Something in the Ayers last night for Obama

Cal Skinner of the McHenry County Blog watched Chicago Week in Review yesterday evening on the local PBS affiliate. He said that CBS 2 Chicago's Mike Flannery, one of the reporters who tried, unsuccessfully, to get Barack Obama to answer questions about Tony Rezko, brought up another skeleton in the senator's closet--former Weather Underground terrorist Bill Ayers.

For those who are unfamiliar with the story:

Ayers is married to fellow 1960s ex-terrorist Bernardine Dohrn, both are tenured university professors and respected liberals living in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. In 1995, escorted by then-State Senator Alice Palmer, the future Cult of Change leader was introduced to Ayers and Dohrn as Palmer's successor. She later tried to keep her seat, but Obama double-crossed her--another story for another time.

Obama and Ayers served on the board of The Woods Fund, and the pair participated in a few panel disussions over the years, with Dohrn along for the ride at least once.

In 2001, Ayers donated $200 to Obama's campaign fund.

Both Ayers and Dohrn are unrepentant about their terrorist pasts.

Back to Flannery: He explained on the show that if Hillary Rodham Clinton doesn't use the Ayers connection against Obama, the Republicans will.

On the latter--I can guarantee that will happen.

Here's a passage of Audacity of Hope, like the Reverend Wright-inspired title of the book, that Obama would like to take back, considering the senator's recently discovered connections to Ayers:

In my teens, I became fascinated with the Dionysian, up for grabs quality of the era, and through books, films, and music, I soaked in a vision of the sixties very different from the one my mother talked about: images of Huey Newton, the '68 Democratic National Convention, the Saigon airlift, and the Stones at Altamont. If I had no immediate reasons to pursue revolution, I decided nevertheless that in style and attitude, I, too, could be a rebel, unconstrained by the wisdom of the over-thirty crowd.

Technorati tags: democrats Barack Obama Obama Politics Bill Ayers terrorism Weather Underground Left Wing Extremists Chicago media