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It wasn’t [Barack] Obama per se; it was the feeling on the ground; it was seeing an old black woman in a wheelchair being wheeled by her son waving a big American flag, and then seeing a guy with his baby in his arms saying,

Bill Ayers

I dropped out in ’64. And I came back to Michigan, in ’65. In 1965, when I came back I had never heard of Vietnam.
BILL AYERS

Country Dropped Heard People
I spoke at the University of Georgia, and a whole contingent of Tea Party people in Hell’s Angels regalia came in and sat in the front and scowled at me while I gave my talk.
BILL AYERS

Angel Government Party
[Students for a Democratic Society] was on many campuses and it was a powerful organization. It was founded by Tom Hayden, who passed away very recently.
BILL AYERS

Organization Powerful Reading
So we were ecstatic and we swirled around spontaneously, the campus in Ann Harbor and about 4,000 of us landed on the steps of the president of the University of Michigan’s home.
BILL AYERS

Home President
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 said something idiotic like, as [William] Shakespeare says, “Action is eloquence,” and the judge just frowned at me and gave me a couple weeks in jail.
BILL AYERS

Couple Jail Judging
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
And afterwards the head of the group got to the microphone and said, I’m surprised that I agree with almost everything you said, but I’m worried that you’re a big government guy.
BILL AYERS

Agree Government Guy Surprise Worried
I don’t buy the whole mythology of the sixties. I think I’m an intergenerational person.
BILL AYERS

Mythology Persons Thinking
All of us pursued our own passions and our own interests. One of my brothers was filmmaker. One of my brothers was a teacher. My sister was a librarian.
BILL AYERS

All Filmmakers Librarian One Teachers
Nixon probably was a nice guy.
BILL AYERS

Guy Nice Probably
One of the things that happened that I think is noteworthy, my parents were pretty tolerant people given their position in society.
BILL AYERS

Agency Children Thinking
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

Rights Support War
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 People War
We should open our eyes, see what’s in front of us, and act.
BILL AYERS

Eye Fronts Should
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

It wasn’t [Barack] Obama per se; it was the feeling on the ground; it was seeing an old black woman in a wheelchair being wheeled by her son waving a big American flag, and then seeing a guy with his baby in his arms saying,

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It wasn’t [Barack] Obama per se; it was the feeling on the ground; it was seeing an old black woman in a wheelchair being wheeled by her son waving a big American flag, and then seeing a guy with his baby in his arms saying,

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