FYI (and to toot our own horn), RW's role in the Barack Obama-Bill Ayers story was recognized by Big Media on April 18, 2008, when Joanna Weiss wrote her article, How Obama and the radical became news. Story highlights the path from blog to mainstream, that was published in the Boston Globe and picked up by the International Herald Tribune.

When Obama became a presidential contender, it was conservatives who picked up on the story. On Feb. 2, the conservative British writer Peter Hitchens mentioned Ayers in a piece titled "The Black Kennedy: but does anyone know the real Barack Obama?" in the London Daily Mail. A week later [on February 11, 2008], a mention of Ayers appeared in an anti-Obama blog known as Rezko Watch.

Soon, the story turned up in the mainstream American press: in the Bloomberg news service, a Washington Post blog, and the New York Sun.

Beginning on page 2, you will find the original February 11, 2008, RW article, followed by a few other posts plucked from the archive of articles about Ayers and his wife, Bernadine Dohrn.

First, though, regular visitor SV provides the link for the audio clip from Milt Rosenberg's WGN Radio program Extension 72, in which he talked May 5, 2008, "with Sol Stern of the City Journal, Ed Lasky of the American Thinker, and Herb Walberg of the Hoover Institute, about the attempted radicalization of the education system." In the 75:40 minute audio clip, Milt and his guests also discussed "Bill Ayers, who has been at the forefront of the radicalization effort."

Next, blogger Bill Baar sends along this blog post by Tom Maguire of Just One Minute who wrote August 13, 2008 (see Maguire's article for numerous links):

Just prior to the Pennsylvania primary Barack Obama was asked at a Democratic debate about his relationship with unrepentant Weatherman Bill Ayers. Obama pretended that he was only casually acquainted with Ayers, describing him as "a guy who lives in my neighborhood, who's a professor of English in Chicago...". Hilary provided a bracing corrective, reminding people that the two men had served on a charitable board together, the Woods Fund of Chicago.

This exchange was newsworthy enough to provoke coverage in the Chicago Sun-Times, and the NY Times; earlier stories had sparked The "Fact Checker" at the Washington post.

And yet! All of these hard-working professionals gave Obama a pass for a very casual relationship with Ayers, citing the charitable board, some joint panel appearances, and a fund-raiser hosted by Ayers. The Barack Obama web site produced a classic of non-disclosure which confirmed these points but added nothing.

None of these sleuths discovered that there was quite a bit more to the story. Barack Obama and Bil Ayers worked together for several years on the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, an educational reform group co-founded in 1995 by Bill Ayers and chaired by Barack Obama. How did Obama forget this? Possibly because the group's effort at public school reform were a failure.

And how did Ayers happen to tap Obama for the chairmanship of this group? Probably because they became acquainted in 1987, before Obama headed off to Harvard, in an earlier go at Chicago school reform.

So Obama has a relationship with Ayers that can be documented from 1995 and almost surely came into being in 1987. Jerome Corsi mentions the Annenberg Challenge in his book - any guesses as to whether Media Matters, the Times, or the WaPo will fact-check that? Obama either lied (by ommisison) or had an absurdly hazy memory at the debate and in the web-site follow-up - any chance the media will wonder what he is hiding and why?

The truth will out - Steve Diamond of Global Labor owns this story and I am riding in his wake - but the Times will be the last to find this news that's fit to print.

Many of Steve Diamond's articles on Ayers, as well as those by Pundita, John Batchelor, and WND's Jerusalem bureau chief, Aaron Klein, can be accessed here in RBO's archive or by clicking on their names in the category list.

Go to next page for the February 11, 2008, RezkoWatch article "Obama and domestic terrorist William Ayers".

This article was originally published February 11, 2008, at RezkoWatch. Please scroll below the story for updates and video and article links.

Obama and domestic terrorist William Ayers

Following the February 2, 2008, Daily Mail/Mail on Sunday (UK) article The Black Kennedy: But does anyone know the real Barack Obama? by Peter Hitchens, two RezkoWatchers commented on the possibility that Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) had received a campaign contribution from William Ayers, a member of The Weathermen, a terrorist group from the 60s. Hitchens commented:

It [Rezko] suggests very bad judgment, as do strong, persistent suggestions that Obama also accepted quite small contributions from extreme Left-wing veterans of the terrorist Weather Underground now living in Chicago.

His list of contributions shows one for $200 from a certain William Ayers. Can this possibly be the same William Ayers, now a Chicago professor, who used to plant bombs in the Seventies and has said: "I don't regret setting bombs. I feel we didn't do enough"? His partner, Bernardine Dohrn, once "declared war" on the US government.

Encounters

Dr. William Ayers, the former leader of a 1960s-era political terrorist group called The Weather Underground, is now a professor of education at the University of Illinois-Chicago (UIC). His wife, Bernardine Dohrn, is with the Children and Family Justice Center at Northwestern University Law School. Obama is a former Senior Lecturer in the University of Chicago Law School. Wondering whether the three may have crossed paths is not speculation. It is a fact that they have. Ayers, Dohrn, and Obama have appeared together at a number of gatherings and academic events.

In November 1997, Ayers and Obama participated in a panel at the University of Chicago entitled Should a child ever be called a "super predator?" to debate "the merits of the juvenile justice system".

In April 2002, Ayers, Dohrn, and Obama, then an Illinois State Senator, participated together at a conference entitled "Intellectuals: Who Needs Them?" sponsored by The Center for Public Intellectuals and the University of Illinois-Chicago. Ayers and Obama were two of the six members of the "Intellectuals in Times of Crisis" panel.

Ayers, "who in the 1960s was a member of the terrorist group Weatherman and a wanted fugitive for over a decade as a result of the group's bombing campaign," is currently the Board Chairman of the Woods Fund of Chicago and Obama is a former Board member.

It has also been suggested by blogger red rabbit at Musings & Migraines that in 1995 Obama engaged in campaign fundraising at the Ayers-Dohrn home (emphasis added):

Alice Palmer was a popular and effective legislator, and would have retained her seat had Obama not challenged her nominating petitions. Most accounts of what took place claim that Palmer lost a special election for an open congressional seat and then changed her mind about running for reelection to the state senate. The fact is the special election was held December 12, 1995 and Alice Palmer had already announced to the Illinois Public Action Convention that she would run for reelection for her senate seat. The fact is the Hyde Parkers whom Obama was courting at the time would've remained loyal to Palmer and many told him as much at the home of Bernadine Dohrn and Bill Ayers in late November of 1995.

Another event occurred in February 2005 that included Ayers, Dohrn, and Obama, a fairwell dinner for Arab American Action Network (AAAN) founder Rashid Khalidi (emphasis added):

Rashid Khalidi, a Columbia professor whose recent book argues that Yasser Arafat was right to reject the best peace deal he had ever been offered, opening the way to four years of bloodshed, presented a tendentious argument for a one-state solution that strained to stay within the bounds of reasoned discourse. [...]

Khalidi's wife, Mona, who also served in Beirut as chief editor of the English section of the WAFA press agency, was hired as dean of foreign students at Columbia's SIPA, working under Dean Anderson. In Chicago, the Khalidis founded the Arab American Action Network, and Mona Khalidi served as its president. A big farewell dinner was held in their honor by AAAN with a commemorative book filled with testimonials from their friends and political allies. These included the left wing anti-war group Not In My Name, the Electronic Intifada, and the ex-Weatherman domestic terrorists Bernadine Dohrn and Bill Ayers. (There were also testimonials from then-state Senator Barack Obama and the mayor of Chicago.)

John Batchelor on William Ayers, February 27, 2008, Fox News Channel

Sean Hannity interviews Karl Rove on Bill Ayers, April 9, 2008

Obama's terrorist friends: the Weather Underground (from NObama08)

Bill O'Reilly and Karl Rove on Obama, April 17, 2008

Hannity & Colmes on Bill Ayers

Update #1: The $200 campaign contribution cited by Hitchens is listed with the Illinois State Board of Elections campaign disclosure details for "Friends of Barack Obama" (D-2 Semiannual Report 1/1/2001 to 6/30/2001). $200 was reported for April 2, 2001. However, Ayers' name does not appear on any other Obama PAC reports—Obama for Illinois, Obama for Congress 2000, Obama 2010, or Obama for America—filed with the Federal Election Commission.

This September 24, 2007, research paper provides more information on Obama's relationship with Khalidi. This March 8, 2007, article in The Jewish Week provides more details.

Update #2: "Bill Burton, Obama's spokesman, said Ayers 'does not have a role on the campaign.' Ayers said he had no comment on his relationship with Obama," Timothy J. Burger reported February 15, 2008, for Bloomberg News.

Update #3: Former intelligence officer Larry Johnson commented February 15, 2008:

At a minimun this reminds us that there is a pattern of bad judgment by Obama. He goes in on a land deal with Tony Rezko even though he knows Rezko is a target of a Federal investigation. And his explanation? A mistake in judgment. Now this. Anyone thinking of running for President should know they cannot take money from a terrorist and they cannot serve on a board with a terrorist. Period. But this simple lesson apparently escapes the brilliant constitutional law professor.

This much we do know. Obama does not deny having a relationship with William Ayers. Obama has never repudiated the terrorism of William Ayers. If you think this is a record Obama can run on in the fall and survive you are living in an alternate universe. It is time to get some clear answers to tough questions before the Democrats sell their soul to someone whose lapses in judgment will come back to haunt them in the fall.

Update #4: Fleaflicker, Bring the War Home: The Ayers Tapes, No Quarter, April 18, 2008.

Update #5: Thomas Lifson at American Thinker pointed out an oddity April 18, 2008, on his blog:

Obama spoke about his relationship with Bill Ayers in the ABC News debate Wednesday night, I was struck by this usage [emphasis added]:

"This is a guy who lives in my neighborhood, who's a professor of English in Chicago, who I know and who I have not received some official endorsement from. He's not somebody who I exchange ideas from on a regular basis."

"On a regular basis" means keeping to a schedule. Weekly meetings to exchange ideas, or maybe a semi-annual retreat to compare notes. But it leaves plenty of room for the occasional phone call, a luncheon now and then, or maybe even a get together with other Hyde Park radicals every once in a awhile.

It does not rule out exchanging ideas. Which is quite interesting, isn't it? Obama could have chosen much stronger language to distance himself from the unrepentant terror bomber, but he didn't.

Update #6: Also see RezkoWatch articles about Allison S. Davis and his connection with Obama and the Woods Fund of Chicago.

Update #7: Transcript: Obama Frustrated Over Focus of Democratic Debate, Lou Dobbs/CNN, April 17, 2008.

Update #8: FBI Freedom of Information: Weather Underground Organization (Weatherman) (420 pages in six parts): "In 1976, the FBI's Chicago Field Office prepared a summary which described the activities of the Weather Underground Organization, also known as Weathermen. This organization described itself as a revolutionary organization of communist men and women. The FBI's analysis of its motivations, beliefs, and international travels are outlined in this summary."

Update #9 Katy of the Caracas Chronicles blog wrote April 17, 2008:

How many people separate Barack Obama from Hugo Chávez? Yesterday's debate between Obama and Hillary Clinton gives us the answer: two!

Barack Obama ... sat on the board of the non-profit Woods Fund of Chicago with '60s radical and University of Illinois professor Bill Ayers, a friend of the Bolivarian Revolution and father of...

Chesa Boudin, a Rhodes scholar, one of the founders of chavista think-tank and PSF echo chamber Centro Internacional Miranda, who has an office in Miraflores Palace and is a key advisor of... Hugo Chávez, autocrat extraordinaire.

In fact, if Ayers himself has a personal relationship with Hugo Chávez, then that's one degree of separation.

More on Chesa Boudin here and here.

Go to next page for the February 22, 2008, RezkoWatch article "Weatherman Bill Ayers".

The following article was posted February 22, 2008, at RezkoWatch.

Weatherman Bill Ayers

Peter Hitchens mentioned the former domestic terrorist, Weatherman William Ayers, February 2, 2008, in the UK's Daily Mirror. RezkoWatch followed up on February 14, 2008, with additional information, including the suggestion by blogger red rabbit at Musings & Migraines that in 1995 Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.) had engaged in campaign fundraising at the home of Ayers and his wife, Bernadine Dohrn.

In an early morning post at The Politico, Ben Smith confirms that State Senator Alice Palmer indeed introduced Obama "to a few of the district’s influential liberals at the home of two well known figures on the local left: William Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn."

While Ayers and Dohrn may be thought of in Hyde Park as local activists, they’re better known nationally as two of the most notorious – and unrepentant — figures from the violent fringe of the 1960s anti-war movement.

Now, as Obama runs for president, what two guests recall as an unremarkable gathering on the road to a minor elected office stands as a symbol of how swiftly he has risen from the Hyde Park left to a man closing in fast on the Democratic nomination for president. [...]

Obama’s connections to Ayers and Dorhn have been noted in some fleeting news coverage in the past. But the visit by Obama to their home—part of a campaign courtship—reflects more extensive interaction than has previously reported.

Smith, after speaking with Dr. Quentin Young, "a prominent Chicago physician and advocate for single-payer healthcare", wrote:

Obama’s connections to Ayers and Dorhn have been noted in some fleeting news coverage in the past. But the visit by Obama to their home—part of a campaign courtship—reflects more extensive interaction than has previously reported.

Neither Ayers nor the Obama campaign would describe the relationship between the two men. Dr. Young described Obama and Ayers as “friends,” but there’s no evidence their relationship is more than the casual friendship of two men who occupy overlapping Chicago political circles, and served together on the board of a Chicago foundation.

But Obama’s relationship with Ayers is an especially vivid milepost on his rise, in record time, from a local official who unabashedly reflected a very liberal district to the leader of national movement based largely on the claim that he can transcend ideological divides.

In one sense, Obama’s journey toward the cultural and political center is not unusual among national politicians. But its velocity is.

Most importantly, Smith recognizes the significance this could play should Obama become the Democratic nominee:

The relationship with Ayers gives context to his recent past in Hyde Park politics. It’s milieu in which a former violent radical was a stalwart of the local scene, not especially controversial.

It’s also a scene whose liberal ideological features – while taken for granted by the Chicago press corps that knows Obama best – provides a jarring contrast with Obama’s current, anti-ideological stance. This contrast between past and present—not least the Ayers connection—is virtually certain to be a subject Republican operatives will warm to if Obama is the Democratic nominee.

Go to the next page for the April 24, 2008, RezkoWatch article "Obama's Weathermen Ayers and Dohrn".

The following article was originally published April 24, 2008, at RezkoWatch.

Obama's Weathermen Ayers and Dohrn

Sol Stern, who authored this Summer 2006 article in the Manhattan Institute's City Journal, about former domestic terrorists William Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn, wrote April 24, 2008, that Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.)'s real William Ayers problem is "not the damage done by the Weather Underground 40 years ago, but the far greater harm inflicted on the nation’s schoolchildren by the political and educational movement in which Ayers plays a leading role today." As several bloggers have headlined, "What Obama omitted to mention ... Ayers is now teaching your children."

Instead of planting bombs in public buildings, Ayers now works to indoctrinate America’s future teachers in the revolutionary cause, urging them to pass on the lessons to their public school students.

Indeed, the education department at the University of Illinois is a hotbed for the radical education professoriate. As Ayers puts it in one of his course descriptions, prospective K–12 teachers need to “be aware of the social and moral universe we inhabit and . . . be a teacher capable of hope and struggle, outrage and action, a teacher teaching for social justice and liberation.” Ayers’s texts on the imperative of social-justice teaching are among the most popular works in the syllabi of the nation’s ed schools and teacher-training institutes. One of Ayers’s major themes is that the American public school system is nothing but a reflection of capitalist hegemony. Thus, the mission of all progressive teachers is to take back the classrooms and turn them into laboratories of revolutionary change. [...]

Ayers’s influence on what is taught in the nation’s public schools is likely to grow in the future. Last month, he was elected vice president for curriculum of the 25,000-member American Educational Research Association (AERA), the nation’s largest organization of education-school professors and researchers. Ayers won the election handily, and there is no doubt that his fellow education professors knew whom they were voting for. In the short biographical statement distributed to prospective voters beforehand, Ayers listed among his scholarly books Fugitive Days, an unapologetic memoir about his ten years in the Weather Underground. The book includes dramatic accounts of how he bombed the Pentagon and other public buildings.

AERA already does a great deal to advance the social-justice teaching agenda in the nation’s schools and has established a Social Justice Division with its own executive director. With Bill Ayers now part of the organization’s national leadership, you can be sure that it will encourage even more funding and support for research on how teachers can promote left-wing ideology in the nation’s classrooms—and correspondingly less support for research on such mundane subjects as the best methods for teaching underprivileged children to read.

The next time Obama—the candidate who purports to be our next “education president”—discusses education on the campaign trail, it would be nice to hear what he thinks of his Hyde Park neighbor’s vision for turning the nation’s schools into left-wing indoctrination centers. Indeed, it’s an appropriate question for all the presidential candidates.

Ed Lasky commented April 25, 2008 in American Thinker:

Barack Obama has been attempting to burnish Ayers' reputation by characterizing him as a university professor -- still one of the more honored and respected professions in America. He peddled the notion that Ayers is an educator now and this should absolve him of the burden of his bomber background.

However, what has Ayers done for academia? He has continued to wreak harm -- just in a different but longer lasting way.

Chicago Tribune columnist John Kass wrote April 23, 2008, that links to the Weather Underground—and two of its key participants, William Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn, now college professors who have contributed to Sen. Obama's political career—are "likely to resurface."

After relating a tale about the former Weathermen, Kass remarks:

A few years later, Ayers got his job as a professor at the University of Illinois at Chicago. And Dohrn was employed at the Children and Family Justice Center affiliated with Northwestern University's School of Law.

I've always been fascinated as to how the radical underground stop running and get jobs in academia. Is there a Terrorist Patronage Office for Rich White People? And how did a convicted Dohrn get hired to teach at a law school?

"I am afraid I don't know an answer to that," NU spokesman Alan Cubbage said. "The person who was the dean at the time is no longer with the law school. And the person who was the president at the time is no longer the president. So I just don't know."

Cubbage did not mention that Ayers' late father—Commonwealth Edison boss Thomas Ayers—was an NU trustee and former board chairman. UIC spokesman Mark Rosati couldn't help either, but suggested I file a Freedom of Information Act request to find out how terrorists get hired by taxpayers.

"It's nothing personal," Rosati said.

How amusing. They don't want to explain how terrorists were hired, so they know nothing.

Comment RezkoWatcher pm pointed out that Kass's story puts an end to the "fatal flaw in Dohrn's defense that she never hurt anyone" and predicted that "Broadway Baby" will become the new blogosphere buzzword.

Update #1: Transcript excerpt from CNN's Lou Dobbs Tonight, April 17, 2008 (emphasis added):

DOBBS: Bill Ayers, we're hearing today from Mayor Daley that he also knows Ayres and he's just a fine fellow and no problem, don't be -- please don't be discomforted by Senator Obama's relationship with him.

MCCARTHY: Look, of all the people who've ever bombed the Pentagon and the State Department and the New York City police headquarters, I'm sure he's one of the best. But I -- my sense is that regular Americans aren't going to see it that way.

DOBBS: Senator Obama, you are declaring rather straight forwardly, is denying some relatively close relationships that he is suggesting are not -- are distant.

MCCARTHY: Yeah, well he's denying the relationship, but I think more importantly what he's trying to obfuscate is that there's a trajectory to all of this and there's a theme that runs through it and whether its some of the statements made by his wife or Reverend Wright or Bernadine Dohrn and Ayers, the fact is he's comfortable... Bernadine Dohrn being Ayers' wife. The other Weather Underground terrorist who was Ayers' wife. But, he's comfortable with people who hate this country. And I think when he talks about and makes the theme of his campaign "Change," and since he hasn't really explained to us much about the change, we're entitled to infer, from the people he's comfortable with, who are social revolutionaries, the kind of change he wants to make in America.

DOBBS: You're including, obviously, Reverend Jeremiah Wright.

MCCARTHY: Of course, right.

DOBBS: And -- and Ayers (ph). Others?

MCCARTHY: Well, there's Rashid Khalidi, who was a recipient of some of the largess that Obama controlled when he was on the Woods Board. He is somebody who was --

DOBBS: He was on the board with Ayers (ph)?

MCCARTHY: Yes, when Obama was on the Woods Board with Ayers, they gave grants to Rashid Khalidi, and his work. Now, he has denied being a member of the PLO. But there's no question he's an apologist for Palestinian terrorism, including suicide attacks against Israeli soldiers.

Update #2: John Hinderaker of Power Line blog has done an excellent 2-part series—The Friends of Barack Obama—with fresh information on Ayers and Dohrn: Part 1, April 22, 2008, and Part 2, Power Line, April 23, 2008.

Update #3: Rick Moran, linking to the Power Line blog articles in Update #2, commented April 25, 2008, at Rightwing Nuthouse:

Ayers most recent pronouncements (and Dohrns) are contained on some audio tapes dug up by a small radio station in Chicago and blasted over the internet on Wednesday by Powerline and Hugh Hewitt. The tapes show that Ayers and Dorhn are in the mainstream of Chicago politics only if Josef Stalin is mayor and Pol Pot is Cook County Commissioner.

This would come as a surprise to Mayor Daley who also has had kind words to say about Ayers/Dorhn – no doubt because he doesn’t wish to anger the liberals in Hyde Park and because he has a sneaking admiration for the former terrorist’s chutzpah. Daley is also a crook who gets away with his crimes which at least gives him something in common with Ayers. There is no excuse for Obama.

Update #4: Larry Johnson at No Quarter provided proof on April 26, 2008, that Sen. Obama has not been telling the truth about the length or depth of his relationship with William Ayers. In fact, in 1995 Ayers was one of the "architects" of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge; he selected Obama to serve as its first Chairman of the Board and Obama continued to serve on the board for eight years, until 2003.

This appointment came at a crucial time in Barack’s life. He was on the verge of challenging longtime state Senator, Alice Palmer for her job. When Barack decided to run it is no surprise that he turned to William Ayers and his wife, Bernadine Dohrn for help in organizing the campaign and in hosting his first fundraiser in the district. [...]

Ayers helped select Obama to exercise a leadership role on the Annenberg Challenge. And Obama wants us to believe they never talked? Never exchanged ideas? Never identified issues to raise and policies to pursue? What is Barack hiding?

Update #5: In an April 27, 2008, op-ed, Jeff Jacoby wrote:

In Chicago the other day, radio producer Guy Benson discovered video recordings of Ayers and Dohrn speaking at a reunion of antiwar radicals in November 2007. To live in the United States, Dohrn told the group, is to be "inside the heart of the monster" that is such a "purveyor of violence in the world." Ayers denounced America as an imperial warmonger steeped in "jingoistic patriotism, unprecedented and unapologetic military expansion, white supremacy . . . attacks on women and girls, violent attacks, growing surveillance in every sphere of our lives, on and on and on." h/t pm

Go to the next page for the May 3, 2008, article "Obama's Weathermen Ayers and Dohrn - Part 2".

This article was originally published May 3, 2008, at RezkoWatch.

Obama's Weathermen Ayers and Dohrn - Part 2

Greta Van Susteren interviewed (transcript) John M. Murtagh, whose family was firebombed by Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill.)'s "long-time terrorist buddies, William Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn". At the time, Murtagh was 9-years old.

On April 30, 2008, both the New York Daily News and City Journal published articles written by John M. Murtagh in response to the April 16, 2008, Democratic presidential debate during which Ayers' name was brought up by the moderator, ABC News' George Stephanopoulos.

Read SusanUnPC's May 3, 2008, article and Uppity Woman's May 2, 2008, article at No Quarter. Watch video clips of the interview posted on YouTube by NQ below. Also see GretaWire comments on William Ayers and the Weather Underground, May 3, 2008.

Greta Van Susteren's May 2, 2008, Fox News "On the Record" interview with John M. Murtagh, Part 1

Greta Van Susteren's May 2, 2008, Fox News "On the Record" interview with John M. Murtagh, Part 2

Go to next page for the May 5, 2008, RezkoWatch article "Ayers: 'No regrets'"

The following article was originally published May 5, 2008, at RezkoWatch.

Ayers: "No Regrets"

This full-color photograph was first discovered by Patrick Henry, who comments at the No Quarter blog. It obviously came from a 2001 photo shoot promoting the publication of domestic terrorist, Weather Underground leader William Ayers's "memoir" Fugitive Days.

The photograph appears in the August 2001 interview with Ayers by Chicago Magazine's Marcia Froelke Coburn. On the first page of the article entitled "No Regrets", Coburn writes:

This—violence, death, and white-hot rhetoric—is his past and Ayers insists he has no regrets. "I acted appropriately in the context of those times," he says.

Larry Johnson, who has relentlessly been tracking the connections between Sen. Obama and domestic terrorist and Weather Underground leader William Ayers, wrote May 3, 2008, at No Quarter:

Barack Obama may have been eight years old when William “Billy” Ayers was planting bombs at the State Department and the U.S. Capitol, but the Senator was a grown man working in the employ of Mr. Ayers when this picture appeared in August 2001.

Read the rest of Johnson's article here.

Update #1: John Ruberry at Marathon Pundit pointed out May 4, 2008, that at the time this photograph was used to promote Ayers' book in 2001, Obama and Ayers were both serving on the Woods Fund of Chicago and Ayers donated $200 to Obama's campaign war chest.

"Guilty as sin, free as a bird, it's a great country" is one of the Ayers quotes in the top clipping.

Update #2: In his September 30, 2001, New York Times' book review of Fugitive Days, Brent Staples concluded:

In Ayers's hands, a career in terrorism becomes a harmless episode out of a John le Carré novel, in which our hero lives on the run, steals explosives, sets off explosions using tradecraft, as the flap copy puts it -- as if the Weathermen were characters in Smiley's People. But the Weathermen game was never really a game. Nor was it ever noble, or even moral. In the aftermath of the terrorist attacks that killed thousands of people in Lower Manhattan and the Pentagon, readers will find this playacting with violence very difficult to forgive.

Former Weather Underground member Cathy Wilkerson weighed in December 2001 at ZMag on Ayer's book. "It was Ayers’s inaccurate and unforgivable trivialization of our experience with political violence that I was trying to write about," Wilkerson wrote. "Fugitive Days is a cynical, superficial romp through struggles waged in the 1960s and 1970s to change our country’s unjust and inequitable institutions."

"Most importantly," Wilkerson wrote, "I think it is dangerous that a young person today could read this book and never realize that Ayers was one of the architects of much of the insanity he blames on others."

Kenneth Heineman wrote in a December 2, 2001, History News Network book review that "Academician Edward Said effusively praised Fugitive Days, concluding that, 'For anyone who cares about the sorry mess we are in, this book is essential, indeed necessary reading.'"

Heineman added that the attention the book garnered was not what the publishers had in mind, referring to the photo stills of Ayers with a "sorry-looking American flag at his feet." New York Post columnist and neo-conservative activist John Podhoretz called people like Ayers "evil, horrific and deluded." Heineman notes that Ayers comes across as full of rage.

Update #3: See SusanUnPC's May 5, 2008, post His Country Beneath His Feet, A Terrorist Holds Fast His Violent Visions (With Comment from Larry Johnson) at No Quarter, which provides some more background on Ayers.

Update #4: Sean Hannity, Fox News, May 5, 2008 (h/t to SusanUnPC at No Quarter)

From Larry Johnson @ No Quarter:

August 9, 2008

"Just today, courtesy of the Rocky Mountain News, we confirmed that Barack aka Barry Soetoro Obama was a citizen of Kenya since 1963. Barack has yet to stipulate when he renounced or relinquished that citizenship. That will be a distracting issue in the upcoming campaign. Americans don’t want to elect a Kenyan as President. It is that simple.

But then there is the Indonesian problem and his Hawaiian birth certificate.

I confirmed today that several teams/individuals visited Jakarta during the last six months to gather up critical documents regarding Barack. It is amazing what money can buy. The information includes details of how Barack made his way to Pakistan. Oh! Did I mention there have been similar efforts underway in Pakistan. There are several lessons and warnings in the John Edwards affair for Obama. First and foremost, you cannot hide your past."

FromThe Real Barack Obama:

"To that blank slate that was Obama in 2004 you can now add the Pandora’s box of Tony Rezko, Allison Davis, Alexi Giannoulias, Kwame Kilpatrick and a long list of members of the Illinois Combine; Nadhmi Auchi, Aiham Alsammarae, Rashid and Mona Khalidi, and Edward Said; Revs. Jeremiah Wright, James Meeks, and Otis Moss III and Father Michael Pfleger; Louis Farrakhan, the Nation of Islam and the 1995 Million Man March; Malik Zulu Shabazz and the New Black Panther Party; William Ayers and Bernadine Dohrn, Marilyn Katz, Carl Davidson, Mike Klonsky and others from the SDS days who are clinging to his coat tails; Jodi Evans; Hamas and other admirers like Hugo Chavez, Fidel Castro, Muammar al-Gaddafi, Kim Jong-Il, and the Communist Party USA; and the list goes on.

Let’s not forget the ever-growing list of controversies: Rezko house and lot; lobbyists, bundlers, and overseas contributions; Odinga family and violence in Kenya; Soetero family and Muslim schooling in Indonesia; Dunham family in Kansas and Hawaii; and the mysteries of his birth certificate—is he Barry Soetero? Barack Obama Jr. or someone else and was his name ever legally changed?—and rumors about his possible dual or mixed citizenship.

Oh, we cannot leave out his elitism and mention of “bitter” Americans and “typical white” people like his grandmother and the constant playing of the race card when his campaign or poll numbers were slipping downward, not to omit 18 million Democratic voters who will never forget how he treated Sen. Hillary Clinton throughout the campaign and how, with the help of the DNC elite and his brownshirted acolytes, he stole the Democratic primary.

Silly reporter. You just had to ask, didn’t you?"

From Goodtimepolitics, "Democrats candidate healthcare, Economic plan":

August 10, 2008

"Barack Obama plan with a trillion dollar tax increase on America’s hard working families.

Senator Barack Obama’s bold plans to spend hundreds of billions on national health care, infrastructure, education, and energy? Put another way, how likely is it that the plans now being spelled out on the campaign trail will actually come to pass? In two words, not very.

So why make promises that you can not keep Obama?  People did you hear, Obama is just talking and there is no way that he can do any of the things he’s says.  Add on the inexperience and you have a useless candidate in Barack Obama."

Please note that TexasDarlin, a key PUMA (Hillary Clinton) Democrat, oringinally published many like items and investigatory results on her own blog. You should check it out and bookmark it HERE.

I also noted this:

I also find it very convienient to them that they aren’t showing any close up views of the most important alledged anomalies.  The show zoom-ins of some artifacts which may be on the paper or due to pixilization somewher else randomly on the page, and they show a zoom in of an area with what the supposed replaced text was and thus destroying any possible anomalies that had been there, but no zoom in of the area unaltered.

Well, now they're claiming that they've proven that the original birth certificate belonged to Obama's sister:

Forensics specialist Techdude, who has been chipping away at the Obama Birth Certificate mystery for some time, has confirmed that the name on the original Certificate of Live Birth (COLB) which was used to forge the document presented by Barack Obama as his valid Birth Certificate IS:

Maya Kassandra Soetoro.

His sister.

So, we'll be able to see the evidence and verify this right?  Wrong:

KG, a reader on the TexasDarlin blog, posted her/his discovery in the Comments section of this post, and detailed the technical process she/he followed to get there....

KG does not have the technical tools to immediately produce a report for publication, and is not sure he/she wants to be published.

But they promise to later:

In the coming days, Techdude will provide a final report that fully discloses his discovery, and provides all the fancy technical data, images, formulae etc. that everyone has come to expect.

I'm not holding my breath, even if they do post it.  In any case, I'll check out their supposed process as posted in the comment thread and show once again that it is bullshit.

Update

They can't even agree on how it was forged.  Techdude thinks that text was deleted and replaced and is using "artifacts" to show what letters are there.  Meanwhile, Polarik argues that the old data on the supposed original was completely copied over, and then text was put on it.

Now, both of these hypothesi cannot be true.

And as noted by the commenters, the alledged real birth certificate belonged to Barack's sister Maya, according to TechDude, even though she was born in Indonesia.  Now, I suppose it's possible that she was able to get a Hawaiian birth certificate somehow, but that's a hard sell, unless it's somewhat standard procedure to get a new birth certificate from the state you live in if you were born overseas and move to the US (I don't know whether this is the case or not).

In any case, you can follow both TechDude's and Polarik's instructions and basically see shit, so I'm awaiting their "full" report.

Update 2

Oh god, not allowing occam's razor to get in the way, apparently they're now saying that Obama's mother illegally got his sister a Hawaiian birth certificate in Hawaii when they moved there.

So here are the claims:

1) Maya has a birth certificate from Hawaii, which should be illegal

2) Obama used this illegal birth certificate as a template to forge his own birth certificate

I mean, seriously?

So they found "anomalies" by zooming into Obama's birth certificate at zoom levels of 300 and 400.  Of course, at that level the pixilization is so bad - even on the large version - that it's rather hard to tell what might be an anomaly in the birth certificate from either flaws in the paper, jpeg pixilation, or both.

For example, here is an area with some supposed anomalies:

This is what it would actually look like zoomed x4.  Now, not only can I not find the alleged anomalies above the text in the Obama birth certificate - at least any anomalies which clearly aren't widespread over the image due to jpeg pixilation, but I actually see anomalies not even alleged - such as the semi-circle under the T in "Birth."

I've tried doing this with various versions of the birth certificate, just in case some had been resaved - but nothing.  There is just nothing there.

My conclusion: they've resorted to plain out completely making shit up.

Added Thought:

I also find it very convienient to them that they aren't showing any close up views of the most important alledged anomalies.  The show zoom-ins of some artifacts which may be on the paper or due to pixilization somewher else randomly on the page, and they show a zoom in of an area with what the supposed replaced text was and thus destroying any possible anomalies that had been there, but no zoom in of the area unaltered.

This doesn't even address the issue that, if someone was going to delete already existing information on the page, they wouldn't have just barely covered the letters, leaving some anti-aliasing behind, they would have covered the entire area up with a cut and paste copy of another area of the background - or if they were really good, different areas of the background assembled together.  Given the pixilation, it's not like it would be easy to tell different areas of the background apart.

Non-germane Update

I also find it humerous how they've been demanding that Florida and Michigan be seated 100%, and now that Obama is saying that they should be given 100% votes at the convention, they're now saying he's "Morally Bankrupt."  So does that mean that they didn't want them seated 100% after all, or that they wanted someone else to force the decision onto Obama (like they could do that).

Gov. Richardson was born on US Soil and is a US Citizen by Birth under the Immigration and Nationality Act 1952 and the XIVth Amendment to the Constitution of the USA. Unfortunately, under Article 30 of the Mexican Constitution and the Mexican Federal Law of Nationality, Governor Richardson is also a Natural Born Citizen of Mexico. There seems to be no mechanism whereby he could have ceased so to be, and it is my contention that under Article II of the Constitution and all Precedent Law no Dual National is Eligible for President. Governor Richardson probably is Eligible to be President of Mexico but not POTUS!

So now in their quest to claim that Obama is ineligible to be President, they're going to throw Richardson under the bus. Nice.

So it looks like the PUMA's initial claim is that you not only have to be a "natural born citizen," but that you have to be a "natural born citizen" of only the United States. I must have skipped over that part in the Constitution.

But apparently that the same thing might have happened to McCain? No problem:

Senator John McCain was born in the Panama Canal Zone, which was not, according to the State Department, US Territory. He was apparently born either on a US Naval Base, or in any event in the purlieus of one, which was not, according to the State Department, US Territory. According to Panamanian Law he may have been a Citizen of Panama by Birth. Unlike Richardson, or Obama, there is no evidence MCain ever used his Involuntarily Acquired Dual Citizenship, or that he ever, in any way, acted as if he had it. The Panamanian Government never acted as if he did either. Sen. McCain was a Citizen by Birth of the United States under the appropriate US Laws at the time of his Birth and according to a non-Binding Resolution of the US Senate acting under the implied powers of the XXVth Amendment to the Constitution of the USA.

OK, I still think their argument about McCain is still irrelevant, but lets swing with it for the moment. How exactly has either Richardson or Obama "acted as if [they] had" their second citizenship, if they ever formally had it to begin with, since this seems to be their argument as to why McCain is eligible.

Unfortunately, they don't answer this question, and they push on with another argument of why Obama is ineligible. They quote this policy from the State Department (I'll link to it since they don't) saying thus:

The U.S. Government recognizes that dual nationality exists but does not encourage it as a matter of policy because of the problems it may cause. Claims of other countries on dual national U.S. citizens may conflict with U.S. law, and dual nationality may limit U.S. Government efforts to assist citizens abroad. The country where a dual national is located generally has a stronger claim to that person's allegiance.

However, dual nationals owe allegiance to both the United States and the foreign country. They are required to obey the laws of both countries. Either country has the right to enforce its laws

So how does this make Obama supposedly ineligible? They just make up a reason, basically:

This, in plain terms means that a Dual National could not, under any circumstances, be Eligible. Additionally, if Naturalized Citizens are Ineligible because of the Legal principle of “The Appearance of Foreign Allegiance” which they are, and always have been, a former Dual National/Dual Citizen MUST be in exactly the same position vis a vis Article II.

So, since a naturalized citizen can't become President due to so-called "Appearance of Foreign Allegiance" because they were once a citizen of another country, then, the PUMAs argue, that someone who was born with citizenship to another country (except apparently John McCain) is ineligible for President, even if they are a natural born citizen of the US. This is, of course, notwithstanding the fact that the US Constitution has no such requirement.

On top of this, someone born solely as a naturalized citizen and thus clearly eligible to be President could, theoretically, make themselves ineligible if they become a citizen of another nation (while retaining their US citizenship). This clearly seems to go against the understood meaning of the "natural born citizen" clause.

In short, the PUMAs are arguing that, not only do you have to be a natural born citizen, but you must have been a US citizen and ONLY a US citizen for your entire life. Your parents got divorced, and you moved with your mother moved to another nation when you were little where she got married, transferring that nation's citizenship to herself and you? Touch luck kid, you can no longer become President.

That example right there shows the silliness of their argument and again, goes against the clear meaning of the Constitution, especially since a minor cannot lose their US citizenship, period.

And to boot, they claim that it is Obama's fault, since he has "covered up" his childhood. So how exactly is it Obama's fault if he is ineligible to be President if he was born with dual citizenship (something which has never even been confirmed). And I'm still trying to figure out how McCain is eligible if he was born with Panama dual-citizenship (also something not shown to be true) but Obama isn't eligible if he was born with Kenyan dual-citizenship (or Richardson with Mexican dual-citizenship).

In any case, let's go back to this matter of "Appearance of Foreign Allegiance." The PUMAs make the obvious statement that location alone doesn't determine whether one is a natural born citizen:

The United States Naturalization Act of March 26, 1790, 1 Stat. 103, 104, which was written, partly, to clarify Article II says this, “the children of citizens of the United States that may be born beyond Sea, or out of the limits of the United States, shall be considered as natural born Citizens”. The Framers were clear that you did not have to be born in the USA, or in a State; you could be born anywhere.

This is a fact that pretty much everyone already knows. However, they then make a startling claim: the being born on US soil does not automatically make you a natural-born citizen. Because, they argue, citizenship is based on loyalty, not location:

No, the Framers were talking about Allegiance, Loyalty. The POTUS had to have only ONE Allegiance.

They attempt to use the case United States vs. Rhodes (can't find a full opinion) to argue, well, something. Rhodes said this:

All persons born in the Allegiance of the King are Natural- Born subjects, and all persons born in the Allegiance of the United States are Natural-Born Citizens. Birth and Allegiance go together. Such is the Rule of the Common Law, and it is the Common Law of this Country…since as before the Revolution.

They then go on to claim that Rhodes means that, under the constitution, one can only hold one true citizenship. Unfortunately for the PUMAs, if this is the case, it appears that United States vs. Wong Kim Ark answered that question of "what country are you a citizen of" as "where you were born":

It thus clearly appears that, by the law of England for the last three centuries, beginning before the settlement of this country and continuing to the present day, aliens, while residing in the dominions possessed by the Crown of England, were within the allegiance, the obedience, the faith or loyalty, the protection, the power, the jurisdiction of the English Sovereign, and therefore every child born in England of alien parents was a natural-born subject unless the child of an ambassador or other diplomatic agent of a foreign State or of an alien enemy in hostile occupation of the place where the child was born.

The same rule was in force in all the English Colonies upon this continent down to the time of the Declaration of Independence, and in the United States afterwards, and continued to prevail under the Constitution as originally established.

Do you see that? Based on English common law, which is what the PUMAs are trying to rely on, if you are born within the territory of a nation (in this case, the United States), you are a natural born citizen of that nation.

In any case, the PUMAs attempt to argue (try to stay with me here) that since allegiance determines citizenship, and Obama theoretically had dual-citizenship, and thus conflicting allegiances, and since naturalized citizens can't become President because of a conflict of allegiance, then someone with dual-citizenship cannot be President for the same reason.

There are several serious problems with this:

1) The PUMAs argue that naturalized citizens were excluded as a check against undue foreign influence in the national government, based on a quote from John Jay. This appears to be a reasonable argument, but it does little to help the PUMA's cause because it does nothing to clarify what a natural born citizen is. The reasons behind why naturalized citizens weren't included appear to be largely irrelevant. The question - the only question - is was Obama a natural born citizen at birth, period.

2) The PUMAs try to argue that the meaning of the Constitution cannot be changed through legislation, therefore whatever the meaning of "natural born citizen" that existed at the adoption of the Constitution is the meaning we must use.

Here is the problem, however. Let's say I agree with them, that we must use the definition of a natural born citizen as it existed back at the adoption of the Constitution. If we do this, then Obama is a natural born citizen per United States vs. Wong Kim Ark due to the fact that he was born within the territory of the United States. The case is quite clear about this: if you are born on US soil, you are a natural-born citizen.

If I disagree with them and say that that, while Congress cannot change the requirement that a natural born citizen must be President, Congress can change the definition of what constitutes a natural born citizen, then their entire argument collapses.

What they're trying to do is mix both: they're trying to use today's definition of natural born citizen and the 18th century definition of natural born citizen simultaneously, using the parts of each which advance their argument that Obama is ineligible.

However, they can't do that. They either have to agree that we use the 18th century definition where natural-bornness is determined by "allegiance" which is determined where you are born, thus making Obama natural born citizen, or you use the more contemporary definition where "allegiance" doesn't necessarily come into the equation...but you're still a natural born citizen if you're born in the United States, so Obama is still a citizen.

3) They try to argue that McCain is exempt since his father was a citizen, then McCain became a natural-born citizen at birth, even though they were abroad. This seems to be an obvious assumption, though why this is so, while the clear reading that if you born within the territory of the US then you are a natural born citizenship doesn't make Obama automatically eligible, I don't now.

However, it seems ironic that they are trying to argue that someone born in a foreign country born of US parents is always automatically a citizen, regardless of the laws of the nation they reside in, but someone born on US soil isn't necessarily a natural-born citizen due to the laws of the nation or nations of that person's parents, despite what the court decisions cited above clearly state.

4) They go on to say that any Panama citizenship McCain might have had was "washed away" when he joined the US Navy, thus making him clearly a natural-born citizen. However, Obama still isn't a natural-born citizen, even if he renounces all but his US citizenship, if he is a citizen of any other nation to begin with, because one can never have been a citizen of another nation, but apparently that doesn't matter for McCain if McCain ever was also a dual-citizen of Panama. Funny how that works.

The problem the PUMAs have, is that there have always been two, and only two, understood definitions of US citizenship: You are either a "natural born citizen," and thus eligible to be President, or you are a "naturalized citizen" and thus ineligible.

Therefore the PUMAs are attempting to do one of two things:
a) they're either trying to create a third designation - something somewhere in between natural-born and naturalized where you are born in the United States, but only have the rights of a naturalized citizen, or

b) they're trying to argue that Obama, due to being a dual-citizen, is in effect a naturalized citizen.

The second argument appears to be the tact they are taking, even though Supreme Court precedence clearly shows that if you are born on US soil you are a natural-born citizen. Despite what the PUMAs would like, all this other allegiance crap is irrelevant. You are either a natural-born citizen or you aren't, and it clear that Obama is by virtue of being born on US soil.

5) They then make this patently absurd argument:

If a Dual National, or former Dual National, is allowed to stand for the Office of POTUS, or be Elected to that Office, any Naturalized Citizen could take a case before the Supreme Court and correctly argue that under the Equal Protection Clause of the XIVth Amendment they are allowed to stand, Article II notwithstanding!

This is ridiculous beyond belief. First off, equal protection shouldn't have any impact on the natural-born citizen clause. You either are a natural-born citizen or you aren't, and it's clear what the Constitution says: only natural-born citizens may be President.
If you argue otherwise, then can you start to argue that equal protection should overturn, say, the age requirements for office, if you could argue that someone "who doesn't act like a 35 year old" became President?

Clearly not, because maturity, knowledge, and experience ultimately has no bearing on whether you can become President or not, even though that is the goal of having the 35 year old age minimum. The age limit is the age limit, regardless of what the founding fathers were hoping to accomplish with it and whether a President actually matches up with those expectations.

The same is true with being a natural-born citizen. The goal is to minimize or eliminate any possible foreign influence on the Presidency. However, the fact that such an influence may theoretically exist or have existed in the past doesn't nullify the fact that a person is still a natural-born citizen, eligible to be President.

Friggin Hilarious...

UPDATE - Apparently this is a new advertizement....  and the first political ad to ever appear on MTV.  Very interesting...

It is with great sadness and regret that I must inform you that the Morning Q program I had the honor to host with Bettyjean Kling will no longer be broadcast. Apparently the folks at No Quarter do not think that what we were doing was anything they wanted to be associated with. Or at least what I was was doing. And because we began this project under the No Quarter brand we must do as they request.

I want to first thank our wonderful producers V and LadyBoomerNYC for all of their very hard work. They are exceptional individuals that I had the pleasure to work with closely, if only briefly. I have nothing but immense respect for both of them.

They were the heart and soul of the show.

And I want to thank my co-host Bettyjean Kling. She is an outstanding person that I am so grateful to have met, gotten to know and work with. We quickly became friends and I treasure her more than I can say. I don't know what I did to deserve meeting and working with her.

But I am eternally grateful that I did.

As to the folks at No Quarter, I wish them the best. I wish things were otherwise but they aren't. And if my inexperience and awkwardness doing these past 5 shows has caused them embarrassment I apologize. It was not intentional. I gave it my best shot.

So I suck as a radio host. Whatever.

Finally, I want to thank our excellent guests and the many listeners that were willing to look past the quirks and appreciate what we tried to do. We really did try to be there for you.

Thank you, all of you, for your kind words of support.

Pagan

So, Obama is fake because he has a speech writer (the horror!), used phrases by Patrick Deval which Devel gave to him (because, you know, that's evil), and he's used phrases which were used by someone at some point in the past (did you know that one phrase he uses is an old Hopi Indian saying?! Can Obama not come up with something original?!).  Did you also know that he has campaign advisers as well?  Shocking, I know.  Meanwhile, we all know that John McCain's campaign is a one man show.  He does everything! He even puts out the plastic plates and silverware at his offices' parties!  Amazing, John McCain!

Meanwhile, I don't hear them complaining about McCain using Hillary's "ready on day one" line very much.

But seriously, I hope these people go back 10 years from now and read what they're writing today and realize just how incredibly stupid they all sound.

These guys aren't too shabby either, in one of their versions:

Be sure to check out their whole "No Quarter" DVD. Fan-freakin'-tastic...

Photographs of the Colombian military intelligence-led team that spearheaded the rescue, shown to CNN by a confidential military source, show one man wearing a bib with the Red Cross symbol. The military source said the three photos were taken moments before the mission took off to persuade the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia rebels to release the hostages to a supposed international aid group for transport to another rebel area.

Such a use of the Red Cross emblem could constitute a "war crime" under the Geneva Conventions.

Right, so there's the basis of the problem. An UNNAMED and UNCITED source within the government showed "pictures" to CNN, (which CNN did not purchase by the way due to an exorbitant cost) that supposedly show Red Cross markings on the helicopter and uniforms of the brave men who flew it in.

However, there are other problematic quotes in this article by CNN that lead me to question the authenticity of both the purported photos AND of the reporting involved in this article.

Both of Colombia's two main guerrilla armies, the FARC and the smaller National Liberation Army, have been known to misuse the Red Cross symbol, sometimes transporting fighters in ambulances. The Colombian government frequently makes international denunciations of rebel violations of international humanitarian law.

First off it appears that the terrorist organization that is at war with the legitimate government of Columbia regularly abuses the Red Cross symbol as a way to shuffle hostages, fighters, and other items around the country. In fact, their doing this is commonplace and is possibly aided by various organizatons like say, the Red Cross and other aid organizations.

The rescue ruse also included bogus communications, sent electronically and by human couriers, to convince FARC rebels that superiors were ordering them to hand over hostages to the group posing as aid workers for transfer to another rebel camp.

Apparently these terrorists use those symbols and organizations for prisoner transport so often that they don't even question why an aid organization would be helping them transport hostages who have been held for up to ten years. Add the following facts to the situation: Terrorists are excluded from the Geneva Convention BY NAME, FARC is a terrorist organization as judged by the majority of the world, including the United Nations, Columbia, the EU, the USA, and the rest of the civilized world, and Terrorists/Insurgents are not signatories of the Geneva Convention.

In fact organizations like FARC, Al Queda, Fatah, and the other terrorist groups all ignore the Geneva Convention when they take hostages, kill civilians, torture prisoners, and break laws of war by hiding behind civilians and the like.

Now, of course these organizations are in conflict with more "civilized countries" who have their hands tied by the Geneva Convention that their enemies ignore. It's rather funny to me that organizations like CNN and the Red Cross are willing to take at face value "evidence" that they do not have on hand, do not know the authenticity of, or even have any means of proving to be true. Of course, they can't prove it came from a FARC member trying to raise a ruckus within their allies in the press and international community. They also can't prove it came from a government source either, but that's where they are pointing the finger.

Now, I'm not saying that it is, or is not true. But if Columbia used a trick from FARC's own playbook against them, then bravo I say. When fighting an unconventional war, you must use unconventional tactics. FARC has been doing their worst to civilians for now over fourty years, it's about time that their enemies started actually fighting back appropriatly.

There is just one action that I see that is appropriate for dealing with a terrorist force like the FARC, or indead, Al Queda. The act of Reprisal. Since this act is LEGAL under the Geneva Convention, and since FARC constantly violated the laws of war by taking hostages, killing hostages and civilians, reprisal is a viable option for dealing with scum like this.

Reprisal is a limited, deliberate, sanctioned, and LEGAL violation of the laws of war. Normally this is done as a punishment of an enemy who violates the laws of war. Seems to me that FARC has done that for now over 40 years. Sounds to me like conducting a reprisal is far past due. Since reprisal forbids harming battlefield casualties, shipwreck survivors, prisoners of war and civilians then I have the perfect suggestion.

No Quarter.

UPDATE Yes, it appears that the Columbian military did in fact use the Red Cross emblem in an effort to free the hostages. It is still irresponsible to declare this a violation of the laws of war. Currently I'm waiting for CNN to call for the hostages to be returned to the FARC.

NO QUARTER RADIO Live Internet Talk launches “Morning Q,” an exciting new show with BettyJean and Pagan. Tune in live on Tuesday, July 15, 10-11 am ET.

BettyJean and Pagan will be hosting a daily round-up of all things for PUMA and Just Say No Deal coalition members along with important news, action items, video reviews, and exciting guests. They’ll also be answering listener questions. The call-in number is (347) 677-0766.

Their kickoff show will feature an interview segment with videographer/artist, Hillacrat, whose brand new video, “Lord Of The Democrats,” was released on Monday, July 14, 2008.

BettyJean and Pagan will be hosting a daily round-up of all things for PUMA voters and the just say no dealers along with important news, action items, video pics, exciting guests, and we will be answering listener questions, the call-in number is (347) 677-0766.

Meet the Hosts:

Pagan: blogs at Pagan Power and No Quarter. He writes “I am opinionated. I am unusual. And I am stubborn. I say what is on my mind and I really don’t care if it pisses some people off. In fact, if what I have to say causes some people to feel uncomfortable I have probably done my job. I believe that we have an obligation to speak the truth regardless of the consequences. So gird your loins, get your head on straight and enjoy the ride. Or get lost!”

BettyJean: likes to say she has been a women’s right activist since birth and doesn’t care who knows how long that has been! Ask her- she tell you – that - and a whole lot more. She describes herself as a tough ol Italian broad from Hackensack , NJ. BettyJean, aka FreeMeNow writes a Newsletter called Free US Now. Bettyjean intends to write a book which she believes will initiate ‘The New Millennium Women’s Movement of 2008’

Action Items on the agenda:
+ July 19th. Resolution Day Events
+ Write a letter to Bill
+ Can You Face Me?

Video of the day !
+ TBA?

Fact or Fiction? From Time to time we may have a few questions for our viewers !
+ Who has not endorsed Obama?
+ Which 8 delegates switched back to Hillary?
+ Can vendors write off all or part of Hillary’s debt as a tax write off

E-mail Us: Send the correct answers : morningquarter@gmail.com

Join US!
Pagan & BettyJean Live on NQR Mornings at 10 AM

You may also use this thread to make suggestions as to what should be discussed tomorrow on the show.

I will publish a press release for the show as soon as it is written.

Thank you for your patience and your participation.

Don't forget to tune in to No Quarter Radio This morning. Click on the photo above to get there. 10AM EST. Be there...

They go on to say that "Obama is in serious trouble in Missouri, Ohio, Pennsylvania and, particularly, Florida."  While Missouri would be nice to have, it's not exactly a keystone state in the campaign (with apologies to Pennsylvania). Even so, Obama is within 5% in both Missouri and Florida - hardly a bad place to me.  In the meantime, he's leading in Ohio (within 5%) and ahead by over 5% in Pennsylvania.  I'm not sure how leading by over 5% in Pennsylvania - a state which Kerry only won by 2% and Gore only won by 4% is "being in serious trouble."

Secondly, even if you take out those four states, Obama is still looking at having about 240 to 245 Electoral votes wrapped up or well in his hands.  Winning any two of those states would be enough to put him over - or doing things like winning Virginia, Colorado, and Nevada/Alaska/Montana/North Dakota/enter your favorite battleground state here.

Obama isn't "consequently" going after other red states because he doesn't feel like he can win Ohio, Pennsylvania, Missouri, or Florida, but because Obama already has other swing states such as Minnesota, Wisconsin, Washington, New Hampshire, and New Jersey already all but sown up.  He's widening the playing field not because he's desperate, but because he's in about the best position any Democratic candidate has been in since Johnson.

Yes, they make a good point about Dukakis' "17 point lead" and such as to why no one can take Obama's election for granted, and I definitely agree with that.  However, one has to learn why that 17 point lead went away.

Part of it was due to Republican attacks, for sure, but Dukakis himself also noted this:

Dukakis himself blames his defeat on the time he spent doing gubernatorial work in Massachusetts during the few weeks following the Democratic Convention. Many believed he should have been campaigning across the country. During this time, his 17-point lead in opinion polls completely disappeared as his lack of visibility allowed Bush to define the issues of the campaign.

Yes, not campainging for a while in the key time that people are paying attention will do that to you.  Dukakis was also hurt by the fact that he was fairly aloof and wasn't necessarily a great speaker and was very analytical in nature - none of which seem to be issues with Obama.

One should also note that the 17 point lead was an 11 point post-convention bounce - a bounce which generally goes away after about two weeks anyway.  I think one could argue that using the 17 point lead example is kind of disengenuous to start with since it wasn't really a "true" lead to begin with.

Also, I find it kind of funny how Obama's 5 or 6 point national lead somehow proves that he's in trouble.  Perhaps it's the inner "it's better to lose than to win" in them. "Oh my god! We're winning! Quick! We have to mess up somehow to correct this error!"

Of course, given the "17 point lead example," they would still argue that Obama was in trouble, even if he had, well, a 17 point lead.