Barack Obama's work with William Ayers

Stanley Kurtz who has done more to explore Barack Obama's radical ties from Chicago reports today on the ties between William Ayers and the Chicago Annenberg Challenge (CAC) where Obama served as its first chairman, a job for which, as Kurtz shows, Ayers helped choose Obama.

In works like "City Kids, City Teachers" and "Teaching the Personal and the Political," Mr. Ayers wrote that teachers should be community organizers dedicated to provoking resistance to American racism and oppression. His preferred alternative? "I'm a radical, Leftist, small 'c' communist," Mr. Ayers said in an interview in Ron Chepesiuk's, "Sixties Radicals," at about the same time Mr. Ayers was forming CAC.

CAC translated Mr. Ayers's radicalism into practice. Instead of funding schools directly, it required schools to affiliate with "external partners," which actually got the money. Proposals from groups focused on math/science achievement were turned down. Instead CAC disbursed money through various far-left community organizers, such as the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (or Acorn).

Mr. Obama once conducted "leadership training" seminars with Acorn, and Acorn members also served as volunteers in Mr. Obama's early campaigns. External partners like the South Shore African Village Collaborative and the Dual Language Exchange focused more on political consciousness, Afrocentricity and bilingualism than traditional education. CAC's in-house evaluators comprehensively studied the effects of its grants on the test scores of Chicago public-school students. They found no evidence of educational improvement.

As Obama touts his experiences as preparation to lead the nation, it's perfectly legitimate to closely examine that record and what he did when had a whole potload of money to hand out. He chose to use that money to give to leftist groups rather than groups focused on real achievement in math and science skills. No wonder he tries to brush over his whole connection with Ayers as just a guy in his neighborhood. As Kurtz concludes,

The Obama campaign has cried foul when Bill Ayers comes up, claiming "guilt by association." Yet the issue here isn't guilt by association; it's guilt by participation. As CAC chairman, Mr. Obama was lending moral and financial support to Mr. Ayers and his radical circle. That is a story even if Mr. Ayers had never planted a single bomb 40 years ago.

UPDATE: As Peter Kirsanow says,

Stanley's work is a challenge to mainstream journalists. A candidate for the presidency has a demonstrated working relationship with — indeed funded — an unrepentant terrorist, yet the media have spent more time reporting about Sarah Palin's hair styles.