By GottaLaff
Via JustForTheRecord over at DKos:
[T]his NPR piece speaks to the Republican funded cause that Obama and Ayers worked on together. And that:"It was never a concern by any of us in the Chicago school reform movement that he had led a fugitive life years earlier," said former Illinois state Republican Rep. Diana Nelson, who worked with both Obama and Ayers over the years. "It's ridiculous. There is no reason at all to smear Barack Obama with this association. It's nonsensical, and it just makes me crazy. It's so silly."
Call me crazy, but I bet they don't take it back. Snerk. Story and audio here.
First, Obama began working with Ayers and others (Republicans, Independents, and Democrats) at the Chicago Annenberg Challenge. Well, what is the Anneberg Challenge? Who is Annenberg? Well according to NPR,
The Obama campaign says he first met Ayers in 1995, when Obama became chair of the board of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, a $50 million fund that awarded grants to groups trying to implement new programs to improve inner city education in Chicago.
Walter Annenberg, a lifelong Republican and former ambassador who was appointed by Presidents Nixon and Reagan, funded an ambitious program to reform urban education in many cities in the mid 1990s. Ayers was an important member of the group that developed and wrote the grant proposal to the Annenberg Foundation.
A Republican community organizer? Say it ain't so, Walter!
Second, there were people of all political persuasions working on this effort with this "terrorist" Ayers and who saw him as acceptable and Obama was no closer than any of the others.
...no one on the board or on the Annenberg Challenge staff remembers Obama being any closer to Ayers than to any other member of the board. The Annenberg board also included several civic, business and education leaders, many of them Republicans...
But wait! There's more!
"I don't remember ever hearing anyone raise concerns or questions or concerns about [Ayers'] background," says Anne Hallett, who has worked closely with Ayers on the Annenberg Challenge grant and with Obama on education and other community and legislative matters. "And that included everybody I was engaged with," including prominent Republicans, and corporate and civic leaders in Chicago, Hallett adds.
Well shut my mouth and call me a terrorist supporter.
So not only was Obama working on a Republican funded initiative, but prominent Republicans were involved on the board with Ayers.[...]
Obama was new to Chicago. [...] However, Ayers had been there for years, building a reputation that was so mainstream that a life long Republican, who was a former Ambassador appointed by Nixon and Regan, allowed the release of $50 Million to let him, prominent Republicans, corporate, civic leaders, and a Harvard trained community organizer form a board to oversee the disbursement of these funds related to school reform.
Hey righties... Don'tcha just hate it when your premise to smear and destroy gets utterly obliterated? Gramm-pa McCain? IWRC* Palin? ::cricket, cricket::
*"In What Respect, Charlie?"
H/t: I forgot again. Apologies.
.jpg)