That's in the nature of social change. So you can analyze what didn't work, but it's very hard to predict what will work. Bill Ayers More Quotes by Bill Ayers More Quotes From Bill Ayers [Martin Luther King] King was a socialist and King was an activist who was really a radical by the end. Bill Ayers luther ends kings It's not Lyndon Johnson who makes the black freedom movement; it's the black freedom movement who makes Lyndon Johnson. Bill Ayers johnson black movement I came back to Ann Harbor, got caught up with people who were much more sophisticated than I, and it was an exciting time because my eyes were opening and that's always exciting and Michigan is the place where we had the first teach-in against the war. Bill Ayers eye war people If you listen to the debate, [Barack Obama] and [John] McCain said the same thing about gay rights. Bill Ayers debate gay rights I was a good liberal in some sense at that point. I wanted to end a war. I wanted to support the civil rights movement. Bill Ayers support rights war It's worth remembering that in 1965, something like 20% of Americans were against the war. Something like 70% were for the war. So, it wasn't a popular or an easy thing to do. Bill Ayers easy remember war It felt to me like I was living my life in a way that didn't make mockery of my values. That's what I intended to do. So, that became a very radicalizing proposition for me. Bill Ayers mockery living-my-life way Even there, [Barack] Obama's generals, his Pentagon, they're telling him what to do. And the force for gay rights is inevitable. And you can say Obama will help us, and maybe he will, but only if we have something on the ground that will make him help us. Frankly, the gay movement on the ground has been one of the great propulsive things that has made politicians do what they do. Bill Ayers movement gay rights I don't know that I ever bought into the "American dream." I was a child of privilege. I grew up in the '50s and it was a quiet time in America, at least on the surface and I grew up in a kind of feathery bed of privilege. Bill Ayers dream children america That's what [Abraham] Lincoln said. "The white man will always be above the black man. I don't want them to run for office, or have political rights, or vote. I want them to go back to Africa." Bill Ayers rights running men This 1965. We went to trial on our city. We were obviously borrowing tactics and strategy from the Black freedom movement, and we were echoing their approach to things. Bill Ayers black cities trials Organizing the working class in England or the U.S. or any other advanced capitalist country has been a daunting challenge. Bill Ayers challenges class country There was one moment when J. Edgar Hoover and us had the same distorted lens about who we were - "a real threat," you know? He thought so and we thought so and we were buddies in that regard. Bill Ayers lenses moments real Now in my view, if you were to line up the Presidents in the order of who made the greatest accomplishments, you'd put Lyndon Johnson in that arena with both Roosevelts probably, and [Abraham] Lincoln and so on. But the idea that Lyndon Johnson was operating as a free agent and coming up with these ideas on his own is nonsense. Bill Ayers views order ideas [Lyndon ] Johnson was responding to a black freedom movement that was tearing the country open and he did what he had to do as a conservative politician. Bill Ayers black movement country Lyndon Johnson who was the president who was executing that war, announced in the spring of 1968 that he would not seek the presidency again. He would go to Paris and end the war in Vietnam. Well we were ecstatic. Bill Ayers paris spring war Something about the fact that an African American had, given the long sad history of our country, now become President - that was exhilarating. Bill Ayers african-american long country [Students for a Democratic Society] it's a social democratic program. Bill Ayers program social students We were very excited and we brought speakers in then it so happened that there was a marine recruiter in the center of campus and one of our brothers, one SDS person put up a sign with a quote from the Nuremberg trial and an arrow point at the marine recruiter, saying, "This man is a war criminal." My younger brother and I, he was freshman and I was a sophomore, got caught up in the debates that were swirling around the center of campus and the young Trotskyists had put out a fact sheet on Vietnam that was phenomenal. Bill Ayers marine brother war One-hundred facts about Vietnam and we studied the fact sheet and got in to these arguments and it was fantastic, and I remember one moment when we heard two students saying don't talk to those guys, meaning my brother and me. They've just memorized that stupid fact sheet. And we thought, gosh do we sound that good? It didn't seem possible. But that was my introduction to politics. Bill Ayers brother stupid two
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