Rating: 
Summary: I've rarely had such a (bad) reaction to a book
Review: Rarely do I have such a reaction to a book as I've had towards this one. Being someone who opposed the Vietnam War, my expectations were that it would be an enjoyable read - not a book I'd come to loathe.Bill Ayers does a good job of taking his readers back to the chaos of that time in the early chapters of his book. And I congratulate him on his unswerving honesty towards himself and his cadre of comrades. But he is such detestable, manipulative, whiny, self-righteous holier-than-thou person that I suddenly see a lot more legitimacy in the words, "Love it or leave it." I completely lost tolerance for him at the end when he brings up My Lai yet another time in the book and then asks when America will acknowledge the sacrifice Diana made toward ending the war - Diana who blew herself up or was blown up by another in their gang while planning to bomb a target in the US. I wish I could rate this book zero stars. I wish I could get my money back.
Rating:
Summary: You don't need a Weatherman....
Review: Bill Ayers, former '60s revolutionary-turned-college-professor, offers us his memoirs of that tumultous time and explains to us why America is still a disgusting, fascist nation where dissidents are paid huge advances for preeening autobiographies and have to suffer the idignity of worshipful profiles in the New York Times. The Weathermen, as Ayers' comrades were known, were infamous for bombing what he calls "symbols" of American imperialism and capitalism. Don't mistake this for terrorism though, because terrorists try to kill innocents whereas Ayers was going after -- well, "symbols." Comments like that, in all their arrogance, are perfect examples of why -- following Ayers' "revolution" -- America made such an abrupt turn from the ultra-liberalism of the '60s and '70s to the ultra-conservatism of the '80s. Though nobody ever wants to seem to admit this, the radical politics of the '60s was built on a grad school elitism which left its proponents convinced of their own educated sainthood and, in their eyes, reduced the "working man" and minorities to the demeaning status of the "noble savage." And of course, since the radicals were all saints, anyone who disagreed with them had to be thoroughly demonic. Of course, a lot of other people who opposed the Viet Nam War or were outraged by Nixon didn't share these views and, once those afermentioned events took the "new left" to a position of power, they reacted to that overeducated ignorance by electing men like Ronald Reagan and further upsetting Bill Ayers. But, anyway, politics aside, this is just a remarkably self-righteous autobiography. For a man who claims to have been fighting for the people, Bill Ayers comes across as remarkably self-centered. The centerpiece of the book seems to the dark day in 1970 when three of his comrades managed to blow themselves up while making a bomb in their Greenwich Village Townhouse. Ayers returns to the event but strangely, let's us know little about the martyrs in question except how their deaths related to him. (And, of course, it never seems strange to him that the Weatherman revolution was based in a townhouse that most "oppressed" Americans would never be able to afford.) The man comes across as a narcissistic sociopath who found, in radical politics, an outlet for a basically unbalanced personality. Ayers, at one point, brags that he's "guilty as sin, free as a bird." Yes, luckily for him, Bill Ayers doesn't live in the type of society that the Weathermen advocated; a society like Castro's Cuba where anyone showing dissent can be executed without trial. No, he lives in America, one of the few countries that will protect you even as you try to destroy it. One friend of mine told me that if Bill Ayers hates America so much, he should just leave it. Ayers, unlike other revolutionaries across the world, actually has the option of leaving if he wants to. He has that freedom and even if he's apparently too arrogant and, quite frankly, stupid to appreciate it, that still doesn't keep that freedom from being all the more beautiful and wonderful.
Rating:
Summary: A Conservative Says Thanks...
Review: For a political conservative like myself, there is no better propaganda than people like Billy Ayers. An unrepentant terrorist who spent much of the late 1960s and early 1970s planting bombs around the country attempts to explain how the Vietnam War made him do it. As a teacher of college undergraduates, I find this work invaluable as a depiction of an important (if often whitewashed) face of the New Left. (My low rating is based on an estimate of the intrinsic worth of the book; its social/political utility is far greater.)
Rating:
Summary: Let's send Bill back underground
Review: There's a certain fascination to this book, but its not the one that the posturing ninny who wrote it was aiming at. Ayers is a moral idiot, incapable of shame or embarrassment. He says here that he has no regrets about planting bombs, and that he cannot rule out the possibility that he will do so again. Here's a fun question to think about: do we, as Ayers' potential victims, have the right to make a pre-emptive strike against him?
Rating:
Summary: Don't waste your hard earned money.
Review: 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.
Rating:
Summary: Days of Rage for the reader
Review: 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?
Rating:
Summary: Drinking His Own Bathwater
Review: 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!
Rating:
Summary: Don't buy this book
Review: 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.
Rating: 
Summary: A wonderful memoir of a time with many lessons
Review: Today, as we all necessarily embark on the launching of a new anti-war movement against yet another vicious amerikkkan assault on the people of the world, we need to learn some of the lessons that this book has to teach. Prof. Ayers gives a short, yet interesting account of how he came to oppose war and racism and to understand the need for standing up courageously for justice and equality. Did he and the Weathermen make errors? well certainly! and he explores some of these.
One wishes that he had presented more of a detailed perspective for what he regards as the way forward. Clearly, one of the key errors that he and his brothers and sisters made was the almost complete liquidation of above ground mass organization. Whatever efforts were later made to revive this on their part, via the Prairie Fire Organizing Committees, etc., was probably too little too late. Hopefully those same errors will not be made in these troubled times by the new emerging anti-war movement.
The book also suffers, unfortunately, from the lack of an index, and it would have been useful to have an appendix with some of the documents of the time described. Many also would have appreciated a section of photos.
You may not agree with all of this book. I know that I didn't. That's not the point.
There are many valuable lessons to be learned here.
And, if nothing else, purchasing this book can help show your appreciation for one of the genuine heros of the movement in support of the Vietnamese people, who did more than just talk when action was clearly called for. Peace and Justice.
Rating:
Summary: Hazy Days
Review: I got really tired of the way Bill Ayers used joints as punctuation. What kind of a society would we find ourselves in if genuine protestors followed his model. Life in America is hardly doing time in "the belly of the beast"...not even in Hyde Park.
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