University won't open Obama-related records now - Page 4 - U.S. Politics Online: A Political Discussion Forum

MattLarson · #46 (**permalink**) 08-20-2008

Oh, and just for the sake of accuracy, the Weathermen killed three people as a result of their bombing campaign, not two.

Furthermore, the target of the bomb that detonated in the Weathermen facility was an officer's dance. The fact that the Weathermen didn't manage a mass murder is only due to their failure to build the bomb properly. The intent was there. The device, a large bomb packed with nails, was going to be detonated at a dance - not an empty building, as Weathermen admirers like to repeat.

Matt

TSGracchus · #47 (**permalink**) 08-20-2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by MattLarson

Sorry, no.

Please research the felony murder doctrine for a clearer understanding of why what I am saying is correct, and why your phone pole analogy falls flat.

I'm talking common-sense meanings of language, not legalities. It's possible that the legal definition of murder stretches to encompass the accidental death of persons engaged in criminal activity, but to ordinary understanding that's a weird quirk of the law.

After all, the legal issue here is dead. We're concerned with a moral issue, and how we should regard what they did. If you want to include serious criminality in the analogy, say that the victim was driving while intoxicated. It's still not murder.

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Yup - and the detonation of an explosive device in a structure qualified.

Very well. I can go with arson. That probably avoids false connotations of triviality which "vandalism," however technically correct, conveys.

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They bombed buildings. They killed - whether intentionally nor not - people in the course of their criminal enterprise.

The implication of the above two sentences is that the bombs they planted in buildings killed people. This is false. The only people who were killed by their activities were themselves. A fully correct statement would be: "They bombed buildings. In the course of their criminal enterprise, several of them accidentally killed themselves."

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And I'd bet if these were "right wingers", you'd see it that way.

If they were, I SHOULDN'T see it that way. I'm as human as anyone, and we don't have an example before us. In the future, should I come across one, I shall keep this discussion in mind.

Yes, you are correct, it was three of them, not two.

andy764383 · #48 (**permalink**) 08-20-2008

UPDATE:

Stanley Kurtz has posted a update on the status of the records.

Quote:

Tuesday, August 19, 2008

Annenberg Records in Grave Danger [Stanley Kurtz]

Earlier today, I appeared on the Jerry Agar radio show, in Chicago, talking about my efforts to gain access to the Chicago Annenberg Challenge records. After my appearance, a spokesman for the University of Illinois at Chicago phoned Agar, read a statement, and was interviewed. Agar did a fantastic job of drawing this fellow out, and what emerged alarms me profoundly. Although the statement read by this spokesman for UIC claimed that the university was aggressively pursuing an agreement for legal possession of the documents, under questioning, this university spokesman clearly raised the possibility that no such agreement would be signed and that the entire Chicago Annenberg Challenge records would be returned to the donor, who he refused to name. You can listen to the interview here.

I will have more shortly.

08/19 01:09 PM

MattLarson · #49 (**permalink**) 08-20-2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by TSGracchus

I'm talking common-sense meanings of language, not legalities. It's possible that the legal definition of murder stretches to encompass the accidental death of persons engaged in criminal activity, but to ordinary understanding that's a weird quirk of the law.

After all, the legal issue here is dead. We're concerned with a moral issue, and how we should regard what they did. If you want to include serious criminality in the analogy, say that the victim was driving while intoxicated. It's still not murder.

From a moral standpoint, I believe that they are culpable in the deaths of their three co-conspirators.

If they had botched their planning and killed someone during one of their intentional bombings, that would have been murder, correct?

Quote:

Originally Posted by TSGracchus

Very well. I can go with arson. That probably avoids false connotations of triviality which "vandalism," however technically correct, conveys.

Fair enough.

Quote:

Originally Posted by TSGracchus

The implication of the above two sentences is that the bombs they planted in buildings killed people. This is false. The only people who were killed by their activities were themselves. A fully correct statement would be: "They bombed buildings. In the course of their criminal enterprise, several of them accidentally killed themselves."

What do you make of the well documented fact that one of the bombs they were building was an anti-personnel device planned for a dance at Fort Dix?

Quote:

Originally Posted by TSGracchus

If they were, I SHOULDN'T see it that way. I'm as human as anyone, and we don't have an example before us. In the future, should I come across one, I shall keep this discussion in mind.

I honestly don't care about the political bent of the bombers - left wing, right wing, it's irrelevant IMHO.

They put lives at risk by bombing buildings. They were intent on mass murder when the premature detonation killed three of their members.

But not for the accidental explosion, they would have gone on to murder who knows how many people. One doesn't wrap a bomb with nails to make a statement - that's an act of premeditation of murder.

Matt

SupPackFan · #50 (**permalink**) 08-20-2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by Imperator

If this is true, its pure Clintonian, nice, he puts them somewhere out of his hands directly, and skips the signature block ala releasing to non confid. sources..........and so it goes, hes running out of newness or "Chope’ ness", and this an issue I have heard obama sppters make hay over ala Hillary games along these lines…....

No voting block will be effected in the least if the U of Chicago, or whoever the buck has been passed to, simply decides to never release the records. Were any Dems or undecided concerned that Bill Clinton never released his medical records? Were any Dems or undecided concerned that John Kerry never released his military records? Libs will circle the wagons until this issue disappears, just as they have always done in the past.

TSGracchus · #51 (**permalink**) 08-20-2008

Andy was correct about the change in policy of the organization following the accident in the Greenwich Village apartment. My confusion lay in the fact that no bomb ever planted by the Weathermen ever did in fact hurt anyone. This struck me as unlikely if they were targeting people before the accident but not afterwards. The answer appears to be that the efforts that led to the accident constituted the group's only foray into an attempted lethal bombing, and the accident itself led them to reconsider the idea:

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After the Greenwich Village incident, the Weathermen officially went underground. WUO shrank considerably, becoming even fewer than they had been when first formed. The group was devastated by the loss of their friends, and in late April, 1970, members of the Weathermen met in California to discuss what had happened in New York and the future of the organization. The group decided to reevaluate their strategy, particularly in regard to their initial belief in the acceptability of human casualties, rejecting such tactics as kidnapping and assassinations.

They wanted to convince the American public that the United States was truly responsible for the calamity in Vietnam.[6] The group began striking at night, bombing empty offices, with warnings always issued in advance to ensure a safe evacuation. According to David Gilbert, "[their] goal was to not hurt any people, and a lot of work went into that. But we wanted to pick targets that showed to the public who was responsible for what was really going on."[6] After the Greenwich Village explosion, no one was killed by WUO bombs.[7]

We were very careful from the moment of the townhouse on to be sure we weren't going to hurt anybody, and we never did hurt anybody. Whenever we put a bomb in a public space, we had figured out all kinds of ways to put checks and balances on the thing and also to get people away from it, and we were remarkably successful.
—Bill Ayers[6]

Nothing like a brush with the reality of death to give anyone with a conscience second thoughts about cavalierly killing people. Of course, one must have a conscience in the first place for this to work.

TSGracchus · #52 (**permalink**) 08-20-2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by MattLarson

From a moral standpoint, I believe that they are culpable in the deaths of their three co-conspirators.

If they had botched their planning and killed someone during one of their intentional bombings, that would have been murder, correct?

I would say so. However, there's a difference between taking an action that leads to the unintended deaths of victims, and taking an action that leads to the unintended death of oneself. The people who were making that bomb were responsible for their own actions. That would not have been true of someone who was killed without ever knowing a bomb was set to go off.

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What do you make of the well documented fact that one of the bombs they were building was an anti-personnel device planned for a dance at Fort Dix?

I believe I covered that in the post above.

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They put lives at risk by bombing buildings.

Yes. I don't believe anyone here is suggesting that this was not wrong. It's all a matter of degree and perspective.

Imperator · #53 (**permalink**) 08-20-2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by AJG

No need to get impacient. I can read (which I think I've proven time and time again).

Forgive me and just respect that I can misinterpret or give a thoughtless answer once in awhile.

no problem.

Imperator · #54 (**permalink**) 08-20-2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by TSGracchus

My sense is that in both cases it depends on which beliefs one is talking about. There's a lot to admire in both cases. There are also some things not to admire, a vandalistic past in the case of Ayers and some over-the-top rhetoric in the case of Wright. However, if you're looking to him to repudiate everything ever said or done by either man and have nothing to do with them henceforth -- well, I sincerely HOPE you will be disappointed -- although Obama is a politician, so you never know.

You know, some of this comes out of the COINTELPRO operation from the late '60s, in which the radicals of that time were made out to be worse than they really were, and the entire antiwar movement tarred by association with them, to try to discredit the movement. What was done to the Weathermen was a magnification and mischaracterization of a core of violence that, in this case, at least existed; what was done to the Black Panthers or to Malcolm X's movement was even worse, since in that case there was no such core. Let's finally recognize that what the FBI and government agencies did to shape public opinion at that time deserves no respect. The Weathermen committed crimes -- they destroyed government property and (perhaps) recklessly endangered people. That's the core of truth underlying all the lies. Granted that it was illegal and, in my opinion, wrong -- how seriously should we take it, merely because the FBI decided that the label "terrorists" should apply?

Do you believe everything the government tells you?

Ayres bio. is open to one and all, as his intransigence re: any and I mean any remorse, and while we are in that era, how about those Puerto Rican terrorists that got early release to help out Hillary ion her NY senate run?
It appears the left are congenitally incapable of calling a spade a spade, as is Obama, so he comes by it honestly I'd say.

Lets not dick around here, you don't choose just anyone’s house for your coming out party, you know it , I know it, these things are thought out, the motive is support and money.

Ayres in Obamas opinion had the reputation in town and the friends and the connections, so he chose his house, he was the host, dance around all you like, that’s not gonna change. You don’t choose a host for an important event like that and expect to meet anyone who are not like minded, that’s the whole point, and you apepal to those folks by BEING like minded.

Imperator · #55 (**permalink**) 08-20-2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by SupPackFan

No voting block will be effected in the least if the U of Chicago, or whoever the buck has been passed to, simply decides to never release the records. Were any Dems or undecided concerned that Bill Clinton never released his medical records? Were any Dems or undecided concerned that John Kerry never released his military records? Libs will circle the wagons until this issue disappears, just as they have always done in the past.

absolutely, kerry promised to release his military records, to this day we have have not seen them......

Rakkasan · #56 (**permalink**) 08-20-2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by SupPackFan

No voting block will be effected in the least if the U of Chicago, or whoever the buck has been passed to, simply decides to never release the records. Were any Dems or undecided concerned that Bill Clinton never released his medical records? Were any Dems or undecided concerned that John Kerry never released his military records? Libs will circle the wagons until this issue disappears, just as they have always done in the past.

great post and so true

TSGracchus · #57 (**permalink**) 08-20-2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by Imperator

Ayres in Obamas opinion had the reputation in town and the friends and the connections, so he chose his house, he was the host, dance around all you like, that’s not gonna change. You don’t choose a host for an important event like that and expect to meet anyone who are not like minded, that’s the whole point, and you apepal to those folks by BEING like minded.

I'm not dancing around anything. I imagine that, to a degree, they are like-minded. Hell, Ayers and I are, to a degree, like-minded. I don't approve of the bomb-planting activity he did for a few brief years in his youth, but I completely approve of the cause for which he did it. If he serves similarly good causes today in less objectionable fashion, that's super. If he does so well enough to earn that kind of influence, even better.

Imperator · #58 (**permalink**) 08-20-2008

Quote:

Originally Posted by TSGracchus

I'm not dancing around anything. I imagine that, to a degree, they are like-minded. Hell, Ayers and I are, to a degree, like-minded. I don't approve of the bomb-planting activity he did for a few brief years in his youth, but I completely approve of the cause for which he did it. If he serves similarly good causes today in less objectionable fashion, that's super. If he does so well enough to earn that kind of influence, even better.

using that anology you could make a case for obama having a shindig with hitler ot Moa....ayers wasn't just some ideologue.

andy764383 · #59 (**permalink**) 08-20-2008

UPDATE:

Stanley Kurtz posted this latest update:

Quote:

Endangered Documents Act [Stanley Kurtz]

There are new developments in my quest to gain access to the Chicago Annenberg Challenge records, to prevent them from being returned to their original donor, and to preserve them from tampering. (For background, see my piece, "Chicago Annenberg Challenge Shutdown?") The Associate Press has reported on the story. Over at JustOneMinute, Tom Maguire makes note of the fact that the AP story fails to mention the contradiction between Obama’s Annenberg connection and his claim that Ayers was just "a guy who lives in my neighborhood." I find it odd that the reporter interviewed a spokesman for UIC, yet neither asked me to comment, nor even mentioned my name. It’s hard not to suspect that the AP is trying to give the impression of due diligence, while nonetheless attempting to control the story-line in a way that minimizes damage to Obama.

Although I linked to it yesterday, I would strongly urge interested readers to consider Steve Diamond’s important post, " 'Annenberg-Gate' — It’s not the crime, it’s the cover up." If Diamond’s legal analysis is correct (and I’ve been hearing a similar analysis from others), then UIC’s claim that it cannot show me the collection because it lacks a deed of gift is merely a "flimsy manufactured excuse." That’s because, according to Diamond, the mere act of giving the documents to the library suffices to transfer ownership. If Diamond’s analysis is correct, then the donor’s demand to purge the collection of "personnel information that could include names..." is most disturbing. First, because it could serve as a tactic to force delay in making the collection accessible. Second, because it would appear to require that someone move through the collection to blank out names that could be of central importance to what I hope to discover. Again, if Diamond is right, there is really no basis for making any modifications to the documents at all, and no basis for yesterday’s claim by a university spokesman that, in the absence of a signed deed of gift, the entire collection might be returned to its original owner.

Diamond also delicately raises the possibility that there may be direct or indirect links between the donor of the Chicago Annenberg Collection records and individuals connected to the Obama campaign. This is an important reason why we need to know the name of the donor.

So I remain unsatisfied with mainstream media reporting on this issue, and continue to be extremely concerned for the safety and fate of the documents. We need more public pressure, and better reporting. I plan to say more down the road about Obama’s role at Annenberg, even without access to the records at UIC. I also plan to say more about the detailed finding aid now in my possession, and about the contents of the single file folder I was permitted to examine.

Let me make one broad point today. Notice that the critical evaluation of Woods Fund grant programs I discuss in "Senator Stealth," my piece in the current issue of National Review, occurred in 1995. That was the same year the Chicago Annenberg Challenge began, with Obama as board chairman, and the same year Obama launched his first campaign for State Senate, at a political coming out party at the home of Ayers and Dohrn, among other venues. In 1995, in other words, Obama moved to increase his influence over two local foundations, each of which would disburse money to his radical political-organizer friends, and even to his future campaign ground troops. This alone raises many interesting and important questions, some of which I pursue in "Senator Stealth." But I note that, if names were to be purged from the Chicago Annenberg Collection records, it could inhibit my ability to follow critical leads on this, and other, aspects of this story.

If you would like to keep up the pressure on UIC to protect these documents, to release the name of the donor, and to make this material accessible to me and to the public, you can email University of Illinois President B. Joseph White here. Phone numbers for President White’s two offices are (312) 413-9097 and (217) 333-3070. Snail mail addresses for the offices can be found here.

08/20 12:15 PM

goober · #60 (**permalink**) 08-20-2008

So I guess you don't believe in private property rights.
These records are still the property of the donor, and the donor has the right to do whatever he wants with them.
When he transfers ownership to the University, then it's up to the University to decide.
If the University seems to be bending over backwards to please the donor, well, that's just common sense, when you want more donations, you don't want a story going around that a donor is sorry he donated to the University. That could inhibit future donations.

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