important elections in history and we desperately need a change and if you aren’t registered, now is the time to do so. By the end of their spiel one of the gang bangers says, with tears in his eyes: this is the first time in his life that a white man had ever spoken to him with respect and understanding. He took a stack of voter registration forms and at some later point brought in 50 filled out registration forms to these same guys. The blogger said it made both of them weep with pride.
I am sure some of them were filled out improperly or incompletely and had to be discarded or challenged or whatever (I am no voter registration expert). I am sure the GOOPers would challenge every single one of those new voters, but it doesn’t change the basic fact that people are engaged as never before. ACORN has to stop paying registrars by the filled out form and just go with an hourly wage or something. Bogus challenges to legitimate new voters should be prosecuted.
The choice is clear: real change or the same tired McBush disaster after disaster after disaster (oh btw here is some more disaster to go with your disaster).
We watched the debate last night and there was one presidential candidate and one angry old geezer who floundered badly.
Stop saying my friends McBush: I am your boss, do your damn job. I said the same for Obama: if he can’t deliver I’ll be happy to vote him out in four years. We need smarter government, not more. One last point, McBush made an epic fail when he said he would freeze government spending. During a downturn gov spending should go up to stimulate demand and ameliorate the economic pain.
October 8th, 2008 at 9:39 am
John, although I get the broad point of your post, I also think it is clear that the “Kill Him” comment by one supporter was directed at Ayers, not Obama. Not that it makes it okay, but at least the emotion should be accurately attributed to the person it was intended to be.
October 8th, 2008 at 10:18 am
…Yes, since it is Ayers, not Obama, the times article labeled a “domestic terrorist,” which he in fact was.
October 8th, 2008 at 11:18 am
Craig,
I’m not sure it’s really clear that the shouter meant “kill Ayers” as opposed to “kill Obama”, though I’ll grant you that the former seems at least as likely as the latter, maybe moreso.
It was interesting to see that McCain backed off from the harsh attacks in the debate last night. I wonder how much of that was a conscious decision that the hate-mongering was not something he (McCain) was comfortable doing, at least in a face-to-face town hall setting, because it is inherently wrong, and how much was just pragmatic, recognizing that it wasn’t working well in the overnight polling.
October 8th, 2008 at 12:14 pm
JBC, Overt personal smears would have resonated as utterly inappropriate for the debate format and subject(s); it would have been foolhardy and awkward for McCain to do so.
We’ll see if the overnight polling changes the McCain smear-by-association with Ayers; I think they will continue.
However, they may as well just drop the Ayers line of attack because it is a stupid and will only appeal to radical, ill informed low lifes. Despite Ayer’s tarnished past in the turbulent 1960’s; it is now 2008, Obama fully rejects Ayer’s past actions, and Ayer’s reformed himself a long time ago and is now, according to wiki, “a professor in the College of Education at the University of Illinois at Chicago, holding the honor of Distinguished Professor.”
Even though they might as well drop that line of attack, it’s going to stick around (perhaps at a lower frequency), because wwnj’s love to get their simple folks worked up with cries of “TERRORIST!” until hate and fearful emotions utterly displace rational thought.
October 8th, 2008 at 1:14 pm
“Reformed” is an inaccurate description for a guy who has no regrets for setting off bombs himself and/or heading the group that set off many more in a variety of settings. A guy who smirkingly said in an interview, “Guilty as hell, free as a bird”, and when asked if he would do it all over again, didn’t discount the likelyhood.
October 8th, 2008 at 1:30 pm
”I don’t regret setting bombs. I feel we didn’t do enough.” – Bill Ayers, as quoted in the New York Times, September 11, 2001.
Year of the Fork.
October 8th, 2008 at 3:28 pm
Resistance to illegitimate authority is legitimate, or do you rightwingers want a do over on the whole Revolutionary War? I don’t agree with setting bombs off (even if they don’t hurt people) to make a ‘political’ point. No one died from a Weather Underground bomb. Ever. Look it up. No one ever connected the WUO to the SF bombing, but please feel free to make up any unsubstantiated and counterfactual blather that makes you feel good.
“a moral, pedagogical, and militant form of guerrilla theater with a bang.”
now you wwnjs are afraid of street theater? what’s next? hunting down all the mimes and jugglers? pathetic! grow a spine.
The antiabortion crowd has killed way more people than the WUO (if you don’t include the SF bombing that killed a police office, that would be infinitely more people killed by ‘prolife’ murderers).
So how about when imPalin met with international terrorist Henry Kissinger?
Or should we call gwb a terrorist for invading a country that hadn’t attacked us, had nothing to do with 9/11 and had absolutely no WMDs? We dropped how many tons of bombs? How many Americans have died for this folly? How many Iraqis have died because the neocons wanted to grab their chance at glory?
Finally, when are the wwnjs going to stop fighting the veitnam war?
Time to move on.
October 8th, 2008 at 3:43 pm
I was wrong, ignorant even, for if you are telling the truth then it would seem, to a critic, that Ayers is not truly “reformed”
At least not reformed in a strict evangelical meaning of the term. Has he committed or incited any crimes for the past 30 odd years? Didn’t think so.
Enk is making a lot of sense lately too. Didn’t realize the actual basis for the wwnj’s stance against the Declaration of Independence…
Enk, I’d like to move on but have you seen the new Rolling Stone cover and comprehensive bio of the real McCain? (Must be in response to McCain’s latest failed tactic asking if we know the real Obama.)
“Make-Believe Maverick
A closer look at the life and career of John McCain reveals a disturbing record of recklessness and dishonesty”
As for being the maverick who will not bend his principles for mere politics:
Hmmm, did I read “Intent on winning the presidency at all costs. . .” ? Touché ! Maybe Rolling Stone is reading the postings here at Lies…
It gets better:
October 8th, 2008 at 5:06 pm
Craig – is this clear and direct enough for you?
firstread.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2008/10/08/1517943.aspx
Give it a week and they’ll be screaming “lynch the f****** n*****!”
October 8th, 2008 at 5:10 pm
In defending Ayers and the Weather Underground, you’re defending the worst examples of the radical left. Bombings, jailbreaks and riots are worlds away from forming an army and fighting a war for independence. The whole point is that Obama doesn’t have an association of any substance with Ayers or is an advocate of violent overthrow of a government.
Also, they killed Brian V. McDonnell, they also managed to kill three of their own with a nailbomb an accident. This is like your Stalin added Osetia to Georgia, enk. You get so caught up in your vitriol that you make a statement that 2 minutes of reading on wikipedia disproves. My advice is to take a deep breath before posting.
Yeah, the militant right are an awful, violent group too, but going ‘well they’re worse’ is saying that more wrongs make a right.
October 8th, 2008 at 6:49 pm
Enky – While it’s true the Weathermen never managed to kill anyone, it’s not for want of trying. You might remember the “Greenwich Village Townhouse Explosion” of 1970. Several Weather Underground members were assembling anti-personnel weapons armed with roofing nails packed with dynamite when something went wrong and the devices exploded, killing three Weathermen, injuring two more and completely destroying the building they were working in. According to Weather Underground Leader Mark Rudd, these bombs were to be used on noncommisioned officers and their dates at a dance being held at Fort Dix that evening. Rudd also said that similar devices were to be used on students and faculty in the Butler Library at Columbia University. The only thing that saved the officers, their sweethearts, and the kids at Columbia was either the Weathermen’s ineptitude or an argument which might have broke out in the basement where the bombs were being manufactured.
Here’s a question for you, Enkydoodoo: Had those bombs not exploded in that basement, would the detonation of fragmentation grenades at a dance or in a college library full of students have constituted “legitimate resistance against illegitimate authority?” Are the Weather Underground innocent of murderous intent because their politics were groovy, or just because they were too fucking stupid to pull off an act of mass murder without killing themselves in the process? Could this incident have anything to do with Ayers’ comment that the Wethermen “could have done more?”
Knarly – You really amaze me. You talk this goofball 911 truth shit, chasing shadows and looking for terrorists who aren’t even there to the point that you can’t even recognize a real terrorist when he’s practically biting you on the ass. Of course Bill Ayers hasn’t been involved in violence since the sixties – his involvement in the”Revolution” cost him at least ten years of his life hiding underground, nearly landed him in prison (where some of his friends still are,) and led to the deaths of three of his close friends, including his girlfriend. You know and I know and he knows that he’s still on every government list you can think of, and would find himself behind bars ten seconds after he made any move towards violent action of any sort. Let’s see…life as an old man in prison or a posh job at Harvard, teaching todays youth what a boss revolutionary you were even though you accomplished nothing, popping off in the New York Times, and banging graduate students…which would you choose? An evening in the shower with Bubba or coctails with Barack Obama? (Hmm…Enky’s thinking about that one “Is this Bubba a gay Republican? Does he have tattoos? Since when does getting too old and scared of the consequences of your violent behavior constitute morality? If a guy bombs an abortion clinic, then hides out for long enough, does that make him innocent? Those redneck goons who were going to kill Obama – if they hadn’t gotten caught, but had made an attempt on Obama’s life and botched it, would they become good people in five years or ten years or even twenty years if they managed to allude capture that long?
October 8th, 2008 at 6:55 pm
“Dig It. First they killed those pigs, then they ate dinner in the same room with them, they even shoved a fork into a victim’s stomach! Wild!”
-Mrs. Bill Ayers, praising the Manson Family in 1969.
(In comparison, even F——- N—– sounds kind of, I don’t know…tame.)
October 8th, 2008 at 7:17 pm
Brian V. McDonnell, who Jason cites in his post, was a San Francisco police officer who was killed by shrapnel from a homemade fragmentation device set on a ledge at the San Francisco Police Department in 1970. The device in question was a pipebomb filled with heavy metal staples and bullets. No group has claimed responsibility for the bombing, but The Weather Underground, including Bill Ayers and his wife, Bernadine Dorhn, have been investigated in the matter.
McDonnell was killed five days before an attack by the Weather Underground on the home of Supreme Court Justice Murtagh, who was presiding over the trial of 21 Black Panthers, indicted in a bombing plot. While Murtagh and his family were sleeping, three gasoline bombs went off in their home. Grafitti outside the home read “FREE THE PANTHER 21; THE VIET CONG HAVE WON; KILL THE PIGS.” This was a few weeks before the Greenwich Village Townhouse Explosion.
October 8th, 2008 at 7:28 pm
Forgive me for pointing this out, but what part of “I don’t agree with setting bombs off (even if they don’t hurt people) to make a ‘political’ point.” don’t you understand?
I couldn’t care less about the WUO (and knew next to nothing about them) until the Rs made a big deal about Ayers. And yes jayson I did read the entire wiki article on them (and Ayers – who sounded pretty radical back then). My question is, did you? These guys made a lot of noise, but they would call in and tell the authorities, ‘we are going to bomb such and such at such and such time, get the people out of there’. Ummmm that doesn’t sound like they are such bloodthirsty bastages.
jayson, you need to read that wiki article again, there was no connection established between Brian V. McDonnell’s death and the WUO.
Ayers is the 60s this is 2008. But no one wants to acknowledge the truth. This WUO stuff happened when Obama was a 6 or 8 year old. I am not defending Ayers, I am just poking fun at the wwnj echochamber of errors.
But neither of you can say anything productive about why the right wing candidates are literally whipping up violence against their opponents and then giving a nod and a wink when the crowd starts screaming to kill kill kill.
So which one of you is going to google how many people have died at the hands of ‘prolife’ errr, well, terrorists?
October 8th, 2008 at 8:04 pm
Look at the little girl backpeddling! So, was that “resistance to illegitimate authority is legitimate” a defense of the Weathermen, as it certainly seemed, or just a tattoo you were reading off Ed Norton’s back while spanking it to “American History X” again? I’ll pick the former, since most people who cry out during orgasm don’t type it out, they just say it.
Good job calling us out on the McDonnell bombing, and the fact the Weather Underground was never officially charged with the murder. That would be really impressive if a) I hadn’t already told you that in my post on the matter and b) you didn’t go back and figure that out after Jason pointed out your initial, shoddy research.
You want us to google how many people have been killed in abortion bombings? Why don’t you do it yourself. Turn off the VCR, use some sanitizer, and google it yourself if it’s such a big deal. I’ll give you hint: you won’t find it by googling “Jeff Gannon” and it’s not on any of those sites you’ve been scouring looking for shirtless hunting pictures of Sarah Palin’s husband. I’ll give you a big hint: in the U.S., 7 people have been killed in incidents between 1993-1998 which is four more than were killed in the Greenwich Village explosion, and one less than would have been killed had Justice Murtagh, his wife and two children not escaped their house when it was firebombed. It’s also a fraction of the people who would have been killed if the Fort Dix bombing had actually taken place – which means that Bill Ayers and his Wacky Crew managed to put as many people in deadly jeopardy in the space of a month or two as the radical anti-abortion movement has in 15 years. Not that we’re accusing you of defending the Weathermen or anything, it’s just that “resistance to illegitimate authority is legitimate” just flies out of people’s keyboards sometimes. Kind of like “I’m a fighter Pilot.”
October 8th, 2008 at 8:08 pm
“Off with his head”?? Who even talks like that anymore and expects to be taken seriously? Perhaps the Queen of Hearts was in the audience. Or maybe the rally was held at a Medieval Times dinner theatre.
October 8th, 2008 at 8:23 pm
…but I will give you points for calling out violent, “pro-life” types as terrorists, which they are (or were – there’s only been one attempted attack on a Clinic since 1998, and that was two years ago. I guess those guys are all square with Knarly and his personally observed statute of limitations on terrorism and murder.) I’d give you even more points if you’d call Bill Ayers a terrorist, too. I just find it really disturbing how you’re always railing against violence and hate and how somebody you don’t even know is harboring some incredible, explosive hatred because he parts his hair on the wrong side and used the word “the” in a speech on C-SPAN, but when you’re faced with real hatred, real violence and someone with an obvious track record of putting people in harm’s way or worse (and come on – there’s more evidence that the Weathermen killed that cop in ‘Frisco than there is that Sarah Palin is a neo-nazi, at least in our world) you can’t call it out. You ride in on this moral high horse, then knock yourself off with your own inability to rise above partisan hackdom and call a spade a spade.
October 8th, 2008 at 8:24 pm
Come on Craig – it was an AD&D Convention. Enky was there getting his boob signed by Gary Gygax.
October 8th, 2008 at 8:27 pm
Enky – If Bill Ayers was driving a tank down Main Street and … oh never mind!
October 8th, 2008 at 8:28 pm
It really sounded like you were defending him, it really did. I guess I attributed the death of McDonell to the WUO, since it was mentioned in the article, seems like they were the primary suspects. As Lefty point out, they were building nailbombs, which are an anti-personnel type weapon. Should we speculate and say ‘well that was a splinter group in the WUO’ and give them the benefit of the doubt?
I’m glad you don’t agree with setting bombs off, I don’t either. Again though, this is a really funny thing about the ongoing lies thread. We should really have some kind of scoreboard here, we could each be our own team. I haven’t had anything good to say about Palin and have come out as supporting Obama in this election as the lesser of two evils (by a wide margin). I have said don’t buy McCain’s maverick status with supporting Bush. However, I didn’t agree with what I understood your post to mean. Immediately, like shcb did in the post about the Palin paintings, you lumped in with right wingers. I just think its funny that any disagreement immediately gets you tossed in the enemy camp, which I feel reinforces my point that a lot of what we’re talking about here isn’t about the issue at hand, its about using it to score points for your team.
I’m sorry if I didn’t get what you were saying.
I’m not sure what you mean by your last question though. As I said before “Yeah, the militant right are an awful, violent group too, but going ‘well they’re worse’ is saying that more wrongs make a right.” I’m not sure what good comparing body counts does. If we want to make a statistical model and say ‘right wing nuts are more dangerous than left wing nuts, based on total 20th century fatalities’ I could buy it if someone wants to do the number crunch. If we’re just talking about moral weight to body count, are we talking about intent or just lives lost, and does it matter? You labeled Kissinger a terrorist previously, if we open up the definition of terrorist that broadly then it becomes most of the world leaders of the 20th century and their advisors. Then again, maybe that is a really good point too.
For the specific topic, I do think that person in the crowd should have been rebuked on the spot by McCain. I don’t think he was talking about Ayers either. The problem is, McCain is now courting the lowest common denominator vote with those tactics, because his campaign is more or less out of cards to play.
October 8th, 2008 at 8:35 pm
Also really, arguing the merits of which domestic terrorist group, moment, or type is worser eally doesn’t do anything for the original point of saying Obama’s connection to Ayers isn’t of a nature that would lead one to believe that he shares or endorses the values or ideals of the WUO. It’s a bad road to be going down from a pro-Obama stand point.
October 8th, 2008 at 8:45 pm
Jason – I’ve thought for a long time that the definition of the “enemy camp” on this blog has a lot more to do with how much or how little you agree with Enkidu and / or Knarly than anything else. Either you’re with them or you’re a “rwnj.” Enky’s responses to your posts tonight, given your overall record as a fairly liberal guy, confirm that. At first, Enky was kind of an anomaly around here; a loudmouth distraction from an otherwise center-left blog. Anymore, he and Knarly account for most of the posts on any given thread, Enkidu is now posting his own threads, and JBC is writing stuff like this, which is a lot more in keeping with the “Knarly” new vibe around here than with the original tone I remember from years past.
October 8th, 2008 at 9:07 pm
Jayson, here is how Dana Milbank frames the “kill him” comment in his actual column:
The reception had been better in Clearwater, where Palin, speaking to a sea of “Palin Power” and “Sarahcuda” T-shirts, tried to link Obama to the 1960s Weather Underground. “One of his earliest supporters is a man named Bill Ayers,” she said. (“Boooo!” said the crowd.) “And, according to the New York Times, he was a domestic terrorist and part of a group that, quote, ‘launched a campaign of bombings that would target the Pentagon and our U.S. Capitol,’ ” she continued. (“Boooo!” the crowd repeated.)
“Kill him!” proposed one man in the audience.
I think its pretty clear that this bit of ugliness is directed at Ayers. Also, this was a Palin rally in which McCain was not in attendance (So it would be hard for McCain to correct the guy). And let’s look at the word choice by Milbank. The retard in the audience “proposed”, not “screamed”, not “shouted” not “yelled”. Its fair to suggest that this low-life was overheard by Milbank from his position at the rally. It may not have even been heard beyond those in close proximity to him. I could be wrong, but I’ve not come across any audio evidence from this rally so far.
October 8th, 2008 at 11:46 pm
Lefty, hell yea I recognize a terrorist when I learn about one. Yes, Ayers met most definitions of terrorist as a radical in the 60’s … in the context of those times – Kent State shootings come to mind – there were a lot of terrorists and most were promoting the Vietnam war. But that is to digress.
Point is, this transparent Rethuglican ploy is old news:
…
(from the Chicago Sun Times, April 18, 2008)
the issue was vetted, in the press no less, and is actually kind of boring in that a desperate old man is taking an old story and using it to demonstrate his desperation. Where’s the glory and honor in that?
Actually, some good may come out of it in that the more people learn about Ayers, the more they may wake up to wider issues of social justice.
I just found Bill Ayers website and it seems like it may be entertaining. He posted a blog on September 23 in the form of the infamous Nigerian bank fraud letters that most of us have received, it starts like this:
continued at http://billayers.wordpress.com/
October 8th, 2008 at 11:52 pm
bottom line is that ayers represents zero threat to America, in fact he has done far more for America in recent years than most people accomplish in their entire lifetime.
October 8th, 2008 at 11:58 pm
I thought these comments by Josh Marshall were interesting:
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/archives/222875.php
Apparently there’s also a Secret Service investigation into Milbank’s column’s allegations:
http://radaronline.com/exclusives/2008/10/secret-service-looking-into-potential-threat-on-obama.php
But Obama spokesperson Bill Burton downplayed the issue when Andrea Mitchell asked him about it, saying he doesn’t know that McCain or Palin are all that aware of what’s going on, and shouldn’t be held responsible for what people are shouting in the crowd. He mentions that people shout pretty awful stuff in the crowd at Obama rallies, too, which I can certainly believe. Though I think it does make a difference if the person speaking is using misleading statements to question the other side’s patriotism or claim that they’re pro-terrorism. Anyway, here’s the Burton clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gCnO1rsmisQ
Interesting-to-me trivia: Bill Burton is married to Laura Burton Capps, daughter of my local US representative, Lois Capps (D-Santa Barbara).
October 9th, 2008 at 5:26 am
Wow! Bill Ayers sounds like a really great guy, Knarly. What a good boy he’s been since he and his buddies killed a cop, tried to burn a judge and his family alive in their house, kill a bunch of people at a military dance and detonate a fragmentation bomb in a college library. What exactly are all these wonderful things he’s done for this country, so much more than the rest of us can do in a lifetime? Not blowing anybody up since 1972? That must have been a real struggle. My mom hasn’t blown anybody up since 1929 – she must be Betsy Fucking Ross.
October 9th, 2008 at 5:30 am
Oh I’m sorry, Enky – allegedly killed a cop. I’m sure every great patriot has fallen victim to similar misunderstandings.
October 9th, 2008 at 8:26 am
jayson – I apologize if you feel I lumped you in with the crazies. My point (and perhaps jbc’s) is that the rhetoric on the right is turning extremely ugly extremely fast. Both you and Craig seem to ignore my opening statement that terrorist bombs that kill people (ok, damage property, whatever) are bad. There. See? Bad! Bad bad bad.
But then you and Craig both ignored this and tried to pretend I am defending Bill Ayer’s actions from a 40 years ago. I am not. But I am trying to get the rightwing errorchamber to acknowledge that no one was ever intentionally killed by a WUO bomb. Sure some idiots blew themselves up (evolution in action), sure some splinter groups advocated more than just political ‘theater’. Bombing abortion clinics is wrong. I asked a question which no righty wants to answer: how many people in total have been killed by (and I use this term with the utmost irony) ‘pro-life’ anti-abortion extremists? no let’s use the proper term, pro-life terrorists.
The right wing is trying to smear Obama with something someone else’s radical group did when Obama was still a toddler. Well if guilt by association is your game then Kissinger is fair game. The illegal and immoral Iraq War is fair game. So…. game on?
Craig, you may be right, this is something that McCain and Failin can’t control. But they shouldn’t just smile, nod n wink and then keep doing it. And you can actually hear them yelling this stuff on youtube if you care to listen. But they also yell things like “treason!” (iirc correctly traitors are supposed to hang, right? would that be a lynch mob or a court sanctioned hangin?) Kill him proposed one man from the audience… come on, he didn’t propose it, he screamed it (check the video on youtube, its muddled but you can hear it). I know you want to make it sound like he asked “one lump or two in your tea vicar?” but it is clear the crowd was getting ugly. Really ugly. I am sure folks yell ugly stuff at Obama rallies when they hear the name McCain. Do they yell ‘f*** him!’? I wouldn’t be surprised. Do they yell “kill him”? Doubt it. The anger is really on one side, hope is on the other. You don’t see Obama whipping up angry mob behavior. It’s just not presidential. R campaign events are yelling “terrorist” when asked who is Barack (Hussein) Obama? They scream traitor and kill him and off with his head (indeed, kinda silly that one) and more ugly stuff.
And I don’t hear you decrying it, just denying it.
October 9th, 2008 at 9:43 am
My post didn’t get through. (No links were in it either.)
October 9th, 2008 at 9:47 am
Enk, please check the post’s queue for my duplicate comments … a minute or so ago. thanks.
October 9th, 2008 at 9:49 am
This guilt by association thing is sleazy and dangerous, it’s politics a la Joseph Stalin.
Sarah Palin … Joseph Stalin … hmmm.
October 9th, 2008 at 10:06 am
Enkidu- I answered your question about Abortion Clinic attacks, Dumbass. Read the post again.
As for “acknowledging” anything about the weathermen, the only thing I’ll acknowledge is that the only reason no one was killed in any of their attacks was that a) the judge and his family were able to get out of their beds and out of their house in time and b) the terrorists were too inept to get the bomb out of the house before they could get it to Fort Dix to Kill people. They still intended to kill a lot of people, they were just unable to pull it off. Is attempted murder not as evil as murder? Is that guy who wanted to kill Obama any less guilty because he failed? If I try to run a Chinese guy over in my tank and he runs away before I squish him, aren’t I still a bad person? God – trying to teach you kids basic ethics is like teaching a retarded child the Macarena.
I also doubt you heard what you’re saying you heard on the Youtube video. The video above is of a McCain rally where somebody screams “terrorist.” The guy who was alleged to have said “kill him” wasn’t even at that rally – he was at a Palin rally in Florida. I am pretty sure I heard somebody yell “Paul is Dead!” though.
Here’s some interesting topics for discussion:
a) since when do a couple of hotheads in an otherwise organized and orderly crowd constitute the sort of “lynch mob” mentality Enky conjuring up here? I could understand the concern if there were huge crowds of McCain supporters spilling out into the streets and setting cars on fire. All that can be established is that a few loudmouths are popping off into a microphone. It ‘s not like anyone’s killed a policeman in San Francisco, then rallied to New york and firebombed a Supreme Court Justice’s House with his family inside before blowing a townhouse up while making nailbombs to blow up in a school library.
b) How is calling Barack Obama a terrorist worse than calling George Bush a terrorist? How is it worse than calling George Bush a nazi?
c) How is using Obama’s perhaps passing acquaintance with a domestic terrorist from decades ago to label him a terrorist sympathizer any worse than dredging up some columnist from decades ago to try and make Sarah Palin look like a neo-nazi?
d) What does some hillbilly nut trying to kill Obama really have to do with the McCain campaign? Even if you’re trying to say that all this “Obama loves Ayers” stuff is inciting violence towards Obama (which is still way the fuck out in Knarlyknight territory) you have to acknowledge that this whole Obama /Ayers tack is a recent strategy. That assassination plot dates all the way back to the Democratic Convention, before Obama was even the official nominee. Maybe it was Hillary’s Shadow Police – they did carry out all those mysterious assassinations on the “Clinton Dead List” (ask Knarly) – who brainwashed the guy and turned him into a sort of White Trash Manchurian Candidate.
October 9th, 2008 at 10:52 am
I think I’m onto something with this whole Hillary angle. Here’s ABC Correspondent /Clinton conspirator George Stephanopoulos planting the seeds of Hillary’s plot to kill Barack Obama by becoming the first in the mainstream media to connect Barack Obama with Bill Ayers. Notice how Hillary is immediately on the attack, with details of the Obama / Ayers relationship she and Stephanopoulos have doubtlessly discussed in advance. You can almost see her calculating in her head: “At what temperature will Obama burn if we fly a plane into him at full speed at a 45 degree angle to the ground with a tank full of jet fuel?”
.youtube.com/watch?v=GlnoXZWRjgE
October 9th, 2008 at 11:00 am
Lefty, re your item “c)” the difference is that “dredging” up an passing association with a misguided 1960’s radical / miscreant / trrrrrst who has since invested decades in improving society, and whose earlier radical associations have been appropriately CONDEMNED by Obama, is entirely different than observing that Palin’s handlers purposefully chose to spotlight the observation of (an unreformed at his death) bigoted neo-nazi (?) author in her recent convention speech, and Mrs. Stalin EMBRACED the quote.
October 9th, 2008 at 11:00 am
Okay, sooooo, according to Lefty Ayers is still evil and dangerous because as a idealistic teenageer or radical in his early 20’s he associatiated with explosives amateurs… back in the 1960’s. That’s lame.
October 9th, 2008 at 11:01 am
And the wrong wing nut jobs (i.e. Sarah Palin, or is it “Stalin?”) are extrapolating that Ayers, who 40 years later has become a distiguished tenured professor and published author of groundbreaking texts (mostly about turning around at-risk inner city youth so they can contribute to America) is not an asset to America but rather is a dangerous recalcitrant terrorist. Noting Ayers associations from 30 or 40 years ago, the wwnj’s then stretch the argument way past the ridiculous to claim that anyone who is more than casually acquainted with Ayeres is to be tarnished and scapegoated with the potential terrorist label and thus must be shunned by society.
October 9th, 2008 at 11:01 am
Apparently S t a l i n ‘ s spirit is running McCain’s campaign.
October 9th, 2008 at 11:02 am
Enk, forget about the queue, my post got through by breaking it up into a number of shorter posts.
October 9th, 2008 at 11:03 am
Obama has condemned him, but you sure haven’t. You can’t even bring yourself to type out the word “terrorist” in reference to him. How exactly has Bill Ayers improved society? How is my life better thanks to Bill Ayers? Is Bill Ayers really “reformed,” or is he just cowed?
October 9th, 2008 at 11:10 am
If I told you Bill Ayers was a homosexual who worships an owl, would you think he’s a bad guy?
October 9th, 2008 at 11:20 am
I love how you try to pawn Bill Ayers’ deadly bombing campaign as a youthful indiscretion. “Oh, he was just in with the wrong crowd. He was associated with some bad kids who made a a pipe bomb or two. That’s no worse than getting a mullet in the 80’s or wearing parachute pants…leave the kid alone. He wrote a real book!”
Y’know, Caryl Chessman wrote some groundbreaking literature too…from prison, which where Bill Ayers should have gone.
October 9th, 2008 at 11:26 am
If Bill Ayers is such a beautiful human being, why doesn’t the Obama campaign put his on television so everyone can see how cute he is and learn to love him the way Knarly does.
October 9th, 2008 at 11:29 am
.youtube.com/watch?v=cefpQtAQrMw
October 9th, 2008 at 11:47 am
His work speaks for itself: http://www.billayers.wordpress.com
No more, no less.
Was Bill Ayers a terrorist in his youth? If he built bombs to kill or even to scare people, or assisted with that effort then I’d say yes. I don’t know if he did or care to investigate further, but some committee hired him as a professor and he’s well thought of in his field so I’d say any reasonable statute of limitations on the “terrorist” label has expired.
“terrorist” in America has “premeditatedly” become a label used to eliminate rational thought, “trrrrrst” is a good representation of that.
October 9th, 2008 at 12:03 pm
If you can’t figure out if William Ayers was a terrorist or not without further research, you’re an idiot. We’d have to ask Enky exactly what Larry Craig tried to do to that guy at the airport, but I’m pretty sure you’re doing the same thing to Bill Ayers, in a figurative sense, on this thread.
October 9th, 2008 at 12:08 pm
You know, a lot of people thought William Pegler was a racist asshole, but he did win a Pulitzer Prize and write for a lot of newspapers, so I guess he was cool, too like Bill Ayers. He was well thought of in his field ‘n’ stuff…
October 9th, 2008 at 12:13 pm
Bill Ayers: his work speaks for itself:
newyorkcitywalk.com/html/images_weathermen.html
October 9th, 2008 at 12:34 pm
Too bad Eric Randolph didn’t turn himself in and get off on a legal technicality. He could have gotten himself connected with some laudable education programs(while not renouncing his past), an then even created some direct associations with either McCain or Palin, and apparently he would have been a non-issue to most Democrats in this campaign.
Look, Ayers would be a non-issue to me if (a) he had ever renounced or been remorseful for his prior actions and (b) Obama had been more straightforward about his associations and knowledge of Ayers history. Like they say, “the coverup is worse than the action itself”. The Obama campaign is trying to run out the clock without admitting too much regarding this guy. Alexrod is now admitting that “yeah, Obama knew about Ayers activities sometime after their initial meetings”. This opens up the likelyhood that Obama knew Ayers background as early as the time of his educational and foundation work with him. Which seems quite different than what was protrayed before.
Regardless, this issue won’t get any real traction in today’s economic environment.
October 9th, 2008 at 1:05 pm
Craig – run out the clock? This stuff was smeared on Obama in the primaries. It didn’t stick because there isn’t anything there. Except to the base. I know McBush is trying to dominate the newscycle with this slime, but it is turning off the independents you need to win over. Obama is staying on the issues: the economy, healthcare, iraq, smarter government.
If you want to play the guilt by association game, we can start talking about the Keating Five a bit more if you want to go there. Cheers!
October 9th, 2008 at 1:07 pm
I meant Eric Rudolph in my post above.
October 9th, 2008 at 1:44 pm
strange, lefty’s newyorkcitywalk link didn’t mention Ayers at all, it just had some remarkable photos and high level captions about the people involved in the blast and some of the famous witnesses (Dustin Hoffman) Now what’s the point of that, more attempts at guilt by association perhaps. It gets lamer the more he tries.
In contrast, the http://www.billayers.com accomplishments speak for themselves.
Craig, I’d be with you about the cover-up being worse than the association, if there was any evidence of a cover-up or any evidence of malfeasance. By the way, what’s Jack Abramoff doing these days?
October 9th, 2008 at 2:15 pm
Sounds like the anti-lobbyist McSame is up to his eyeballs in lobbyists:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/09/28/us/politics/28gambling-web.html?pagewanted=3&_r=1
October 9th, 2008 at 3:53 pm
washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2008_10/015097.php
paragraph 4 is like guilt by association bingo
October 9th, 2008 at 4:36 pm
Wow. And if paragraph 4 is like bingo then paragraphs 5 and 6 are Russian roulette. It would be nice to e-link this article to every smear advertisement and “news” report endorsed by the McBush / Stalin ticket.
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/archives/individual/2008_10/015097.php
October 9th, 2008 at 5:16 pm
I’m just wondering something Knarly, which is a little off subject but will come back around. Have you never heard of the Weathermen before today? Have you never heard of Bill Ayers before he was brought up in the present election? I’m not being facitious – re-reading your posts I get the sincere impression that you’ve never encountered any of this information before, and I’m curious if that’s actually the case. As an American who grew up in the seventies, I have just been assuming that everybody came into this knowing who Bill Ayers and the Weathermen were, but I get the impression that (maybe) as a Canadian (a young Canadian?) you’ve never heard of any of this before. You don’t seem to have real knowledge of who Ayers is, the depth of his involvment as a founder of the Weathermen, what the Weathermen did, how Ayers is connected to the Greenwich Village explosion or any of it. I’m not trying to be funny…I’m just taken aback. It kind of feels like I’m talking to someone who has just discovered Col. Sanders, but isn’t sure how he’s involved with KFC and is incredulous that anybody would actually fry a chicken.
October 9th, 2008 at 5:17 pm
???
October 9th, 2008 at 6:10 pm
you’re basically right lefty… I’m threshold Boomer / Gen X and don’t live in the USA so Weathermen were just a vague recollection from my past, something older siblings may have talked about – like the JFK assassination – …
Your turn: my sense is that you were on the short hair’s side, mad as hell at John Lennon and the hippies for mindlessly wrecking the structure of your country and not recognizing that the messgae of peace was sincere… Weathermen and Panthers excepted.
October 9th, 2008 at 7:02 pm
Actually, I was too young for the hippies, but was big fan of the sixties myth early on. I still think the sixties counterculture had a lot going for it. The real hippies were fierce Libertarians, not Liberals as that term is now defined. If you study Allen Ginsberg, Father Yod, Timothy Leary, the Fugs before they succumbed to the drag of Marxist ideology – none of the real heroes of the age- there is no connection whatsoever between them and mollycodlers like Nancy Pelossi, or even Barack Obama. Modern Liberalism is the leftovers of old 1930’s New Dealism filtered through the faux Che culture of the College Campus. Fug that! Big Mother knows about as much about dope, rock and roll music and fucking in the streets as Big brother does – maybe even less.
Don’t you dare lump the Black Panthers in with the Weathermen. The Panthers were black ghetto soldiers fighting a war against very real oppression, at least in the beginning. The Weathermen were a bunch of spoiled, rich white kids trying to co-opt Black Power rhetoric to justify a drug-addled war on reality that used violence to try and realize some Communist Never Never Land that not even they could define clearly.
You really need to read more.
October 9th, 2008 at 8:49 pm
Enkidu, you may want to reread this thread, because I’ve never suggested anything about you defending the Ayers of the 70’s. Your disagreement must be with some other Craig.
October 9th, 2008 at 11:11 pm
Lefty – points taken. Exept that I really need to read more, no need for that I got wiki now. (kidding)
Surprised of your take on the 60’s, and agree with your libertarianism vs neo liberalism melancholy.
In my defence, the Weathermen were just a little sideshow south of the border compared to the bombings and seperatist activities in Canada at the time. The FLQ was a paramilitaristic group active throughout the late 60’s in the Canadian province of Quebec, and in 1970 their bombs, kidnappings and murder of a government minister climaxed in what is etched in our history as “the October Crisis” in which the War Measures Act was invoked (i.e. Martial Law – tanks in the streets of Quebec and our capital Ottawa and the suspension of all civil liberties.)
So I appreciate your understanding if I wasn’t up to speed on the WUO; and I’d expect you’d have little knowledge of the FLQ. Yes I realize this is a USA site so let’s get back to topic.
Iif I knew little about the Weathermen 36 hours ago, now I have a pretty good sense of the disorganized, idealistic, multi-faceted splinter groups that they were and morphed into as a the years passed. That just makes me wonder all the more how in the world you could think Ayers is the kind of person that warrants the terrorist label now and why you think he was so intent on killing people? Doesn’t jive with the evidence. He seems like one of the saner of the WUO, the more I read the more apparent that becomes, his splinter group denounced violence early.
e.g. “We were very careful from the moment of the townhouse on to be sure we weren’t going to hurt anybody, and we never did hurt anybody. Whenever we put a bomb in a public space, we had figured out all kinds of ways to put checks and balances on the thing and also to get people away from it, and we were remarkably successful.” – Bill Ayers as quoted in wiki.
It’s funny that you think the Panthers had a legitimate cause fighting oppression (“at least in the beginning”.) Does that mean, unlike Bill Ayers, you don’t consider Panthers terrorists? Freedom fighters perhaps? What’s the difference? Ayers was trying to stop the slaughter in Vietnam (and it was a slaughter of epic proportions); Ayers was doing everything in his power to stop that macro level killing – carpet bombing of Laos, Cambodia, and agent orange Mai Lai etc. that was occuring in his, and you, names. Did Ayers ever kill anyone? Did he think about killing (i.. Fort Dix, etc.) Americans? Probably. Was he involved in the bomb making in the NY brownstone? I don’t know (but I do know that some teenagers at my school were making pipebombs and blowing up garden gnomes, compost piles and garbage cans for fun at about the same time.) Would Ayers have carried out a bombing to kill people if the WOU NY brownstone hadn’t exploded first? We’ll never know, 50/50 that he would have or would have had second thoughts and not followed through.
If the Panthers weren’t terrorists, how are you going to explain to a Palestinian fighting in Gaza for proper food or medicine and other rights, or an Iraq kid who will do anything to get Americans out of his country after half his family were set on fire by guided missiles because their wedding party looked like a threat to some guy piloting a drone from a computer terminal 5000 miles away – that America now considers him to be terrorists? Oh never mind.
Where did you get the idea that Ayers wanted to do more bombs (Sean Hannity is a likely bet), or all that other crap in your Oct 9, 10:06 post second paragraph? You could use a little more reading too. Ayers has a pretty good handle on what terorism means. I found this insightful: http://www.billayers.wordpress.com/2008/04/06/episodic-notoriety-fact-and-fantasy/ ; but not for what Bill Ayers wrote. That blogpost was interesting, in an idealistic, naive and bullshit “yea sure Bill” sort of way.
What was interesting was the vitriolic dumb ass comments after that blog, any one of which you could have written (except for the one by John Duerk at 3:31 pm April 9, 008) , after that I tuned out…
Now, to try and link Obama into this discussion, well that’s just insane.
October 9th, 2008 at 11:50 pm
John Lennon would have been 67 today.
October 9th, 2008 at 11:51 pm
www . imaginepeace . com / imaginepeace . html
October 10th, 2008 at 7:07 am
1) My ignorance of Canadian history is shocking. I really need to read more.
2) Point taken on Palestine. That’s food for thought.
3) I never read, watch or listen Sean Hannity. I have not willingly watched a fox News show in years.
4) I understand the sobering effect the Townhouse explosion had on the Weathermen, but the point remains that they really didn’t stop to consider the consequences in human life of their bombing until their friends got killed. Until then, it was okay to blow gas bombs up in houses where children were sleeping and kill people with nail bombs. All of the sudden, it was wrong to hurt people because Bill Ayers girlfriend was dead. But then, you still have all this wierd “kill the pigs” rhetoric, Ayers’ wife praising the Manson Family and a lot of unhealthy psychology the Townhouse incident didn’t seem to abate. Also, anytime you place a bomb in a public place, someone is very likely to get hurt, no matter how careful you think you’re being. It was only luck that nobody died after the Townhouse, and if Ayers and company were really as concerned about harming anyone, they should have halted the bombing campaign, period. It’s much like armed robbery – the penalties are stiffer if you rob someone with a gun because your are immediately putting someone in danger by the very act of pointing a gun at them, since the gun might go off whether you mean it to or not.
October 10th, 2008 at 7:40 am
And also, although this will ultimately get lost in the shuffle, I’ve never even tried to link Obama very closely with Ayers – although I must say that it is foolhardy for anyone with National political aspirations not to run screaming from someone as notorious as Bill Ayers. I seriously doubt Ayers is any sort of “mentor” to Obama, anymore than Sarah Palin has any significant connection to William Pegler. By the time Obama came on the scene, Ayers was already entranched in Chicago politics. Obama wasn’t the dumbass who kept him out of prison, where he belonged. Obama was just one of the guys who had to work with him. And so what if they’re friends? I’m friends with a guy who I believe to have been at the Flynt, Michigan “War Council” where the Weathermen debuted their “Year of the Fork” Manson Family schtick. My problem’s not with Barack Obama, it’s will Bill Ayers. I think that the defenses of Ayers on this thread have been really stupid, and this whole idea that the McCain campaign is trying to goad anyone into doing anything more violent to Barack Obama than vote against him is just the kind of silly shit JBC comes up with from time to time when he’s feeling “snarky.”
October 10th, 2008 at 9:41 am
knarly – don’t feed the troll
October 10th, 2008 at 10:42 am
What? Are yiou Knarley’s mom, now? I’m sorry Mrs. Knight, we were just talkin’ – honest. You look very lovely today, Mrs. knight. Are those new pearls you’re wearing? They certainly compliment your lovely white teeth.
October 10th, 2008 at 3:25 pm
More on the “kill him” story….
TAMPA – The U.S. Secret Service is looking into reports that a crowd member yelled,”Kill him!” while Gov. Sarah Palin was talking about Sen. Barack Obama during her Clearwater rally Monday.
The incident reportedly occurred after Palin questioned Obama’s patriotism because of his acquaintance with William Ayers, a Chicago university professor who was an anti-Vietnam War radical in the 1970s.
Apparently the only public evidence of the “kill him” shout is a Washington Post news story Tuesday by reporter Dana Milbank, who covered the rally.
Milbank later was quoted in an interview with the Politico Web site as saying he thought the shout may have been a reference to Ayers, not Obama
October 10th, 2008 at 6:25 pm
Craig, what about the video they keep showing where after McCain says ‘Who is the real Obama?’ you can hear the guy yelling ‘Kill him!’ in the crowd?
October 29th, 2008 at 3:39 pm
http://www.splcenter.org/blog/2008/10/27/skinheads-arrested-in-plot-to-kill-obama/
I think I can see mcfrootloop in the group photo
and I was a couple weeks off on my predication of when they’d be shouting “the n word” at Palin rallies (I’ll dig up the youtube link later)