McCaskill: “Ridiculous” to tie Obama to ’60s radical
With Barack Obama’s connection to a 1960s radical, foes of the Democratic nominee for president hoped they had the “Swift Boat” for 2008.
Ayers
What they ended up with was more of a slow schooner that’s managed to stay afloat.
U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill was the latest to reject suggestions that Obama is close to Bill Ayers, a founder of the anti-establishment group the Weathermen, which bombed government buildings to protest the war in Vietnam.
McCaskill was on Fox News Sunday, responding to a comment from GOP veep nominee Sarah Palin, who over the weekend referred to Obama as “someone who sees America, it seems, as being so imperfect that he’s palling around with terrorists who would target their own country.”
“I mean, really, how ridiculous. American people deserve so much better,’ McCaskill said Sunday. “Do they really think America is going to think that Barack Obama’s palling around with terrorists? What that man did Barack Obama has condemned. And by the way, he did it when Barack Obama was 8 years old. Come on.”
Ayers, now a college professor, lives in the same Chicago neighborhood, Hyde Park, as Obama. The two sat on the board of the same education foundation. Early in his political career, Ayers hosted a coffee for Obama.
A New York Times story on Saturday found that Obama perhaps has downplayed his association with Ayers, but “the two men do not appear to have been close.”
Ties between Ayers and Obama have been targeted by the American Issues Project, an independent group formed with the help of two prominent Missouri Republicans, Tony Feather and Ed Martin.
Outside the beltway, the group has not gained much traction — some networks refused to run their ad.
Even so, Republicans have signaled they are prepared to pepper the final month of campaigning with sharper attacks against Obama’s character — which means voters should be prepared to hear more about Ayers before they head to the ballot box.
The only reason it is ridiculous to bring this up is because character does not matter to Democrats. It doesn’t matter to Democrats that Obama smoked weed, snorted cocaine, was married and his children baptised by an anti-American racist or that Obama rubbed shoulders with a known terrorist (Ayers)…as long as Obama gets elected and gives them the handouts they so desperately want and feel entitled to, THAT is what matters most.
It’s all about handouts..and Democrats are just licking their chops as to what the government is going to do for them. Free healthcare for all! No more war! Peace in our time! No more homelessness! Homes for everyone (oops..tried that…didn’t we?)! Free college for all!
Socialism…lurking just a month away…
I agree with her. America deserves better. Better than a President who associates with terrorists.
So Claire McCaskill and The New York Times say Obama isn’t close to Ayers. Now all we need is a story on MSNBC, and an editorial by Hendrik Mink, and voters will have all the information they need on this issue.
Claire, you need to check your facts. Everyone else knows that Obama has had recent involvement with Bill Ayers and if you continue to ignore this, you will end up a fool. Didn’t you see the in-depth report, interviews, documents and photos on FOX News? We don’t want a president who associates with terrorists!!
Character doesn’t matter to Dems like it does to Republicans, huh? Well then, how did we end up with a Republican president who had a coke problem and a drinking problem?
And a VP who used of every deferment there was to get out of going to Vietnam?
Or a candidate who has been running one of the most dishonest campaigns in recent memory? Or a VP candidate who used her office for pursuing personal grudges?
Boy Claire, for being a former prosecutor, I’m really disappointed in you. Bill Ayres bombed a police station. The Pentagon. It’s ok to disagree without being disagreeable. Ayres didn’t think it was awful what he did. Claire, would your parents have approved living next door to him while you were growing up? Your house may have been leveled by an accidental explosion of a bomb he was making…
Scott,
Ayers bombed those places. Not Obama. Obama has condemned those actions.
I think it is dangerous for McCain to start playing these “guilt by association” games as it might hurt McCain/Palin more. Do we want to associate McCain with the Keating5 (during another economic crisis it might mean more) and USCWF? How about Palin’s association with the treasonous Alaska Independence group?
The only people who care about something like this, that as McCaskill stated–happened when Obama was 8 years old, are Republicans who are grasping for anything. Anything.
E.D., please do some research. Biden had the same amount of deferments as Cheney (five). It has yet to be proven that Bush did coke, unless you have a legitimate website you can provide? As for his drinking problem, yep..he had one and stopped. I guess I’m more okay with him having a drinking problem than Obama allegedly doing weed and coke (I say allegedly because he mentioned in his book that he did it in his youth..cocaine was very hard to come by in Hawaii prior to 1980)..however if you consider alchohol a drug, then I see your point. Obama is on record in his book that he smoked week and snorted cocaine. The dishonesty of both campaigns has been duly noted on Factcheck.org. I would also have your do your research on the number of dishonest statements your boy Biden made in the debate. If you would like, I can list them in my next post. However, my guess is that you wouldn’t care..since he is a Democrat…and you can get your free healthcare soon.
Palin married a seperatist who hated America as much as Ayers. Now that’s character!
I remember seeing a picture of Ronald Reagan standing with John Wayne Gacy. The picture was taken 4 months before it was discovered that Gacy sexually mutilated and killed 33 young boys…..
Bet you didn’t know Reagan was “palling around” with such psycopaths.
The NYT soft peddled it… and you guys on the left are screaming.
Must be something to it…
Is this the same Claire McCaskill that said:
“…they’re going to find out that this is a (Republican) ticket that wants to put women in prison for having an abortion after they have been raped.” ??
http://www.cqpolitics.com/wmspage.cfm?docID=news-000002950734
Claire McCaskill — a disgrace to the citizenry of Missouri.
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It is very sad how racist you people are and how you have to stoop so low out of desperation that the Republicans are not going to win this election.
Not only is it sad, but it is funny. SMH!
Middle class democrats work just like middle class republicans, so this crap about handouts it ridiculous. God doesn’t like ugly and that is why it is our year to win. BARACK THE VOTE!!!!!!
What Claire means to say is that examining ANY of Obama’s many questionable choices in associates is ridiculous.
What she wont tell is is there is no way in Hell he could pass a security clearance background investigation with his known past associates.
Hendrik Mink…
… is he the resident Neo-communist that used to make fun of Dan Quayle?
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How do I know the Ayers association is a big story - the PD has totally ignored it. That is always a dead give away. Claire, you can embarrass yourself and ignore the facts, but here are the facts and this is more than a passing in the night. Ayers has groomed Obama for this position since he left Chicago to go to law school. In fact, it is said they may have met during his Columbia days and that is why he went to Chicago in the first place. But since Obama won’t tell us the truth:
http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/obama-ayers-partners-in-revolution/2/
Swish
Swish
Swish
What’s that noise? That’s the desperate Republicans grasping at straws!
I’m supposed to think Obama’s character is flawed because he knows a guy who did some bad stuff 40 years ago? Are you serious? Is there any chance that McCain and Dizzy will talk about some issues in this last month? I’m doubting it. The more they pull this sophmoric crap the more I’m convinced that they are lost in the woods.
“I’m supposed to think Obama’s character is flawed because he knows a guy who did some bad stuff 40 years ago? “ — slamfist
Chicago Annenberg Challenge, a school reform group that pumped $50 million into Chicago Public Schools. Obama was board president and Ayers help organize the charity in 1995.
www . chicagotribune . com/news/local/chicago/chi-obama-ayers-universitysep09-archive,0,1053585.story
$50,000,000 … beginning not 40 years ago, but in 1995. Worked together to divvy up $50 million in grants and 0bama says they were just “neighbors” ??
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Whoopsie… will somebody help an angry slamfist get up?
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Slam, “knowing a guy” and starting your political career in his house are just a bit different. I’m game for talking about issues…how about how far left this country will be if Obama gets elected? You’ll get your socialist trifecta: Obama, Pelosi, Reid. You’ll need free healthcare just to pay for your “gimme elbow” which you’ll get when you keep raising your hand for handouts.
Sheshe, bringing up the race issue is racist itself. The only one bringing up race is Obama. Also, being a democrat ALWAYS means that you rely on government for your livelihood and blaming successful people for your problems and wanting their money because you failed on your own.
Garrison, Palin’s husband was not a separatist. Please see this retraction:http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/sep/02/uselections2008.republicans20085?gusrc=rss&feed=worldnews
I won a bet today when I bet a guy that I could go to the newspaper and find a full page of negative stories on McCain/Palin. Way to go Post, you didn’t disappoint me! Watch the rest of the week…every paper will have a full page of stories that make Obama and Biden look good and McCain an Palin look bad…
Just typical republican hogwash and backwash and whitewash. Here’s an idea: Let’s waterboard Obama and see what he really knows about the Weather Underground. I think he might be hiding something he was involved in as an eight-year old. Gulf of Tonkin incident - didn’t happen. Kent State massacre did happen. Ten days later another “police action” at Jackson State University in Mississippi killed two and injured dozens. Ayers was fighting against the “police state” that American tends to become when politicians take us wrongly into war and do whatever they can to silence the opposition. Those were different times but we can start drawing parallels if you want.
This is just dirty politics and once again the source of it is the right wing fear-mongering bone-headed chumps that “swift-boated” Kerry and manipulated the public with disinformation and lies for the Neo-Cons and Bush.
McCain’s advisers said it themselves, they are making a concerted effort to “turn the page” away from the economy (which McCain admits is not his strong suit) to attacks on Obama’s character. This is straight out of the Karl Rove playbook. Distract, distract, distract while Rome burns. Americans have been fooled by this nonsense before. We are too smart this time around for the BS character-assination stuff to work. The Republican emporers have no clothes and America knows it. Why esle are the polls showing an Electoral landlside in Obama. This is just the last gasp of an increasingly desparate conservative revolution that has done nothing for the past twenty years but run our country into the ground.
Trickle down economics has failed this country. It has failed us and it has failed our children. We can’t afford more of the same.
sheshe - You sound exactly like D. Walker. Obscenities and race baiting interlaced with religious verbiage. Now that I think about, D. Walker hasn’t posted here in quite a while. Did you get banned, and come back here under another name?
Using the same “rules” of “guilt by association then all of the following are equally true:
1. All police officers (especially those who wind up arresting repeat offenders, and because they can be found around criminals on a regular basis) are obviously guilty of rape murder, theft etc.
2. Since the September 11th terrorists used box cutters to threaten people on the planes before they crashed them in the Twin Towers, and since warehouse workers routinely use boxe cutters, ergo warehouse workers must be terrorists.
3. Since John McCain, after VietNam went through psychiatric/psychological therapy, he, like Senator Thomas Eagleton before him, must be crazy.
Come on a specious “argument” is still specious no matter how many times you shout it.
I thought Palin was wrong to attack Obama over Ayers, but, after reading this, I am now not so sure:
“For the next four to five years, the two worked together to raise the matching funds and disburse small grants to local organizations pushing the reform program. It could only have been an intimate partnership. When Obama decided to run for the state senate, his first fund-raising event was held in the home of Ayers and Dohrn. In 1997, Ayers published a book about juvenile justice, A Kind and Just Parent, which Obama blurbed as “a searing and timely account.” The two also served together on the board of the leftist Woods Fund from 1998 until 2001.
This is what is now public about the relations between Obama and the unrepentant terrorist Bill Ayers. There may be much more, so far successfully hidden by all concerned; but even these facts suggest that Ayers was among Obama’s closest collaborators.”
https://www.commentarymagazine.com/viewarticle.cfm/special-preview-br–obama-s-leftism-12961?page=all
Ah… the cowardly Conscientious Objector who thinks he can solve society’s problems.
How sad his best years spent allied with the anti-war left. But then he and his liberal friends turned their backs on the violence that followed our withdrawal from Vietnam.
Please don’t do to us what you were willing to accept from your glorious NVA and VC commrades in Hue, Saigon…
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Massacre_at_Hu%E1%BA%BF
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This is a very sad. McCain does not understand the economy so he calls Obama a terrorist lover. I know Bush has messed up the economy but please keep talking about it! We need to get off the oil standard. Please do not skip my comment b/c I voted for Ron Paul. We deserve a better conversation than who likes terrorist vs who is just like Bush. When we embrace these sexy distractions we lose focus on saving our nation. I hope we get a real debate tonight the last two were WEAK!!