No Chicago Columnist in modern times is more iconic than Mike Royko. Royko passed away in 1997. Though he passed way too early, his "ghost" hovers over Chicago's journalistic community. He worked for the (now defunct) Daily News, and then the Suntimes, until Rupert Murdoch purchased the paper, at which point Royko had the prescient inclination to say the following:
"No self-respecting fish would be wrapped in a Murdoch paper," and that, "His goal is not quality journalism. His goal is vast power for Rupert Murdoch, political power."
Thus, in 1984 Royko moved to the Chicago Tribune. On the Tribune's website today, columnist Eric Zorn rehashes a 1990 Royko column on Ayers.
18 years later, some still need a little bit of perspective.
It's very clear Royko had considerable contempt for the action of William Ayers and the Weather Underground's actions. He essentially dismissed their actions as juvenile and inconsequential:
Anyway, the Weathermen went "underground," as they liked to put it for dramatic effect. Some later blew themselves up while trying to build a bomb. Apparently they had dozed through their college chemistry classes. A couple of others became robbers, but most universities don't teach bank heists, or even remedial heisting, so they didn't have much of a flair for it and wound up in prison...
So in the 1980s, they began drifting out of the "underground" and gave themselves up. The problem was finding someone to give themselves up to. The authorities figured that prosecuting them wasn't worth the bother.
Albeit tinged with snark, Royko continues and displays much more "Christian" spirit than the current "crusaders" who maintain the righteous indignation over 40-year old Vietnam protests.
With all forgiven, they've rejoined society. Some have even used their prominent family connections - clout they once condemned as evil - to land better jobs than the mopes they hoped to lead to revolution have been able to land.
And one of those who has now become a useful citizen is Bill Ayers, now 45, a parent and an assistant professor of education at the University of Illinois at Chicago. You may have read all about him in a recent issue of the weekly Reader.
One thing about Royko is that he didn't hide his personal feelings behind generalities or ideologies. He was an investigator, but he wasn't an alarmist. He spoke his mind. I mean, this guy wrote Boss while Richard J. Daley was still mayor. The article continues:
Back when he was a young radical, I thought he was kind of a jerk. I wanted to see if there was reason to change this opinion. But, no, I still think he's a jerk.
As the story noted, he was wearing a T-shirt that read: "America is like a melting pot: the people at the bottom get burned and the scum floats to the top."
That confirms something I've always believed about people like Ayers and his fellow well-born, well-bred suburban revolutionaries. Despite all their fine talk about helping the down-trodden, they had nothing but contempt for those at the bottom. They assumed that those who were born poor couldn't achieve anything without the leadership and teachings of bright people such as Bill Ayers. So it stands to reason, as the T-shirt implies, that those who managed to accomplish something without Ayers' help must have used sneaky, low-down methods. Thus, they are "scum."
...In fairness to him, he's now working for a good cause, improving public education. He's become a leader in the so-called school reform program. (However, he does send his own kids to private schools. No sense in letting your own offspring get scorched at the bottom of that melting pot.)
But what struck me most about the story was that there was nothing in there about the Persian Gulf. Nothing about Ayers revving up his old anti-war sentiments, now that there are a few hundred thousand American youths in the Mideast desert. Not one word about our being on the brink of a questionable war from someone who made Vietnam protest the reason for his existence. And for having a whoopee time breaking other people's windows...
Royko gets it. He doesn't like the guy. He says so. But as much as he doesn't like him, he recognizes the passage of time and Ayers' accomplishments. It's kind of **cough,** "fair and balanced."
In today's column, Zorn points out some other interesting details regarding pre-08 campaign coverage of Ayers:
These are only two of 60 references to Ayers in the 1990s I found in local news archives available on Nexis. Twenty one of them make reference to his unseemly past—it was no secret—but 39 do not.
He was publishing books on education, helping lead a charge to get grant money for school reform and being honored as Chicago's Citizen of the Year in 1997.
Aside from Royko's "I still think he's a jerk" column in 1990, I found only two objections to Ayers' civic rehabilitation in the decade's news archives: a 1993 letter to the Tribune and a 1999 guest commentary.
If there were protests or organized efforts opposing Ayers, the papers didn't cover them.
If any of Mayor Richard M. Daley's feckless opponents tried to use his approval of Ayers as an issue in the 1990s, I can find no evidence of it.
In the 1990s, William Ayers was not considered a terrorist. Obama did not associate with "terrorist" Bill Ayers because I'm pretty sure all of the WU were out of grade school during the Vietnam-era. If Royko was alive today, he may criticize Obama for having poor taste in acquaintances, but I doubt the descriptor "terrorist" would even cross his mind except to chastise those in his profession who choose to perpetuate this bullshit storyline. To think that John Kass essentially occupies Royko's space in the Tribune is enough to make me vomit.
I understand Ayers is only an issue because the Republicans have nothing else to offer. I understand increased sensitivities about terrorism after 9/11. I understand the Internet essentially gives anyone a platform from which to preach. I understand the psychos yelling "terrorist" and "kill him" at McPalin rallies are so wrapped in hatred and detached from reality, that the a sensible comment from a journalist, politician, or circus freak won't mean shit.
In some respect, this is less about Ayers, and more about the state of the Media and electorate in 2008. And damn, was Royko right about Rupert Murdoch.
Cross-posted here.