I was arrested 1965. I had come back from the merchant marines, got into conversations about the war. I had never heard of Vietnam until I was in the merchant marines in constitution square in Athens, and I picked up the New York Herald or the International Herald Tribune and there was my first introduction of the word Vietnam.
Bill AyersIf you listen to the debate, [Barack Obama] and [John] McCain said the same thing about gay rights.
Bill AyersI breathed the air of deliverance through books, and through books I leapt over the walls of confinement.
Bill AyersWe're actually saying, here's a principle that I'd like to arc toward. That's a very different role in life. I didn't expect [Barack] Obama to go to the root of things. I didn't expect him to have a principled position on anything. I mean, just pay some moderate attention to the guy.
Bill AyersTwo thousand people a day were being murdered in Vietnam in a terrorist war, an official terrorist war.
Bill AyersWhat was on the agenda was school and social life and those kinds of things. So I was the middle of five kids. So I had the great advantage of being able to play up to the older kids and play down to the younger kids and I think that's part of what propelled me to become a teacher at some point in my life. But it was a comfortable childhood. It was a privileged childhood.
Bill Ayers