Zombietime post about Ayers’ book Prairie Fire leads to his denial of Emeritus status
During Barack Obama’s 2008 run for the presidency, I dug up an extremely rare original edition of Prairie Fire, the forgotten communist manifesto co-written by Obama’s friend and colleague William Ayers, and I published excerpts of the book at zombietime.
As I wrote at the time, “This essay only exists to correct and unequivocally debunk claims routinely made by the mainstream media over the last few weeks … that William Ayers wasn’t such a bad guy after all, and that it is no shame to be associated with him.” Read the full essay to see the full extent of the devastating evidence against Ayers.
In my exposé, I highlighted what I thought were the most noteworthy aspects of Prairie Fire, including the part where Ayers brags about and then lists in detail the numerous terrorist bombings he carried out in the 1970s; where he describes himself as a communist, and cites his desire for a communist revolution to overthrow the United States; where he cites the many motivations driving the Weather Underground’s terror campaign, most of which had nothing whatsoever to do with the Vietnam War (as the media endlessly claims to this day); and so on. I also listed the many close links between Ayers and Obama.
Almost as an aside, I pointed out halfway through the report an absurd detail that I noticed by accident when scanning one of the book’s pages — that Ayers and his co-authors had dedicated Prairie Fire to (among dozens of lesser known criminals and radicals) Sirhan Sirhan, the assassin who killed Robert F. Kennedy.
If this had been an isolated fact, it would have been outrageous enough, but compared to the numerous other outrages in the book, it practically didn’t even seem worth mentioning — at least to my mind.
Boy, was I wrong.
As I had hoped, the report did ignite a massive amount of publicity and coverage. But most of that coverage barely mentioned most of the damning facts which I had highlighted; instead, to my astonishment, the blog posts and TV reports and newspaper articles focused almost entirely on the Sirhan Sirhan dedication, which somehow struck a nerve in the national consciousness.
Unfortunately, my Prairie Fire essay failed to derail Obama’s run for the White House, but now two years later it has had an unexpected side effect — a fitting and ironic postscript to the whole affair:
Bill Ayers denied emeritus status at UIC
Son of RFK — now U. of I. board chair — rips prof for dedicating book to his father’s assassin
When retiring University of Illinois at Chicago professor Bill Ayers co-wrote a book in 1973 [sic], it was dedicated in part to Sirhan Sirhan, the assassin of Robert F. Kennedy.
That came back to haunt Ayers when the U. of I. board, now chaired by Kennedy’s son, considered his request for emeritus status Thursday. It was denied in a unanimous vote.
Before the vote, an emotional Chris Kennedy spoke out against granting the status to Ayers.
“I intend to vote against conferring the honorific title of our university to a man whose body of work includes a book dedicated in part to the man who murdered my father, Robert F. Kennedy,” he said.
“There is nothing more antithetical to the hopes for a university that is lively and yet civil, or to the hopes of our founding fathers for their great experiment of a self-governing people, than to permanently seal off debate with one’s opponents by killing them.”
Take that, Bill Ayers!
[Scan of part of the dedication page; see the original report for the full-page scan and more details.]
See also Michelle Malkin: Weather Underground terrorist Bill Ayers denied emeritus status
(Note: This is not a photo of me, but rather
1Rich on Sep 24, 2010 at 9:14 am:
Thank you for this. Too bad it couldn’t derail that hope/change thing. Le sigh.
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2Perpetua on Sep 24, 2010 at 9:38 am:
To me it is very sad that it had to be someone who was so personally involved to call him out. If Kennedy’s own son hadn’t been chair, this wouldn’t have happened.
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3Curmudgeon Geographer on Sep 24, 2010 at 11:12 am:
This is a great day. Thank you for sharing this great news.
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4tarpon on Sep 24, 2010 at 3:12 pm:
I guess the bombs were not enough for these liberals.
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5CattusMagnus on Sep 24, 2010 at 3:46 pm:
Put that in your pipe and smoke it Billy Boy!
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6psaturn on Sep 24, 2010 at 9:00 pm:
I first saw this news on Drudge and was thinking of your article when you discovered the dedication to Sirhan Sirhan..and there are still professors at UIC who were shocked he did not get emeritus status. Oh well…
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7Charles on Sep 25, 2010 at 8:22 am:
Congratulations!! The world sometimes works in unexpected ways!
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8Rose on Sep 25, 2010 at 11:29 am:
Thank GOD!
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9blangwort on Sep 26, 2010 at 6:24 pm:
Zombie, we owe you a great debt for digging this up. Ayers is toe cheese in my book. This is merely justice delayed for a disgusting coward who should have been imprisoned decades ago for his deeds.
John Brown was a wide eyed religious nut who ultimately may have set the cause of freedom backward by many decades. Meanwhile, though Harriet Tubman understandably thought Brown’s sacrifice was noble, she probably did more by helping slaves to escape than Brown ever did in his “direct actions.” It is understandable that he believed the cause was noble. However, the ends never justify the means. Winning hearts and minds means not pointing a gun at their faces. Patriots such as Gandhi and Dr. King have showed the world that dramatic policy changes are possible without violence, fear, or rancor.
Ayers never understood that. Clearly he believed that the ends DO justify the means. And that is one of the very most popular paving stones on the way to hell.
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10eots on Sep 28, 2010 at 1:01 pm:
To me one of the most infuriating and unbelievable aspects of the 08 election was the fact that Ayers was completely rehabilitated. Good job Zombie!
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11Spiny Norman on Sep 28, 2010 at 9:54 pm:
Well, eots, not completely rehabilitated, as we can see. ; ^ )
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12Bakunin on Oct 1, 2010 at 8:34 am:
“Winning hearts and minds means not pointing a gun at their faces.”
Of course, this statement doesn’t apply if you are in the U.S. Military! SUPPORT THE TROOP, HIPPY!
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13Daniel Noe on Oct 1, 2010 at 12:00 pm:
It is still nice to have a gun should the heartless lose their minds.
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14Ken on Oct 1, 2010 at 4:18 pm:
Wow, RFK’s son was the chair of the board? Man, small world.
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15sarainitaly on Oct 6, 2010 at 4:05 am:
well done, zombie, well done!
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16richb on Oct 18, 2010 at 5:27 pm:
Sometimes there is a little justice in the world. Sometimes we have to live with the small things.
Good Job Zombie, for helping making it happen. Of course if there was true justice, Bill Ayers would be in the next cell in prison with Sirhan.
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Thank you Zombie….your work is now getting to the masses!!! please keep bringing the truth.
Obama will aim for the college vote in 2012. We must reach college students and make them aware of what a liar Barry really is and the type of people he surrounds himself with. Thank you again
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