I think I am a radical. I have never deviated from that. By radical, I mean someone trying to go to the root of things.
Bill AyersIf you listen to the debate, [Barack Obama] and [John] McCain said the same thing about gay rights.
Bill AyersThe great example, the killer example in history, is of course Abraham Lincoln, the great emancipator. Read his speeches. Read the debates. Wendell Phillips called him "the great slaver from Illinois."
Bill AyersIt 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, "I didn't want her to miss tonight! I wanted to be able to tell her!" And to see all these people, a Hispanic cop dancing with an old white woman, wow! I mean, that's the world I want to live in, and because it's the world I want to live in, I had a hard time leaving.
Bill Ayers