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Just a Co-Author From the Neighborhood?

6:09 PM, Sep 24, 2009 • By EMILY ESFAHANI SMITH
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It's been a rumor since the 2008 presidential campaign that Bill Ayers ghost-wrote or co-wrote Barack Obama's memoir, Dreams from my Father. The story seems to be on fire again, though, because a new Obama-friendly book by best-selling author Chris Anderson, perhaps without realizing it, seems to confirm the rumor. Jack Cashill at the American Thinker has been investigating whether Ayers co-wrote the memoir for a while and recently picked up on key excerpts from Anderson's book, Barack and Michelle: Portrait of an American Marriage.

Cashill notes that as the deadline for Obama's memoir quickly approached, Michelle Obama recommended that her husband reach out to "his friend and Hyde Park neighbor Bill Ayers." Cashill goes on, "To flesh out his family history, Obama had taped
interviews with various family members. Andersen writes, 'These oral histories, along with a partial manuscript and a truckload of notes, were given to Ayers.' Andersen quotes a Hyde Park neighbor, 'Everyone knew they were friends and that they worked on various projects together. It was no secret. Why would it be? People liked them both.' Andersen continues, 'In the end, Ayers's contribution to Barack's Dreams From My Father would be significant--so much so that the book's language, oddly specific references, literary devices, and themes would bear a jarring similarity to Ayers's own writing.'"

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