Today, a new interview by Ayers only strengthens evidence that Ayers and Obama don't know each other well other than professional relationships on the education board.
MR. CUOMO: Clearly, the matter at hand, is this relationship with Barack Obama. So let's get right to it. You did have a meaningful relationship with Barack Obama, didn't you? (looks like a trap question)
MR. AYERS: I knew Barack Obama, absolutely, and I knew him probably as well as thousands of other Chicagoans and like millions and millions of other people worldwide, I wish I knew him better right now.
MR. CUOMO: But thousands of people were not asked to help start his political career in their home, right? That's an intimacy.
MR. AYERS: I was asked by the state senator to have a coffee for Barack Obama when he first ran for office and we had him in our home and I think he was probably in 20 homes that day, as far as I know, but that was the first time I really met him.
MR. CUOMO: But you understand the concern here is that it seems that there's an evasiveness here, yes, you served on boards together, but that relationship that somebody is in your home and you are introducing them to a political community that you have connections with. You're vouching for someone. There's an advocacy. There's a relationship, certainly, you must have spoken with Barack Obama about things. You must have gotten to know him before you did that.
MR. AYERS: No, actually, I didn't get to know him before I did that, but I did know him in the context of being on a board together and that relationship was public, always in a large kind of context, but you know, I don't really agree with your premise that this is worth somehow, this is worthy of really exploring because I don't buy the idea that guilt by association should be any part of our politics, and the interesting thing is as much as this was created as an issue in the campaign, it appears for most people it had no traction. It had no meaning.
So the assumption that if two people share a cup of coffee or take a bus downtown together or have a thousand other types of associations that that somehow means they share politics, outlook, policy or responsibility for one another's actions.
MR. CUOMO: But when you're measuring the content of a man's character who wants to President of the United States, certainly, information about his friendship/coffee/association with a man who has the past that you have, creating violence against the United States, you must understand how that would be a concern.
MR. AYERS: No, I don't agree with either part of that. I think that dishonest narrative is, one, to demonize me. Let's remember that what you call a violent past, that was at a time when thousands of people were being murdered by our government every month and those of us who fought to end that war were actually on the right side. So if we want to replay that history, I would reject the whole notion that demonizing me or the Weather Underground is relevant, but secondly -
Obama 'pal' Ayers fights back: The Swamp
Yes, I am thinking the same thing, too.