I have been following the comments of both Senator Hillary Clinton and Senator John McCain on the William Ayers situation. As Senator Obama has said, it does not make much sense for him to be held accountable for the actions or words of someone else especially when those actions or words occurred when Senator Obama was 8 years old.
It is also disappointing for John McCain to jump into the fray given the lesson he taught all of us about forgiveness and understanding that some of us do things when we are young that we later regret. Specifically I am talking about the case of David Ifshin, head of the National Student Association in 1970. During the later years of Vietnam War, Mr. Ifshin traveled to Hanoi on numerous occasions and while there regularly broadcast radio messages to the American soldiers in the South that they were guilty of war crimes against the innocent people of North Vietnam. He proclaimed that the war was illegal and immoral. He was the Tokyo Rose or, as William Buckley commented, the Little Lord Haw Haw of the Vietnam War. He was also the host of the infamous Jane Fonda trip to North Vietnam. In short, Mr. Ifshin committed not acts of verbal offense or acts of protest at home, but acts which most who knew of them, considered treason.
After the war, Mr. Ifshin, like so many of the young people involved in the antiwar movement, went on with their lives. He worked in Israel and subsequently achieved his law degree. He became a well-respected member of the Washington DC legal community and lobbied effectively for the State of Israel. He was general counsel to both the Mondale and Clinton presidential campaigns. David Ifshin was a close personal friend of the Clinton's and near his death he spent long hours with his friend Bill Clinton.
To this day, many Vietnam veterans cannot forgive nor forget the role David Ifshin played in their war. I was one Vietnam Vet that found his presence among the closest Clinton advisors to be sufficient grounds to work tirelessly, if unsuccessfully, for the reelection of President George H.W. Bush. Upon his death in 1996, David Itshin was eulogized on the Senate floor by none other than Senator John McCain. Senator McCain found the grace in his own conscience to forgive the detestable acts committed by David Ifshin on his many trips to the enemy home land during the Vietnam War. When McCain eulogized Ifshin, I was embarrassed to admit, I had not had the grace to forgive and to move beyond the Vietnam War and the ripping force it shot into the entire nation. If McCain could forgive, what issues could I possibly have? In his eulogy he spoke on behalf of the better angels in all of us.
So it is deeply troubling that both Senator Clinton and Senator McCain, find it politically expedient to now attempt to use the mere fact that Senator Obama and Mr. Ayers have served on a board together and live in the same neighborhood, to fan the flames of political personal destruction and "gotcha" while hiding the fact that they like so many others have known individuals, who in their younger years did things that were affronts to this entire nation and who as they matured became close friends who were welcomed into the highest offices of this land.
I am not surprised that Senator Clinton would use the Ayers board membership to cut and slice her way to a few votes, but I would have hoped that John McCain would remember the time he taught all of us about the grace of forgiveness and the need to grow beyond the tumultuous times of the Vietnam era.
Paul "Bud" Bucha is a West Point Graduate and of the Graduate School of Business at Stanford. He was awarded the Medal of Honor for service in Vietnam. He is now a supporter for Barack Obama for President.
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Posted April 23, 2008 | 04:37 PM (EST)