Pallin' Around With Terrorists

One of the many criticisms leveled against Barack Obama was that he was, in the words of Sarah Palin, "pallin' around with terrorists". That of course meant his still-not-entirely-clear relationship with one William Ayres, who back in the day, was one of the leaders of the then-notorious radical Weather Underground.

While the WU was responsible for a series of bombings of offices that were symbolic of American imperialism -- the Pentagon, several Department of Corrections offices, a police station, the Latin American HQ of ITT -- most people forget that they were scrupulous in trying to avoid injury and bloodshed in these attacks.

In fact, the only people ever killed by the Weather Underground were three members of the group who were accidentally blown up in 1970 in a Greenwich Village townhouse when a bomb they were assembling exploded prematurely.

That said, I wonder who else was pallin' around with terrorists. Take a look at this photo:

So who is that funny-looking little guy next to Nancy Reagan?

Well, glad you asked. That is none other than Israeli Prime Minister Menachim Begin, who in his youth was active in a Jewish terrorist group in Palestine called Irgun. Begin was directly responsible for the 1946 bombing of the King David Hotel which killed 91 people, British, Arab and Jewish. Unlike the Weather Underground, who killed no one except three of their own.

So tell me again, who was pallin' around with terrorists? But, as Saint Ronald himself said, "one man's terrorist is another man's freedom fighter."