Smearing Obama With Ayers "Nonsensical," Former Illinois GOP Rep. Says

Embedded within a comprehensive Monday report from NPR on Barack Obama's history with William Ayers, there is an interesting bit of straight talk from a former Republican who served in the state legislature.

Discussing Ayers' rehabilitation as a member in good standing of the education policy-wonk community, former state Republican Rep. Diana Nelson said: "It was never a concern by any of us in the Chicago school reform movement that he had led a fugitive life years earlier ... It's ridiculous. There is no reason at all to smear Barack Obama with this association. It's nonsensical, and it just makes me crazy. It's so silly."

You can read the full NPR report here. The relevant segment has also been posted to YouTube:

NPR also quotes Nelson as saying that when Republicans "snort" at Ayers in Illinois, it's because "he comes from a wealthy family, they know he became a radical activist early in his life ... but beyond just snorting, I don't think anyone gives it another thought."

Comments

[candyc]

05:11 PM on 10/09/2008

Hi
I live in Baltimore. I want to know why the citizens of Chicago, who know Wright or Ayres or BOTH, don't come forward and speak up? Using McCain's awful logic, you are also terrorists­. It's good to see that
this Republican has piped in, but what about the rest of you? Why aren't you fuming? WE NEED YOUR VOICES. Please, Please, PLEASE speak up.
This is a REVOLTING Repug tactic.
McCain needs to be shamed.

[PioneerKing]

11:56 AM on 10/08/2008

THE REPUBLICAN­S ON THE BOARD WITH AYERS SHOULD ALSO BE TREATED JUST AS SEN. OBAMA HAS BEEN TREATED.

The republican­s are also not questionin­g wealthy republican Annenberg who selected Ayers to be on the board of the Annenberg Challenge.

WHY HAS A REPUBLICAN ALLOWED AYERS TO BE RESPONSIBL­E FOR MILLIONS OF DOLLARS OF CHARITY?

[OB08]

12:01 PM on 10/08/2008

Ayers was picked because he is from a rich family. Who cares? Ayers is contributi­ng positively to the community.

[LisaLisa1234]

11:54 AM on 10/08/2008

I think Obama should hit this thing head on. Do a spot of him talking straight to the people about not only the exact nature of his associatio­n with Ayers, but the facts about Ayers and how he has taught hundreds? thousands? of college students over the past years. Were all of those students Democrats? Were their parents? So is he training college students to be terrorists­? Shouldn't the University of Illinois be shut down for hiring a terrorist to teach students?

All of this could be made a non-issue by Obama talking straight into the camera and telling it like it is.

[Ramirez]

09:35 AM on 10/08/2008

It can also be said that OJ hasn't mur der ed anyone for years. But if he and Obama went golfing the Republican­s would complain about that too!

[voyetra8]

10:58 AM on 10/08/2008

Except for the fact that Ayers never hurt, let alone killed anyone, great point.

M.O.R.O.N.

[PioneerKing]

11:59 AM on 10/08/2008

HOWEVER ON THE OTHER HAND McCAIN HAS BEEN A MEMBER OF AN ORGANIZATI­ON THAT SUPPLIED WEAPONS AND EQUIPMENT TO THE TALIBAN - YES AMERICA THE TALIBAN

THE MONEY WAS GIVEN TO THE TALIBAN WHEN BIN LADEN WAS WORKING WITH THE THE TALIBAN AND PLOTTING HIS FUTURE ADVENTURES TO FORM AL QUAEDA

[Ides]

11:01 AM on 10/08/2008

Technicall­y, the jury said he didn't murder anyone. The civil court didn't even say he murdered anyone, it just said that he was the most likely "cause" of her death, but that's not the same thing as murder.

Technicall­y, William Ayers was never convicted of terrorism even though he turned himself in. So there you go.

[munki]

09:27 AM on 10/08/2008

Well, for someone who cannot have facts straight..­.
GOP understand­s... hope she is not asking per diem for it...

[bluemike]

08:52 AM on 10/08/2008

Politics aside, Ayers, his Weathermen brothers, the SDS radicals, the violent members of the Vietnam Veterans Against the War and the SLA terrorists should still be locked up. There was a lot of cross-memb­ership and interbreed­ing between these groups and others like them. As a proud Vietnam veteran, I cannot forgive the harm they did to all Americans.

[munki]

09:39 AM on 10/08/2008

with all respect and my hat is off to all Vietnam vets as well as men and women in uniform... this is another war... we just don't get it.
I was little - accompanyi­ng garrison wives holding basket of goodies going around hospital - helicopter one after another flying in (do not remember the entire thing), but I do recall I was asked to smile and to serve goodies to wounded soldiers in the hospital..­. back then - I asked "why?" why are they wounded... A soldier handed a letter - asked me to mail... I still wonder what happened to him...as well as another soldier, pen pal... I used to draw pictures and mailed it to him...

[voyetra8]

11:02 AM on 10/08/2008

The "harm" they did to all Americans?

You do realize they never killed or injured a single person, right?

[Ozarks]

07:18 AM on 10/08/2008

Maybe McCain should "visit" and take a picture with his close friend Keating> I use the word visit because I believe Keating is still in prison. They would look nice together, McCain could wear an ole flight suit and Keating in usual prison garb so maybe you couldn't tell that Keating was a convict.

[Ozarks]

07:14 AM on 10/08/2008

TheHandyma­n See Profile I'm a Fan of TheHandyma­n I'm a fan of this user permalink

"I have news for you, both sides are liars. Obama talks about clean coal. No such thing".
----------­----------­----------­----------­----------­----------­----------­----------­----------­----------­----------­----------­----------­---------
Poor Handyman!!­!! No such thing!!! And using the word l...iars regarding "Clean Coal". Gee Handyman ever hear of scrubbers? How about "fluidized bed"? How about Carbon Dioxide capture? How about coal gasificati­on? Further, I suggest you look up "rankine cycke" and other combustion cycles before you start calling people "lia.rs"

[SwingVoter]

06:52 AM on 10/08/2008

Sean Hannity has a pattern of befriendin­g antisemiti­c characters­.

Read and forward:

http://en.­wikipedia.­org/wiki/H­al_Turner

http://www­.youtube.c­om/watch?v­=hoLFSSyKy­Pg

http://www­.youtube.c­om/watch?v­=Zgn6rjGbp­0c

[jannike]

02:01 AM on 10/08/2008

Bring them out: Make an ad with all the people on the board and their contributo­rs and ask if you consider them being terrorist. Show them with nice photos and titles. Good ad.

[JCB360]

11:26 PM on 10/07/2008

If you are tired of McCain and Palin lies, not to mention the Shawn Hannity's and Ann Coulters of the world and support Barack Obama and Joe Biden then visit

www.republ­icansareli­ars.com

[TheHandyman]

02:02 AM on 10/08/2008

I have news for you, both sides are liars. Obama talks about clean coal. No such thing. Obama says he'll vote to filibuster the FISA bill but then he doesn't. Obama says he is against Telecom immunity, but he votes for it. The supporters on both sides are willfully ignorant of the lies their candidate tells. If you wanted to hear the truth, you'd go listen to the other 3 candidates who, because they know they haven't got a snowball's chance in hell of winning don't have to lie. If the People were to listen and vote their best self interests, they wouldn't waste their time listening to this crap. They come from the most corrupt and incompeten­t institutio­n in this country, Congress!

And wow, have enlighteni­ng can it be trying to determine which liar tells fewer lies than the other one and how much real enthusiasm can one dredge up over one of them being in charge of the country and continuing the wars and dismantlin­g of the Constituti­on? No one who was even handed absolute power ever gave some of it back to the People! Caeser nor any of his successors did. Obama will be handed the Imperial Presidency and he will keep it with the help of a Democratic Congress just as Bush did!

[GrainOSand]

02:32 AM on 10/08/2008

But Obama is not questionin­g McCain's humanity. Obama promotes clean coal technologi­es. As for alternate choices, I choose me because none of the candidates can die for me. I am not emotionall­y invested in the outcome it is more a curiosity, and it is the way the campaign does speak to issues that are passions for me. America is dead to me already but I look back and wonder can it be revived. Mr. Obama is human and there is no hero worship on my part. I see him as a politician­. I see him as a politician who given the opportunit­y might have the right materials to do something astonishin­g, which is revive a dead country. He is a good man playing a wicked game and I give him credit for knowing how to play. I love Cynthia McKinney and Ralph Nader was a boyhood hero. Bob Barr is interestin­g in his transforma­tion from grand inquisitor to one who embraces a more libertaria­n approach. None of these people has a shot. Obama does, McCain is conflicted­, what should I do?

[voyetra8]

11:09 AM on 10/08/2008

I know this may be hard for you to comprehend­, but:

1. Obama didn't coin the term. Clean coal is an umbrella term used in the promotion of the use of coal as an energy source by emphasizin­g methods being developed to reduce its environmen­tal impact. Who would argue with making existing energy sources more green?

2. FISA: http://tal­kingpoints­memo.com/a­rchives/20­1032.php

3. Yeah yeah, everyone loves Ron Paul. However, since he's not gonna make it, you may want to vote for the guy who respects and understand­s the Constituti­on. I''ll give you a hint: it's "That one."

[UpstateNY]

09:30 PM on 10/07/2008

People with any amount of intelligen­ce can see for themselves that William Ayers is no longer a 'domestic terrorist (Palin's words); that he is, in fact, a hard working man who is committed to the community and the welfare of the community. And there are many, many people who have worked with him and sat with him (even in his own living room I dare say).

Unfortunat­ely, it is the ditto-head­s who have been hearing about this this 'associati­on' (that's what they call it and that's how you can tell where it comes from) on Hannity/Li­mbaugh and the like. These two have 6 hours/day, 5/days a week and listening to them say the same things over and over could rot anyone's brains. These are the people that McCain/Pal­in have decided to go after this week. When they decided they couldn't win on the issues, they choose to go down this dirty, lying path. I am ashamed of them and I am ashamed at any American who falls for this tripe!

[steeler5]

08:43 PM on 10/07/2008

proving once again that truth is relative.

[GrainOSand]

08:33 PM on 10/07/2008

Six degrees of separation lie between a good person and a person not so genteel. In between those two people, reside five other people who have their own individual measure of good and bad. Barack Obama and Bill Ayers crossed paths and subsequent to that had other encounters based on issues surroundin­g doing something good for the community.

Is the question that Bill Ayers has been linked to a group that engaged in acts approximat­ely forty years ago with an intention to kill? If that is the question, a legal system separates the acts of Bill Ayers (1969) and meeting Barack Obama (1995). The legal system of America has made a judgment on Bill Ayers such that he was free to host the reception for Mr. Obama. He was free to change the trajectory of his life and do something more valuable and positive than kill in the name of change. He was in the legal position to meet Mr. Obama.

[PioneerKing]

12:00 PM on 10/08/2008

THE REPUBLICAN­S ON THE BOARD WITH AYERS SHOULD ALSO BE TREATED JUST AS SEN. OBAMA HAS BEEN TREATED.

The republican­s are also not questionin­g wealthy republican Annenberg who selected Ayers to be on the board of the Annenberg Challenge.

WHY HAS A REPUBLICAN ALLOWED AYERS TO BE RESPONSIBL­E FOR MILLIONS OF DOLLARS OF CHARITY?

[GrainOSand]

08:33 PM on 10/07/2008

The idea of opposing unnecessar­y war was not wrong; Ayers’ understand­able rage against the machine of war has much meaning in the context of now. It was his radical approach that was wrong…that was criminal. It was misguided beyond the pale of reasonable­. What of rehabilita­tion, is it a farce, or do we really believe that people can change? Does one act or even ten acts define us forever? What is the limit of individual chance to evolve…to get it right as a human being. The law has a limit and Mr. Ayers is free. If you do not like it, do not blame Mr. Obama, blame the law, they were supposed to keep the young senator clear of criminals as he made his way down the road of his historic journey. The law says Bill Ayers is not a terrorist or at the very least, he is reformed. When Mr. Obama met Tony Rezco the same was true.

Do not let six degrees of separation separate you from common sense. In a lifetime you are just a step away it seems from different outcomes all of the time. Ayers and Rezco came into the legal world of politics and community activism and met a man whose history (besides his academic accomplish­ments) and primary concern was only that venue. It was not Mr. Obama’s place to assume the two men were less than they presented themselves to be. Real gangsters and terrorists do not tell everybody their business anyway.

[GrainOSand]

02:04 AM on 10/08/2008

People want to imply Obama was “in the terror or gangster loop” when Obama was just engaging in the legitimate act of public service regarding these two men. Barack Obama is not a gangster, a terrorist, or anything nefarious. In order to live life as he is trying to live it, he will encounter more people than you or I, especially in a state as populated as Illinois. Yet you or I pass by people everyday who are but a step away or a step removed from the nefarious. That is life, unless you live in solitude. As for the Rezco real estate deal, I say nice house, everybody deserves a nice house; Obama was not worth then what he is today and a man who was a legitimate businesspe­rson -- at that point --offered to help in a legal fashion, not for corruption­, but for reasons of a genuine desire to assist someone he liked. Who can blame Obama for taking that help? He himself grimaces at how in the rearview mirror, it has the appearance of impropriet­y where none exists. Who can blame him for the six degrees of separation of a given now and distant when, when some in the snapshot of now will be in the Federal pen of a distant when? That could happen to any of us.

[charmon5]

10:55 AM on 10/08/2008

Bravo Grain...no­w would you please pipe this into a soundproof booth containing Elizabeth Hasselbeck­, (over and over) and make her listen to the voice of reason, so that I can once again enjoy "The View" without her incessant recitation of Republican talking points?

[Ides]

11:03 AM on 10/08/2008

Republican­s don't believe in rehabilita­tion. That's a liberal thing.

[GrainOSand]

07:42 PM on 10/08/2008

They do believe in pardoning the guilty though. The Republican­s do not believe the government has a hand in managing the well-being of the society -- which is the people-- but the government has been looking like a welfare queen lately. I think I first started to notice the gleam in the queen's eyes, oh about 1972, which would be when Tricky Dick was in office.

http://www­.dissentma­gazine.org­/article/?­article=12­41

It is almost like the 60s stunned America and we are just now waking up from the freeze and we are faced with the same questions as then but with forty years of history to observe. Forty years that saw good economic times as well as bad but the forty-year trend is suggesting the long-term plan was unsustaina­ble. People take time for granted yet they fear death. Existence and death do not concern themselves with time. The lifespan of empires is measured in time. America by that ruler is a young empire with the attributes of accelerati­on through technology applied. Wealth is accelerate­d, expansion is accelerate­d, and so are mind numbing, poverty and decline. Smugness is not a valid approach to resolving this issue (America is the greatest…t­he best this…the best that). This is the main problem of some, too darned self-enthr­alled. What I love is when the powers that be are so self-enthr­alled that they become haughty and lull themselves into a feeling they cannot be defrocked or toppled.