Going To The Library

Steve Diamond of Global Labor has been leading the charge on the Obama/Ayers connection to the Chicago Annenberg Challenge.  Today he has lots of questions about the role being played by the library where the Chicago Annenberg Challenge archives were housed. 

Conservative critic Stanley Kurtz had contacted the University of Illinois at Chicago library requesting permission to review the archives.  For some reason, this set off alarm bells at the library.  Mr. Diamond writes:

An earlier statement by a UIC spokesperson stated that UIC contacted the donor of the CAC records and that it was then discovered that an "ownership agreement" had not been prepared for the CAC records. This is most likely not accurate.  No such agreement is likely in this situation. A gift of corporate records, such as those of the CAC, is valid without a written instrument.

...

But more fundamentally there would be no reason for anyone in the Special Collections Library to even question the validity of the gift of the CAC documents! 

And a donor would never be allowed to know who or when someone is asking to review a validly granted gift of documents. That violates the confidentiality of library users. It reminds me of the concerns that civil libertarians have properly raised about the Patriot Act.

That leaves only one possible conclusion:  Someone inside the UIC Library clearly was concerned that a critic of Barack Obama might be attempting to examine these public records. That led to an unprecedented and, in my view, highly inappropriate notice to the donor of the CAC documents that a potential political critic of Obama was interested in the documents.

They told Glenn Reynolds that if Bush were re-elected no library user would have any privacy.  And they were right!

Comments

[sbw]

he used the money meant for the improvement of educational achievement of poor urban Chicago kids

... he used the money meant to raise the educational standard of poor Chicago children...

[MayBee]

Look who posted about this:

Sunday, August 24, 2008 Targeting Obama/Ayers and Chicago school reform

Karl Rove’s boys have stepped in and taken over McCain’s resurgent campaign. They want to turn the election into a referendum on Obama’s patriotism and his supposed ties to ‘60s radicals like educator Bill Ayers. They certainly don’t want the election to be a referendum on the Republican’s last 8 years in office.

So they're spreading the word that Obama is a closet “socialist” (Manchurian candidate) and have dredged up swiftboater Jerome Corsi’s trashy book Obama Nation to spearhead their assault. They've also enlisted a handful of wing-nut bloggers who continue to recycle their own lies about Obama and others (including myself) in this latest Rove-inspired disinformation campaign, reminiscent of the 1950’s red scare.

Along with trying to frighten undecided swing-state voters, the wing-nuts have also targeted school reform efforts and the old Annenberg Challenge in Chicago, which they claim were all part of the Ayers-Obama socialist conspiracy from hell. Their lies include: 1) Obama was the chair of the Annenberg Challenge Board and directed its funding; 2) that Ayers was on the board; 3) that Obama gave thousands of dollars to Ayers. Not a word of any of this is true.

School reformers and ed bloggers seem to be running scared, afraid to speak out against the swiftboaters. This is the kind of fear that gripped the Kerry campaign in 2004 and helped lead to his defeat. It’s this fear that Rove and his boys are counting on in their desperate attempt to cut into Obama’s lead.

Travelling in Massachusetts, I just read this excellent piece by Boston Globe columnist Scot Lehigh, who has obviously not fallen into fear’s grip. He writes:

Corsi notes that Obama was once a community organizer in Chicago, and not just any community organizer, he maintains, but one trained in the tradition of Saul Alinsky, the self-proclaimed radical organizer who died in 1972. For Alinsky, Corsi asserts, the word change "invoked radical socialism" and was "nothing more than a code word for the typical income redistribution those on the left have sought since the days of Karl Marx."

Perhaps you find it hard to believe that Obama, who declines to call for either a single-payer healthcare system or even an individual mandate for healthcare coverage, is either a radical or a socialist. Well, consider these tidbits Corsi presents about the college days of one of Obama's youthful campaign bloggers: In his Harvard suite, he hung "a Communist Party flag that he and a roommate brought back from Russia." Further, the same future blogger's bookcase "included titles by Karl Marx and Howard Zinn. . ."

Hopefully Lehigh’s needle will encourage others, especially some of the reformers here in Chicago who worked on the Annenberg Challenge with Bill Ayers and Obama, will come out of their shells.
Posted by Mike Klonsky at 2:36 PM
Labels: McCain, new mccarthyism, Obama, schoolreform

LUN

[Ranger]

Well, if you want it short and sweet:

Barack Obama already failed the children of Chicago. Why should we give him a chance to fail the chidren of America?

[MayBee]

You can leave comments on his blog.

[Pagar]

BobS, That is my understanding of what the AERA does----Control the curriculum.

"William Ayers, the unrepentant former SDS Weather Underground bomber of the 1960s, was recently elected by the American Education Research Association (AERA) as vice president and head of its division of curriculum studies."

[JM Hanes]

Pagar:

I think you're making the point very cogently, and I find the fact that Ayers et al are so explicit in their aims and methodical in their operations makes it all the more alarming. In some ironic ways it's unfortunate that the right has been complaining about this kind of thing, largely on the basis of discrete examples, so steadily for so long. Differentiating the charges here politically from "the usual Republican talking points" may take some work. The reality, it seems to me, is that one of the easiest things to dismiss is a Republican who can be made to sound like they're shouting anything remotely like "the commies are coming!" -- completely aside from whether or not it might be true.

[bad]

I think its kinda hot to be called a "Rove Boy."

[MayBee]

Is Klonsky simply disputing the compound here?
1) Obama was the chair of the Annenberg Challenge Board and directed its funding;

Anyway, I bet he's reading here.

[sbw]

Whoa! Olympic closing? Jimmy Page playing Led Zepplin looks like Joe Biden with a pony tail.

[Matt]

Kurtz should have just showed up at the library when he first asked. By requesting permission over the phone and carrying on repeated communications about the documents, he only gave a liberal librarian the time needed to throw up a road block. He says he was initially granted permission. If he was at the counter that day, this never would've happened, and that should've been foreseeable to a journalist working for a conservative publication (or anyone investigating a liberal politician). Who knows what's missing now.

[clarice]

Ranger--For people who get paid by the word your formulation means a hard candy Christmas. Actually we've about got it though I think Bob S has a good point, too..it wasn't just to pay off those creeps it was to give them a means to control the schools and indoctrinate the kids.

[clarice]

Wors games by Klonsky--it's the compound, silly.

[Ranger]

Is Klonsky simply disputing the compound here?

1) Obama was the chair of the Annenberg Challenge Board and directed its funding;

Anyway, I bet he's reading here.

Posted by: MayBee | August 24, 2008 at 09:42 PM

I would say yes, he is disputing the compund of the two. It is indisputable that Obama was the chairman, but he didn't 'direct the fudning.' That was a colaborative process of the board. But, as has already been pointed out in some of the writing about this, Obama volunteered to be the go between for the board and Ayers when issues came up.

[JM Hanes]

MayBee:

What a find! Pagar, MayBee's link is precisely the kind of thing I had in mind. Klonsky says it all more succinctly in his "Labels":

"McCain, new mccarthyism, Obama, schoolreform"

[BobS]

Pagar: Thanks for the link (again - there've been so many of late)

Thats what I'm looking for are things as specifics of meetings involving curriculum. Are there efforts at establish romantic versions of Marxism and of Fidelism or of Che Guerva? Will they insist on selective lessons of slavery and women's sufferage or internment to paint the worst pictures of America. Heaven knows what they could do in Science.

They can do these things through school community leaderships councils that establish school planning

[Ranger]

Clarice,

Well, I was actually just trying to boil it down to a tag line for a TV spot. Didn't mean to suggest replacing your more developed statement.

Also, remeber that a big part of the CAC's mission was to 'empower the local counsels.' That simply translated to getting the city to pay for running special elections that ACORN used to practice thier get out the vote operation and refine their tactics between regular elections.

[bad]

CAC Tax Return Info: LUN

1998 Grants paid $8,214,240
1999 Grants paid $10,866,875
2001 Grants paid $5,085,653
2002 Grants paid $67,743
2003 Grants paid $1,418

Remember!! Tax returns are not available at Global Labor for 1995, 1996, 1997, 2000

Please take a look and tell me what I'm missing.

[Sara]

I just posted a link in the Powell thread showing McCain wiping the floor with Obama in Nevada - 46 to 39. Some other interesting statistics as well.

[sbw]

Well, Klonsky seems to mistake our effort to understand with an effort to control.

At the same time Klonsky tries to deflect people from seeing that theirs was an effort to manipulate dollars and control them for their own purposes under the guise of education.

[sbw]

Bad, why are the numbers so small?

[BobS]

BINGO! to Maybee and JM!!!!

[JM Hanes]

Clarice/Rick:

In the only known instance where Obama held executive authority he failed Chicago's children. As the leader entrusted with control of a $100 million dollar initiative, he directed money meant to improve the education and foster the achievements of poor urban Chicago kids to organizations which, instead, advanced the interests of his political supporters, including domestic terrorist and communist friends.

First stab; the second sentence is still too long to be articulated verbally. I cannot tell you how strongly I believe that "domestic terrorist and communist friends" will kill the message, and be dismissed as histrionics. You've got an equivalence going on here between subverting education and throwing bombs that is just not going to work.

[bad]

why are the numbers so small?

Maybe I just suck at reading tax returns and am missing something. HELP!!

[sbw]

... advanced the interests of his political supporters, and others with their own agendas.

[JM Hanes]

Much better sbw. Would "their own self-serving agendas" add anything or just increase length?

[clarice]

"That simply translated to getting the city to pay for running special elections that ACORN used to practice thier get out the vote operation and refine their tactics between regular elections."
Oh, Ranger. I think it's much more--these counsels were to undercut the Daley establishment, the existing school power structure and replace them with "local counsels" which would organize the parents to mau mau not only for curricular and school governance matters but for everything using the schools as the loci of power.

[sbw]

Bad, perhaps, the money was funneled BY CAC and not THROUGH CAC. That might put it outside the tax returns.

[clarice]

**"local councils" (Sorry, the pain killer is making it hard to concentrate.)

[Larry]

Bad, I sign the foundation's rax returns, but can't remember ever questioning our accountant. No help here. Sorry.

[bad]

JMH

Technically it was a nearly $150 million dollar initiative. The original grant from Annenberg was $49.2 million requiring 2:1 matching donations. An additional $98.4 million had to be raised to get the Annenberg donation.

[bgates]

It can't get much longer - 8th grade target and all that.

"Barack Obama wasted a hundred million dollars that was supposed to be spent on improving Chicago schools by giving the money to friends and political allies."
"And I can't explain that in more depth, because you probably went to a school that was run by the same sort of people, which is why you read at the 8th grade level."
"If you can't help your 9th grade kid with his homework, blame Barack Obama. McCain 08."

[clarice]

Don't worry,jmh. My next story on this isn't due until Thur and I'll keep mulling it over in my head to get it right.

[bad]

The Annenberg money is showing up on the returns. Donations over $5000 are listed individually as attachments on the returns. There are more donations listed than just those from Annenberg.

[Rick Ballard]

JMH,

It warn't me that put them terrorist and commie words in thar.

We all know the SOB is red to the core but I do agree that including those words is very ticklish. SBW's formulations work just fine for me. The deal is that it has to be very short and very easy to understand.

All that's left is 8-12% of the Muddle, you can't be too harsh and you really can't get too complicated.

Honest.

[MayBee]

I agree with Klonsky that it would be great if the reformers that worked with Ayers and Obama would speak up. Somehow I don't think it's the Rove people keeping them quiet.

[clarice]

It can't get too complicated and it must be clear but it is important, I think, to establish the ruse aspect of this--that the goal was not to help the kids but rather to help the far left take over and control the Chicago schools regardless that this set the kids back.
Don't worry..it'll come.

[sbw]

Also important:

In his campaign for President, Obama has minimized his longtime involvement with the Chicago Annenberg Challenge for personal and political reasons.

Obama may have been proud of his participation, but he probably felt Americans would not be.

[clarice]

Hmm, I'm reasonably sure this was to give him some credentials and favors to be called in when he ran for Senate, sbw. A moment's thought would remind him that Ayres and Klonsky while useful in Ill politics were harmful in national politics and the final report would make this an odd choice to cite as prove of his executive experience.

[clarice]

***the final report CRITICAL OF THE ENTIRE EFFORT would make this an odd choice to cite as proOF of his executive experience.****

[Rick Ballard]

Clarice,

The timing of his accepting the founding presidency and chairmanship of the Turn Chicago Commie Challenge and his soiree with Ayers to plan the backstabbing of Palmer could stand a closer look. A quid pro quo - Annenberg money to Ayers for Ayers support of Obama is very easy to understand. Like Uncle Tony's help in the purchase of Chateau Rezko.

[clarice]

Did Ayers help with backstabbing Palmer? Wasn't it enough to get the ACORN guys to the polls for him that he got them money thru this neat school gambit?

[sbw]

ACORN to the polls...

So, Clarice, does O get his ears pinned back for understanding the consequences of his actions at CAC, or for not understanding them?

[bad]

Did Ayers help with backstabbing Palmer?

IIRC, she was ousted because enough of her petition signitures were ruled invalid. Maybe his ACORN buddies did the signature gathering, if ya know what I mean...

[clarice]

I think properly handled, there is simply no way out of this for O. None.
Dems want to make all the rules "for the children", then they can die by that rule.

[RichatUF]

In the only known instance where Obama held executive authority he failed Chicago's children. As the leader entrusted with control of a $100 million dollar initiative, he directed money meant to improve the education and foster the achievements of poor urban Chicago kids to organizations which, instead, advanced the interests of his political supporters, including domestic terrorist and communist friends.

my attempt:

Barack Obama's leadership of the Chicago Annenberg Challange failed Chicago's parents and school children. During his tenure as Chairman, Obama's only executive experience, the Challenge spent over $100 million and made Chicago's schools worse. The funds were directed to Obama's political supporters and to those with a self-serving agenda, not to those dedicated to improving education.

[bad]

On second thought, maybe the petition signature thing was used to keep other rivals off the ballot, not Palmer.

[Rick Ballard]

We know that Obama had connections with Ayers running back to the late '80's. My understanding is that Obmama's Tale mentions his meeting with Ayers prior to taking on Palmer as a "first encounter".

I'm suggesting that two events - his campaign against Palmer and his selection as president and chairman of the Annenberg Challenge (which supported Ayers' efforts, if not Ayers himself) may not just be serendipitous. I admit, it's a "Curiously, in the same time period..." supposition at this point but you would be amazed at how wholly unsurprised I would be should a definitive link suddenly appear.

[BobS]

Here's what Klosky was doing with the Anneberg money as written in my blog.

LUN

Credit to JMH and Maybee

[clarice]

Good ,Rich.. If I steal it will you sue?

[Rick Ballard]

"and made Chicago's schools worse"

Maybe "as conditions worsened in Chicago schools"

Causation would be tough to prove. Otherwise, it has a good ring.

[JM Hanes]

"...the Turn Chicago Commie Challenge..."

I think Rick is my favorite!

[clarice]

Good BobS..there we go--centers of leftist organization and the creation of a generation of unemployable, unskilled semi-illiterates who know how to organize for "social justice"..

[bad]

the Turn Chicago Commie Challenge

Someones gonna call you a "Rove Boy."

[clarice]

For the time being it's in my word file as Obama and the Little Red Schoolhouses.

[Soylent Red]

In the only known instance where Obama held executive authority he failed Chicago's children. As the leader entrusted with control of a $100 million dollar initiative, he directed money meant to improve the education and foster the achievements of poor urban Chicago kids to organizations which, instead, advanced the interests of his political supporters, including domestic terrorist and communist friends.

Shorter...

"Barack Obama was entrusted with $100M to improve education and opportunities for poor children. Instead, he chose use the money to pay off political cronies and support anti-American special interests. He calls that 'leadership'."

Also, I asked before: What was the add-on suggested by a commenter that made troll posts invisible?

[Larry]

Is there adequate confirnation to say $ was given to his pinko buds instead of the children?

[BobS]

Indeed,Claice. Even more ACORN shills. Its a half-step (sort-of) up from "supersize it?"

[RichatUF]

clarice-

It's yours. Just trying to help out a little.

[Rick Ballard]

Clarice,

Factoid drill bit:

At the end of the Annenberg Challenge, in 2002, only 43% of Chicago's eighth graders met or exceeded Illinois state standards. Five years later the number was 74%. Obama's absence obviously improved the educational performance of Chicago's kids.

Get rewrite!

[MayBee]

Rick- Funny. I was just thinking about the Alice Palmer thing. IIRC, she seemed to think she brought Obama over to Ayer's house to introduce Obama as her successor. Yet Obama surely had to know he had enough people on his side to stand up to Palmer when she wanted back in.
It occurred to me, too, that poor Alice Palmer didn't know what hit her.

[clarice]

The more things change, the more they remain the same.
When my dad was a young immigrant to Chicago from Poland, "organizers" or whatever they were called came to the family's hovel in Chicago and offered a free camp in the Ill countryside.
The firsat day at the samp, they ran a red flag up the flagpole and started singing the internationals. He called his mom to come get him and take him home.

[clarice]

***The first day at the Camp, they ran a red flag up the flagpole and started singing the internationale******

[Sara]

Five years later the number was 74%. Obama's absence obviously improved the educational performance of Chicago's kids.

Or maybe GWB's "No Child Left Behind?"

[clarice]

Oh, no--Klonsky was fighting the No Child Left Behind Act--can't actually educate the kids. It would diminish their revolutionary fervor and cut down on the mau mauing time.

[Rick Ballard]

"Is there adequate confirmation to say $ was given to his pinko buds instead of the children?"

Confirmation? We don't need no steenkin' confirmaton.

Actually, the grant to Commie Klonsky is well documented. The Ayers money will be found in the "performance documentation" that Bad noted, if detail actually still exists.

[BobS]

Hope you are sitting down and have a beverage as you read that drivle, Clarice. I had to make another

[RichatUF]

Larry-

Maoist Comrade Klonsky got $175k for his "Small Schools Workshop". I'm sure some of that trickled down to the little revolutionaries children, but salary, consulting, overhead, &c is expensive. Running a revolution in Chicago public schools ain't cheap!

[RichatUF]

sorry folks let me try that again

Larry-

Maoist Comrade Klonsky got $175k for his "Small Schools Workshop". I'm sure some of that trickled down to the little revolutionaries children, but salary, consulting, overhead, &c is expensive. Running a revolution in Chicago public schools ain't cheap!

[BobS]

again, rick....its no da moooney....its the devil in the details

[bgates]

Soylent -
here.

[JM Hanes]

O/T

Just caught the end of a clip on my local news of a McCain ad pondering why Obama didn't put Clinton on the ticket, despite her millions of votes. What's really funny about it is that they apparently released it a 3:00am. LOL! A tradition in the making?

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Plus they just had a tornado which could be seen from Denver. Check in Charlie!

Here I am, here I am. Just found out I'm sharing my convention credentials with Michelle Malkin. I'm guessing I'm not getting a lot of the exciting times on the floor.

I watched the business about the tornado from a lovely bar downtown called Pi π. A big bottle of politically incorrect Fiji water, very good wings, a decent bacon cheese burger, a truly adorable brunette waitress, and clear blue skies. Wolf Blitzer, the wuss, was on TV looking like he was ready to dive under a table any second.

The tornado was in Parker, about 25 miles from downtown Denver. People forget that Denver is well up a ridge, and iot's downhill all the way to Kansas (in more ways than one.) You can see a long ways.

Don't forget, 'askcharlieanything@gmail.com'.

[JM Hanes]

"I'm guessing I'm not getting a lot of the exciting times on the floor."

Not to worry, Charlie. Constraints only foster creativity.

[Rick Ballard]

BobS,

I could write details concerning the Gramscian web supporting the Alinskite tactics being used to bring communism into classrooms accross Chicago for hours.

The net result would be to induce a catatonic state among the 2% of the Muddle able to stay with me past the first paragraph. How the hell do you think the commies get away with it? They tack some sort of "feeling" ot "caring" hook into every other sentence while the educrats set their report writing to "stun into insensibility" mode every time they touch a keyboard.

You have to fire back with "supercare" and talk about theft from the children in order to get the point accross.

And you damn well better not be mean when you do it or the commies will break down in sobs between shouting "Look at what those evil Republicans are saying - we were just trying our best to help!"

[JM Hanes]

Charlie,

I feel confident in saying that Ann and I are definitely interested in your 10 best & worst dressed lists. Is that anything enough for your purposes -- or are you hoping for anything less frivolous?

[clarice]

True, Rick--It's why look what they did to the kids is my hook.

jmh--Swell idea..It'll give Charlie an opening line with cute girls at the convention if nothing else.

[Ranger]

I wouldn't go too far with the made things worse. During the 5 years of the CAC, the Chicago schools improved dramaticly. But those improvements were the result of the Chicago School Borad's efforts, which the CAC was activly resisting. It is funny, because CAC was so marked in their resistance to the changes being made, it made it impossible for them to claim any credit for the improvements.

[clarice]

True--as I recall the final report is said that CAC had been responsible for no improvements and in some cases had made it more difficult for the involved schools to make the changes necessary to improve the educational achievements .

[clarice]

**to raise the educational achievement .***
Niters all.

[Rick Ballard]

Ranger,

My factoid up there is absolutely correct and doesn't claim that CAC made things worse. I agree that a claim that "made things worse" is unprovable - "without a net positive result" is accurate though.

It's still money wasted - and worse than wasted in the sense that had CAC accepted Chicago School Board methods, overall results would have been higher.

[MayBee]

BobS- I just read your Lawndale blog. Good stuff!

[hit and run]

Charlie:
The tornado was in Parker, about 25 miles from downtown Denver. People forget that Denver is well up a ridge, and iot's downhill all the way to Kansas (in more ways than one.)

Eh, well, Parker ain't exactly downhill from downtown Denver. Elevation 5800+ ft.

But where we lived when in the Denver metro (Greenwood Village), you're right, the views to Kanasas were spectacular available.

[RichatUF]

Ranger-

During the 5 years of the CAC, the Chicago schools improved dramaticly...

and-

At the end of the Annenberg Challenge, in 2002, only 43% of Chicago's eighth graders met or exceeded Illinois state standards.

Good grief, just how bad were Chicago's schools in 1995 that 43% represents "substantial improvement".

[PaulL]

I agree that Rich's rewrite is better. If terrorists and communists are mentioned, it's an instant turn-off for a lot of people. The focus would be on that, and it would all be laughed off in the media.

The focus instead should be on why Obama has covered-up his only executive experience. The answer is because he doesn't want it to be known that he wasted $100 million in just one city. Imagine how much money he'd be able to waste in the entire country.

[bad]

Page 53 of the pdf LUN regarding CAC Guidlines:

Responsibilities of Grant Recipients

A. Matching Funds

Local schools and partners will be responsible for examining their budgets for monies which can be used to match the funds you seek from the challenge. It is the obligation of applicants - both for Implementation and planning grants- to at a minimum, match the amount you are requesting from the Chicago Annenberg Challenge. By providing a list of the public and private funds which your network schools receive, and which will be dedicated to the project, your network will be helping the CAC qualify for funds from the Annemberg foundation.

It appears CAC raised matching funds by having existing financial resources of the schools and networks renamed and redirected as CAC money.

[Soylent Red]

That's the ticket bgates. Thanks.

Puts a little monkey on my browser, and gets rid of several others.

Just need to figure out how to program it now...

[Sara]

According to the LINK I have posted, at length, Frank Marshall Davis came into little Barry's life at the age of 10 through a friendship he had with Grandpa Dunham.

I've heard nothing about the grandfather, but if Davis was they type of friends he had, maybe he was an atypical white person grandfather to the typcal white person grandmother.

Do we know anything about Grandpa Dunham. I don't even know his first name.

[Sara]

Please excuse the typos, like Clarice, I'm also on pain meds.

[RichatUF]

PaulL-

If terrorists and communists are mentioned, it's an instant turn-off for a lot of people.

I'd say that the topic needs to be softed up a bit before the link between Ayers WUO terrorism and the classroom can be made. But the link should and needs to be made.

I'd be interested, just for the shock value, what sort of nationalist hate propaganda (ie. "social justice") that CAC groups produced and distributed to the children. We can talk numbers and philosophy all day, but if someone can dig up a "Tookie Williams 3rd Grade Reader" or "Malcom X's 4th Graders Guide to the White Devil" it makes the link between Ayers terrorism and what his ideas really represent in the classroom.

[JM Hanes]

bad:

"By providing a list of the public and private funds which your network schools receive, and which will be dedicated to the project, your network will be helping the CAC qualify for funds from the Annemberg foundation."

Does this bit make anybody else's antennae wobble?

[MayBee]

I wonder what it was that Ayers saw in Obama. Why the affinity?

I find it fascinating that in one of Kozinsky's blogs, he abhors the fact that Obama has been made to do things like wear flag pins. I am certain his friends were the kind of people that decried the nationalism after 9/11.

Ayers has a certain viewpoint of the country now, aside from his former terrorism. I want to know why he thought Obama, a seeming particular favorite, was a fellow traveler worthy of his attentions. If we could know that, I believe it would tell us about his foreign policy viewpoint as much as anything.

[MayBee]

JMH- you do the work for us. We'll get the money if you help us qualify.

[MayBee]

And we'll also know where you get any money we may exploit in the future.
It's too bad it's before cel phones were popular. They could have asked the schools to provide their phone numbers to receive a text message of exciting CAC announcments.

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

I wonder what it was that Ayers saw in Obama. Why the affinity?

From his parents, now possibly his grandfather, mentor Frank Rich Davis, 2 years at Columbia - he was ready-made for Ayers. Harvard just spruced him up a bit. But, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that Obama was seeking out like-minded socialist/communist leaning groups and hanging with them.

[Sara (Pal2Pal)]

I'm watching a Fox bio on Obama now and they just showed a clip of Obama saying that he used to hang out in Washington Square Park, heart of Greenwich Village, NY. You can bet that he was getting an earful and maybe giving an earful. I don't know what it was like in the Obama years [his drug/party years], but I used to hang there in the late sixties and it was an anything goes kind of place with lots of politics and activism going on.

[bgates]

MayBee - Kazinski was a crazy academic who set off bombs to try to force a radical overhaul of how this country was run. I think you meant Klonsky, who is a respected professor at UI.
If Kazinski's first bomb had killed his girlfriend, those two names could be reversed.

As for why the attraction to Obama - he went from talking to Frank Davis to reading Franz Fanon. The first time they met Obama probably asked Ayers to autograph a hand grenade.

[JM Hanes]

BobS:

A revealing article and an excellent point on what an Obama version of "championing school choice" actually looks like! Speaking of definitions, I've been wondering lately if "social justice" is just a more palatable name for what used to be more frankly called "distributive justice." Haven't gotten around to sussing it out, though.

[bgates]

Soylent - right click on the little monkey and select 'manage user scripts', then select 'troll blocker' and click 'edit'. Let me know if you have any questions on what to do from there.

[RichatUF]

Sara-

From his parents, now possibly his grandfather, mentor Frank Rich Davis, 2 years at Columbia - he was ready-made for Ayers.

I did a bit of looking at Ayers wiki bio and Ayers got his MEd and Ed.D from Columbia in 1987 and went to Bank Street also in NYC (earning his first M Ed) in 1984. Obama was also in NYC from 1981-1985 at Columbia then working. Its possible that they meet back then if Obama was seeking out the radical profesors and grad students.

[MayBee]

bgates- yes, you're right. Kazinsky is the one with the hoodie and the rad glasses. I don't know what got into me.