CHICAGO - They didn’t run into each other, but Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama cast his vote on Tuesday at the same polling place as his acquaintance William Ayers, a former 60s radical who has played an unwilling role in the campaign.
Obama’s association with Ayers, a Vietnam-era radical who became a university professor, has been one focus of attack on the Illinois senator by his Republican opponents, who cited the contacts as evidence that Obama had radical ideas.
Obama has insisted he and the former leader of the Weather Underground were never close. They served on the board of a community anti-poverty group and worked on educational reforms in Chicago.
Ayers was one of a number of people, including Obama’s fiery former pastor and a Palestinian activist friend, who Republican presidential candidate John McCain and running mate Sarah Palin often brought up in campaign speeches and ads to back his case that Obama was too “risky” to elect as president.
Ayers voted before Obama and his family arrived at a local elementary school in the tree-lined Hyde Park neighborhood a few blocks from the Obamas’ house, and the men did not meet.
As Barack and Michelle Obama filled out paper ballots, their daughters Malia, 10, and Sasha, 7, looked on and a crush of photographers and reporters watched from a few feet away.
“I noticed that Michelle took a long time though. I had to check to see who she was voting for,” Obama joked to reporters later as he boarded a plane for Indianapolis to help encourage voters in a state he hopes to wrest from Republicans.
Later, he will watch the election coverage with family and friends in Chicago before his election night speech in Grant Park, where a huge audience is expected.
On the tarmac, Obama said, “I feel great.”
“When polls close, the journey ends,” he said, “but voting with my daughters, that was a big deal.”
Photo credit: Reuters/Jason Reed (Obama family arrives at polling station)
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People of America WAKE UP!! Read your Bible….prophecy is being fulfilled and we need to be ready.
- Posted by marthaGeorge, my comment was not directed towards the media, rather the enormous amount of bloggers who provided links to Ayer’s book as evidence (somehow) of Obama’s guilt.
- Posted by Ben FranklinPoint is, it didn’t work and both Obama and Ayers profit from it. This certainly wasn’t their intention, but foresight requires thought.
Anyways, I’m glad you didn’t tell me to go fly a kite.
I would vote for an independent…
McCain and Obama are from the same Cabal.
Like Noam Chomsky said, the US is a one party system. Its just two streams in the Cabal (the Gambini’s againts the Corleone’s)
The independents are not even allowed to debate the two puppets of the Dem/Rep.
Nothing will change.
The puppets have to listen to the Military-Industrial-Complex (Carlyle, Lockheed, Blackwater, etc) The Financial Cabal (FED, Goldman Sachs, Rothschild, etc) and the contruction Cabal (Bechtel, Haliburton, etc)
- Posted by Mitch Jackson CAIt’s shoddy jounalism, not ’shotty’.
- Posted by Sally ApffelHey Rhonda,
If you want to vote against socialism, you should vote for the Libertarian or Constitution Party candidate. The Bush regime has been as socialistic as it gets, and McCain has spent more time fear mongering than proving to us he’d be all that much different. Heck, I’m almost convinced Obama’s brand of socialism would be better.
Republican Socialists? That’s blasphemy you say? Look at the facts mentioned in the article link below and try to convince me otherwise.
http://www.bobbarr2008.com/press/press-r eleases/170/republicans-accuse-democrats -of-%e2%80%9csocialism%e2%80%9d-but-repu blican-bailouts-without-end-are-as-big-g overnment-as-it-gets/
- Posted by JustinJohn,
its simple if you do the math, instead of having lobbyists giving large sums you get a large amount of citizens giving smaller sums more often.
PS: Learn how to spell.
- Posted by autoprtCome on people wake up. It doesn\’t matter where the two voted or if they are close aquaintances, the story is just to draw readers and no other reason. Ben Franklin if you think that the media is on the side of the republicans you really need to get out more. You may be better off as a democrat. The only thing of importance is that Obama is not qualified to be president regardless of how much people would like him to be.
- Posted by George WashingtonBarack Obama: Free at Last, by Kirby Sommers
The largest turnout for a presidential election in the history of the United States has happened today. It has happened at a moment in history where something called change is what’s needed in our country. And, it has happened because change is riding on the wings of a man named Barack Obama.
Martin Luther King must be looking down from the heavens above and for the first time since he delivered his “I Have a Dream” speech (full text reprinted below after article) at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, D.C. on August 28, 1963, for the first time since that day, he must be rejoicing.
Free at last.
Liberty and justice for all is Barack Obama’s gift to the world.
For everyone. For whites. For blacks. For he is both. His father, Barack Obama Sr is a black man from Africa, and his mother is a white woman from Kansas.
In 1959 the Senior Obama left Kenya and arrived on an airplane as a student in Hawaii to pursue his dream. How different that scenario has been for so many whose ancestors arrived in this country as cargo and sold into slavery to endure the unbearable.
In 2005 I founded Katrina Home Drive, an all volunteer based housing and help group for Katrina evacuees, and I recall being appalled at just how much discrimination was left in our country.
During a phone call to a United Methodist Committee on Relief (UMCOR) partner in Arizona, a caseworker told me: “The blacks, well, we’re just not going to let them stay here. We give ‘em a one-way ticket back. This town is not going to be subject to those criminals.”
This woman who worked in a church and was being paid to help Katrina survivors was basically telling me she was going to help who she wanted to, and that did not include “black folks.”
I urgently discussed this problem with UMCOR’s Katrina Aid Director Warren Harrity and although it helped bring about a “Bill of Rights” of sorts to ensure evacuees were treated with courtesy and respect, the reality is nothing much changed. I continued to see discrimination from The American Red Cross, FEMA, and almost every help group across the country against African-Americans.
Today Barack Obama has changed the perception of African-Americans as lesser than.
Free at last.
There are few days in our lives we will remember forever. Today is one of those days. We will remember where we were. What we did. What we wore, even. This day will be embedded deep into the imprint of our humanity forever. The air is electrified with excitement and the knowledge that change indeed has arrived. Change will forever be linked to the name Barack Obama.
Every man, every woman, every child is now an equal. And world is watching in awe.
Free at last.
2008 Copyright Kirby Sommers
- Posted by Kirby Sommershttp://kirbysommers.blogspot.com
I really want Obama to win we need some change in America
- Posted by MarlonOne would get $750 million by having a phenomenal ground campaign and appealing to a broad base of the american poplulation to make small contributions that add up. Fundraising is no longer about just the big donors, as we have seen a little can add up to be quite a bit.
- Posted by Samuel Vespers“Obama tell the u.s.a the truth about ayers&acron how would one get 750 million dollers for a campaign?”
hmm maybe because people are actually passionate about a canidate for once? and wtf do ayers and “acron” have anything to do with raising campaign “dollers”?
- Posted by robbieSo What! If you live in the same vicinity that may happen. MOVE THE HELL ON TO SOMETHING IMPORTANT.
- Posted by Chris Fraser