Recently Obama has been criticized for his association with former domestic terrorist Bill Ayers. Ayers who was a member of the Weather Underground, a group which had issued a “Declaration of a State of War” and bombed a variety of targets here in the U.S. in protest of the Vietnam War.

In addition to bombings the Weathermen also robbed banks, and for a fee, broke Timothy Leary out of jail.

Often cited was Bill Ayers statement about that time, “We didn’t do enough.” Ayers has responded on his blog with, a comic strip.

The implication usually is that Ayers meant that they should have bombed more, or committed more acts of violence. It is that to which Ayers specifically responds:

So this clears up the fact that he was not saying that they should have bombed more.

But note that he does not even issue a token statement of regret about the violent acts that they did commit, and that he rationalizes them. “No one was ever hurt,” may be true, but they were bombs, by design they destroy and kill.

It could have just as easily been that the warnings failed to protect, or the bomb went off prematurely. The fickle nature of working with explosives is driven home by the fact that three members of the Weathermen were killed in assembling such bombs.

More importantly, exactly how was this going to bring an end to the Vietnam War? These actions persuaded no one. I bet they undermined the peaceful efforts to end the war.

Bombs do not signal a desire to end a war. It is the choosing of sides and escalation of a war.

The Weathermen’s continued criminal activity beyond the end of the Vietnam War, which kill people, also undermines the idea that they were merely protesting the war.

Mind you, all this really has nothing to do with Obama. To somehow tar Obama with this is overkill, it’s a bit of guilt by association. It could be considered a statement about the judgment about who he chooses to associate with, but more of it has been made that I think it should be, especially since Obama has shown the good sense to downplay his association with Ayers.

The criticisms about the effectiveness of the education policy projects that Ayers and Obama worked together on are much more valid, and relevant to policies an Obama administration might have.

Ayers’ comic inspired a photoshopped parody by Jim Treacher.

This is a curious choice to use the comics form for this response. Especially as the visual action is merely of a talking head.

No illustrations of the war to drive home his point about it were used, probably because the potential for confusing bombs going off in Vietnam with bombs going off in the U.S.

The visual aspect adds nothing to the piece other than showing us he’s raided Phoney Bone’s wardrobe: