Former Weatherman Criticizes Ayers, Admits Wrong

Former Weather Underground member Howard Machtinger criticized William Ayers, his former colleague in the 1960s radical group, and said he was “terrified” by the violence and believes the group’s strategy may have been wrong.

Machtinger seeks to clear the air about misconceptions about the group, penning his thoughts a lengthy piece In the liberal magazine “In These Times”.

His comments are notable because they contrasts the often steadfast dedication to the cause displayed by Weather Underground member in movies such as the 2002 The Weather Underground.

Machtinger writes at the beginning of the piece that he is hoping to set the record straight after Ayers’s association with President Obama became a Republican talking point during last year’s campaign. Machtinger is critical of Ayers’s op-ed in the New York Times, which Machtinger says “glosses over” the violence of the Weather Underground and, most notably, the errant explosion at the Townhouse Collection that accident caused the death of three of the group’s members.

Machtinger’s essay seems to show he is still grappling with the difficulty of the time, the violence and his role in all of it. “Despite some bravado,” he writes, “I myself was a cautious person looking to break the shackles of bourgeois detachment. I felt real relief in seemingly giving my all. But at the same time, I was terrified. Such existential