A perfectly reputable fellow.

Turns out that Bill Ayers may not be as radical as purported. He denies ever bombing or killing anyone when he was a member of an underground movement opposed to the Vietnam War. He's now a college professor. A perfectly reputable fellow, it seems to me.

But Barack Obama was criticized during the presidential election campaign for having associated with Ayers. Such an association should come as no surprise, because Ayers is Obama's neighbor, and they served together on the board of directors of a charitable foundation.

In a news report today, Ayers lamented that his relationship with Obama became an issue.

"The more serious point," he said, "is that Obama was asked once more to defend something that ought to be at the very heart of democracy: the importance of talking to many people in this complicated and wildly diverse society, of listening with the possibility of learning something new, of speaking with the possibility of persuading or influencing others. ... In a robust and sophisticated democracy, political leaders, indeed, all of us, would seek out ways to talk with many people who hold dissenting, even radical, ideas." --Jim Broede