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I’m wary of government. Part of [the Tea Party] impulse is to dislike and be worried about the rich. I’m that way too. So I don’t find them to be as atrocious as most people do, as your liberals do. I’m not a liberal.

Bill Ayers

It’s the height of the Cold War, but I grew up in apolitical family and politics wasn’t on the agenda.
BILL AYERS

Agendas Height War
If you were against slavery in 1840 and a white person, you would have been against the law, the Bible, your church, your pastor, your parents, common sense, tradition, everything. You would have been against everything.
BILL AYERS

Common Law Sense White
I wanted a racially just society. I wanted to end wars. I wanted to end white supremacy. I wanted to create a world that was based on egalitarianism, sharing, racial justice.
BILL AYERS

Egalitarianism War White
I wish I had been wiser. I wish I had been more effective, I wish I’d been more unifying, I wish I’d been more principled.
BILL AYERS

Unifying Wiser Wish
When I was arrested opposing the war in Vietnam in 1965, as I said about 20 or 30% of people were opposed to the war. By 1968, more than half of Americans were opposed to the war.
BILL AYERS

People Vietnam War
There are things about classic liberalism that obviously I’m drawn to and I bet all of you are as well. Those are things like liberty, freedom, the Bill of Rights. But the reason that I reject the label is that I grew up cutting my teeth against the liberals.
BILL AYERS

Cutting Liberty Rights
Injustice anywhere is an assault on all of us. That means that we all can get busy.
BILL AYERS

Busy Injustice Mean
I proposed a law that every country where the U.S. has a military base – those people should be allowed to vote in the American election.
BILL AYERS

Country Law Military
Well, first of all I think that we have to be careful with terms like the working class, obviously. When [Karl] Marx wrote about the working class he was writing about something much more bounded than we’re talking about.
BILL AYERS

Talking Thinking Writing
Two months after that, Kennedy was assassinated. Two months after that, Henry Kissinger emerged from the swamp he was living in at Harvard with a plan to expand the war.
BILL AYERS

Assassinated Emerged Expand Living War
The only people who have never had a problem with me speaking in their venues are independent bookstores and libraries. Universities and humanities councils have canceled me, but never an independent bookstore.
BILL AYERS

Humanity Independent People
Every relationship is an experiment and what one learns from it is so fascinating.
BILL AYERS

Experiments Fascinating Relationship
I wasn’t part of John Kennedy’s vision of the world, or Lyndon Johnson’s. I thought of them as anti-Communist imperial monsters.
BILL AYERS

Monsters Vision World
There were no political ideas. It was an apolitical time. It was the ’50s and in the privilege of the suburbs.
BILL AYERS

Ideas Political Privilege
Beginning to dismantle the Pentagon would save $1 trillion a year – a small government proposal if ever there was one.
BILL AYERS

Government Proposal Years
I didn’t kill innocent people.
BILL AYERS

Innocent Kill People

I’m wary of government. Part of [the Tea Party] impulse is to dislike and be worried about the rich. I’m that way too. So I don’t find them to be as atrocious as most people do, as your liberals do. I’m not a liberal.

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Popular Authors

I’m wary of government. Part of [the Tea Party] impulse is to dislike and be worried about the rich. I’m that way too. So I don’t find them to be as atrocious as most people do, as your liberals do. I’m not a liberal.

Related Topics

Popular Authors

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