I'm freaking fed up with the Bill Ayers crap. Ayers went to great lengths to not harm anyone with his acts. Bombing stuff is dangerous and probably over the top but the only people that died were their own. On the other hand, McCain...
When are we going to talk about the students that were killed on school campuses!!!!! The Ayers thing has to be put in to context. The "terrorist" label is un freakin believable. Who are the terrorists? We thought the National Guard who killed those kids were.
I remember the James Rector killing very well. I had a copy of the Berkeley Barb for many years with a tribute to Rector in it. It was one of my prized possessions, as well as a "We Love You Tanya" poster. I was in Berkeley in 1971 and was present the day the fence came down at People's Park. I also remember coming out of Sproul and walking down Telly and seeing thousands in the street and police cars doing 50+ mph flying up the street. I turned east on Durant and started running toward the Top Dog. I looked back and saw riflemen on each of the corner buildings firing into the crowd. By that time. they were smart enough to use rubber bullets, but nonetheless it was terrifying. It's a miracle no one died that day.
From my point of view, Vietnam was a joke and a totally ridiculous war. When Ali refused to go, I decided I'd never go. I'd have moved, shot a toe off, (I had a copy of 1001 ways to beat the draft) , whatever. My draft number was 111 and they never got that high. That McCain was a POW, tough luck Johnny, I had friends that didn't come back or came back in shambles from seeing death on the ground. It was obvious to me that the war was BS. My biggest regret about both of the Iraq wars is that I didn't hit the streets again.
So, it's OK for McCain to drop bombs on Vietnam and it's called love of country and Ayers is somehow a terrorist. I guess there's a few Vietnamese folk who consider McCain a terrorist. It's all about perspective. "America Right or Wrong" is a terrorist idea. Ayers was fighting for what he thought was best for America, just like hundreds of thousands of us who protested. Remember that the non-violence protests K brought MLK and Bobby's deaths. At least Ayers tried to avoid harming people as compared to McCain, who knew damn well that people would and did die at his hand. McCain killed humans and Ayers didn't and Ayers is the bad guy, if that ain't "America right or wrong" I don't know what is.
So, where is the MSM tributes to Rector the Kent State 4 and all of the wounded that tried to stop an unjust war. Why is no one putting Ayer's deeds in context, it's a compelling story. Torture of American soldiers by the Vietnamese was wrong, but killing students on campuses is wrong too. When will McCain talk about those kids? Never, is my guess, he probably thinks of them as collateral damage.