Fugitive Days: A Memoir by Bill Ayers Summary and Reviews
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Book Reviews of Fugitive Days: A Memoir
Book Review: Bombs Away
Summary: 1 Stars
William Ayers was a founding member of the Weathermen, that home-grown terrorist organization that tried to end the Vietnam war by blowing things up in the United States. Their ideology was distinctly communist, and their goal was not just the removal of U.S. forces from Vietnam, but the overthrow of the U.S. government, a goal that Mr. Ayers calls "...lofty, if immodest". "Fugitive Days" purportedly deals with Mr. Ayers' life on the run after three of his comrades vaporized themselves in the infamous New York City townhouse explosion when the bomb they had built to place in an army installation detonated prematurely, but is in reality nothing more than a lengthy rehash of the Weathermen's skewed philosophy. Strange days indeed, particularly so since Mr. Ayers has long since morphed into his father (much belittled in "Fugitive Days") and taken his own place in the upper middle class. He writes from his tenured sinecure as a full professor at the University of Illinois. The Weathermen in general and Mr. Ayers in particular recognized the strategic value of striking at the heart of the country's institutions and cultural symbols. Thus they placed bombs in the Pentagon ,the U.S. Capitol, and numerous other government and quasi-government buildings. Mr. Ayers seems particularly proud that he blew up a statue in Chicago that memorialized police officers killed in the line of duty. When the Chicago police union (one union that Mr. Ayers apparently doesn't support) replaced the statue, Mr. Ayers blew it up again. The union replaced it again, but this time had it moved indoors and placed in the lobby of the Chicago Police Academy. Mr. Ayers' writing here gets downright chilling. In a post September 11th world, this self-confessed bomber who "...can't imagine entirely dismissing the possibility..." of bombing more buildings, blithely points out that the statue is still vulnerable "...from the air". Mr. Ayers is also capable of defiling monuments in a less explosive fashion, as when he makes a trip to the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C., the Wall that honors U.S. military personnel killed in Vietnam, an absolutely holy place to veterans and their families, and there scrawls the name of the woman who died in the New York townhouse exoplosion. The bomb she helped make, remember, was destined to kill American soldiers. Mr. Ayers is indeed, as he brags, "guilty as hell and free as a bird".
Doublespeak abounds and evasions and omissions proliferate. Cop killers are called "freedom fighters" and bombs were placed for "peace". Mr. Ayers writes of something called the "white skin privilege", and if by this he means that it is better to be rich and white in America than it is to be poor and black then he'll get no argument. However, he misses an opportunity to show the reader exactly what this means by omitting entirely the saga of fellow Weather alum fugitive Kathy Boudin (she is acknowledged on the very last page of the book; Mr. Ayers and his wife adopted and raised her son), a "freedom fighter" imprisoned for her part in the "expropriation" , i.e., armed robbery, of a Brinks truck that left two police officers and a security guard dead. The black men who took part in this were convicted and sentenced to 75 years to life; they will never get out. Ms. Boudin, the very white daughter of the very rich lawyer, negotiated a plea bargain of 20 years to life. She is now eligible and clamoring for parole.
Book Review: Days of Rage for the reader
Summary: 1 Stars
This book is not worth a read. It serves more as a publishing oddity than an honest account of an interesting and complex time. The main problem is the key character, Ayers himself, who is not a leader, thinker, or dreamer. He is instead a user of everything (drugs) and everyone (lovers, friends, ideals). Just because this book is well written doesn't make it true or valuable. Content may not mean much to Ayers but it does and should count with respect to books and political movements. This book is a contradition throughout--historically, politically and dramatically. It is an attempt to cash in on a cool persona Ayers has tried his whole life to create and "live" as well as take credit for actions Ayers did not think through or seem to believe like Oughton, Gold, Robbins, and the rest of the people who gave their lives to the cause. [. . ..] He is not a warrior or a true believer. He is an opportunist. He asks the reader to suspend their knowledge of history and common sense in order to feel sympathy and/or understanding for his actions. In the end, the book falls very short. The only question that is not clear is how and why did Bernardine Dohrn who is the real deal end up with him?Book Review: Don't buy this book
Summary: 1 Stars
The chief virtue of this book is that it serves as a reminder, at this particular time, that not all terrorists are fundamentalist Islamic extremists. As least one of them is a spoiled rich kid who is now a tenured professor of education at the University of Illinois at Chicago and who, five days AFTER the attack on the World Trade Center, was favorably profiled by the New York York Times on the occaision of the publication of this "memior" of his exploits in terror. In light of the events of Sept. 11, I am urging anyone considering purchasing this book to instead make a contribution to those affected by the tragedy, because I feel strongly that the author, a smug, unrepentant American terrorist, and his publisher, should not profit from its sale any more than Osama Bin Laden should get a book deal to give us his "memiors" of the trade center attack. In this book, Ayers, describes his participation, as a member of the "Weathermen" in the 1970s in bombings of the Pentagon, the Capitol Building and the New York City Police Headquarers. Read about his dispicable acts (and his cowardly attempts to evade being brought to justice for them) in the New York Times article, but please don't let the author profit from his crimes.
If the events of September 11 have shown us anything, surely it is that the killing of innocent people through acts of terrorism is pure evil, and indefensible no matter what political cause it is intended to serve. This is Ayers quoted in the New York Times on September 11: "I don't regret setting bombs. I feel we didn't do enough." Apparently nothing will cause Bill Ayers to outgrow his truly juvenile political philosophy, his arrested adolescent narcisism, or his chilling indifference to human life other than his own.
Book Review: Don't waste your hard earned money.
Summary: 1 Stars
There's only one thing worse than a spoiled little boy who is constantly indulged and never made to mind. Ayers knows that the United States of America is the only nation on the planet where he would be allowed to boast and profit from his crimes. You know, guys like him make me proud of this country. Proud that we are so great that we can allow those of his ilk to freely speak their mind. But if I were you, I wouldn't pay a single, solitary sou for the right to read Mr. Ayers' childish rant.Book Review: Drinking His Own Bathwater
Summary: 1 Stars
This might well have been a wonderful satire under a pen named assumed by P. J. O'Rourke. But it is not quite clever enough for that. Rather this "memoir" of the 60s, 70s, and 80s comes from someone who is "still rad". One might only conclude from this sorry compilation of mendacity that Ayers has spent 50 years drinking too much of his own bathwater and taking too little Prozac. Having inflicted bombs and bombastic rhetoric on American culture and politics, this work is, hopefully, the final bomb from someone whose political philosophy was outdated and shopworn and wicked from the very day he embraced it. Get out the turkey baster, Mr. Ayers, pump in the prozac and drop that keyboard!