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I read as far as his refusal to take it back. I was the head of the anti-war movement down the road from you at Western Mi. (I'd of been with you at UM, but that's another story.)
I fought against the bomb throwers then, and I'll fight against them now. It doesn't work to say the problem was "them"--some conspiracy on the part of the govt. at that time. The "Underground" gave them the "ammo" they needed to light a fire under the nationalists--and as far as I am concerned Ayers has a responsibility but is denying it in this interview.
By taking up arms Ayers and violent advocates like him didn't do the first major non-violent populist uprising in the country any favors--and he almost knocked off Obama in the process. Thankfully, he kept his mouth shut during the campaign.
The WU were mostly the hotheads and ideologues of the movement. The example of ML King (and Gandhi, of course)--as close as we were to them at the time--wasn't good enough for them. They concluded that violence against violence was the only answer--and obviously Ayers still thinks the same way.
He's not even entering into a conversation on a responsible level.
I've written my own book about this, which, of course, hasn't been published, because it's much more newsworthy to throw bombs than advocate peace. The real story of what happened in those years still hasn't been told. When the WU started to advocate violence at Western to start burning and bombing, I said "no," and if you do it, I wasn't going to cover for them. It was a battle waged behind the scenes at colleges all over the country.
In the case at my school, the result was they waited until I left to do their deeds--and throw the cause of peace out the window for the better part of the next forty years. History didn't prove them right, it proved those with the discipline to remain non-violent right.
That he still won't take it back says he isn't much different than the ideologue he was back then, and the years in between have taught him nothing. I consider Ayers a man who deserves the contempt of not just the mob, but those who refused to be caught up in the mob mentality at that time--and today.
