The question about Senator Obama's association with Bill Ayers is being taken up by the Wall Street Journal.
Sen. Clinton is almost certainly right. The Internet already has numerous references to Sen. Obama and Mr. Ayers. Sean Hannity, the conservative host of Fox News Channel's Hannity & Colmes, has devoted more than one show recently to the subject.
Sen. Obama puts up no argument. "That was the rollout of the Republican campaign against me," Sen. Obama said Thursday of the debate, pledging to a North Carolina audience to respond "sharply and crisply" when it does arise.
But first Sen. Obama has begun with Sen. Clinton, noting during the debate that her husband, former President Bill Clinton, during the last days of his administration, commuted the sentences of two Weather Underground members, including Susan Rosenberg, who was involved in the 1981 heist of a Brinks armored truck in New York that left two policemen dead.
In a conference call with reporters Thursday, Howard Wolfson, communications director for the Clinton campaign, sidestepped a question about whether Sen. Clinton approved of her husband's pardoning Ms. Rosenberg and Linda Sue Evans, a Weather Underground member implicated in several bombings in the 1980s.
Sen. Clinton is correct that Sen. Obama once served as a director for the Woods Fund and that Mr. Ayers continues to; the post pays a $6,000 annual salary. The charity which is funded by an endowment valued in 2006 at $72 million, dispenses roughly $3 million a year to about 80 Chicago-based charities, most of which are involved in neighborhood development or education initiatives. The president of the charity is Deborah Harrington; a current board member said the charity decided recently that she alone would field calls from the press. Ms. Harrington was out sick Thursday and was unable to comment, her office said.
The charity was set up in the 1950s as an offshoot of one operated by a Lincoln, Neb., telephone executive and his family.
Mr. Ayers is by far the most controversial figure on the board; most of the current and former members of the panel are prominent business leaders or businessmen.
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It appears that this story has legs like Cyd Charisse. John Rubery of Marathon Pundit has been doing the heavy lifting on this story, since well before Senator Obama put in his bid for the White House.
Ayers/Obama/Woods Fund has surfaced in the hot story of the fighting taking place in Columbia with focus on Ayers' active participation in this matter.
The Dangerous Scene On The Colombo-Ecuadorean Border (Time) #
Sat Apr 19 13:58:08 UTC 2008The Colombo-Ecuadorean border is probably Latin America's most dangerous, (although the Colombo-Venezuelan border must be a close runner up) and it was in this area that the Colombia army struck at FARC chieftain Raul Reyes on March 1. A Time reporter went and explored the place, and though it is little more than travelogue, gives the feel for what it is like. Having been there once, we think it's accurate. It presents a nuanced picture of all that is going on over there on both sides.
The Ayers connection is only now getting underway and it is a matter of much more pith and moment than the Obama Campaign suggests.
