Yes, we have more terrorist “connect the dots” concerning Barack Hussein Obama and unrepentant domestic terrorist William Ayers. (Connect the terrorist dots, Part I)

The “dots” connect more than William Ayers and Obama, they lead to other questionable contacts, friends and associates. As a board member, Obama helped scratch a lot of backs with grants to politically connected groups via the Woods Fund of Chicago.

The Woods Fund is a non-profit foundation which declares its goal to “increase opportunities for less advantaged people and communities by giving money primarily to not-for-profit groups involved in housing, the arts and other areas.” Obama joined the board of the Woods Fund in 1993 and remained until 2002. But Obama didn’t merely use the Woods Fund to help his fellow man — he used it to further his career, writes Jennifer Rubin.

What did Obama help with at the Woods Fund?

Allison S. Davis – a developer represented by the law firm where Obama worked, as well as a small contributor to Obama’s political campaign funds.

When Davis approached the Woods Fund, he was building another apartment building with now convicted felon and Obama friend/fundraiser Tony Rezko. The Chicago Sun-Times recounts: “Obama agreed. He voted with other directors of the Woods Fund of Chicago to invest $1 million with Neighborhood Rejuvenation Partners L.P., a $17-million partnership that Davis still operates.”

Davis’ family would go on to donate more than $25,000 to Obama’s political campaigns, including his bid to be president of the United States.

Arab American Action Network (AAAN) – established in 1995 as non-profit group supposedly dedicated to improving the conditions of Arab immigrants in the Chicago area.

AAAN sponsored a Palestinian art exhibit on the “Nakba” — that is, the “catastrophe” of Israel’s establishment in 1948. AAAN’s officials routinely have made statements vilifying Israel.

On the death of Yasser Arafat in 2004, Hatem Abudayyeh, executive director of AAAN, announced:

“Arafat was a great man. Yes, Arafat was an icon. … We’re saddened by his death, but we don’t ignore the fact that this is not an issue of individuals, it’s an issue of a people who have been oppressed and occupied for 55 years.”

AAAN board member Ali Abunimah co-founded and operates the Electronic Intifada, a website replete with anti-Israel slurs and which declares Israel to be an apartheid state.

Rashid Khalidi – Palestinian activist and now professor at Columbia University whose wife headed AAAN.

The Woods Fund granted AAAN $40,000 in 2001 and $70,000 in 2002. As Salon magazine wrote, this was “nepotism, Chicago style.”

Khalidi, a former spokesman for Yasser Arafat, held a fundraiser for Obama in 2000 during his unsuccessful bid for Congress. In 2003, during a dinner honoring Khalidi for becoming the Edward Said Professor of Arab Studies at Columbia, Obama warmly praised his friend, reminiscing about the many meals cooked for him by Khalidi’s wife Mona and of the discussions he and Khalidi held that were

“consistent reminders to me of my own blind spots and my own biases. … It’s for that reason that I’m hoping that, for many years to come, we continue that conversation — a conversation that is necessary not just around Mona and Rashid’s dinner table,” but around “this entire world.”

During Obama’s tenure at the Woods Fund of Chicago organizations were given tens of thousands of dollars and the favor came back to Obama.

The Brighton Park Neighborhood Council, Business and Professional People for the Public Interest (BPPPI) $60,000 , the Center for Neighborhood Technology $150,000 , Centers for New Horizons, the Chicago Jobs Council, the Chicago Education Fund, the Chicago Institute on Urban Poverty, the Chicago Urban League, The Gamaliel Foundation all benefited from Woods Fund money while Obama served on the board. Dozens of the board members and officials from these organizations donated money, in many instances up to the legal limit, for Obama’s Senate and Presidential races between 2004 and 2008.

The favor was returned with  BPPPI board members and executives donating at least $16,950 to Obama’s political campaigns and the Center of Neighborhood Technology donating over $24,000 to Obama campaigns.

The Infamous Obama Earmarks

Lynne Sweet of the Chicago Sun-Times wrote in March 2008:

“Instead, since I have some reporting history here, I am noting a pattern that has emerged: This is Obama’s third ethical conversion of convenience — taking on a higher standard, but only when it appears to be politically expedient. Obama is making government transparency and ethics a centerpiece of his presidential campaign.”

In 2006, Obama requested $1 million for the UIC College of Education is the major supplier of new teachers for the Chicago Public Schools. (This is the department where William Ayers “teaches.”) [Obama Request Letter To Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Labor, Health, Education, 4/5/06]

Obama is getting hammered on the Ayers issue now while more people are listening to the public debate. We have written for months on the top of Ayers, his wife Dohrn, ACORN, Chicago Annenberg Challenge and other suspect associations of Mr. Obama.

Hillary Clinton raised this issue earlier this year at the Philadelphia debate when Obama, as he has done throughout the campaign, tried to minimize his relationship with Ayers.

That exchange was set off with a question asking Obama to explain his relationship with Ayers:

OBAMA: This is a guy who lives in my neighborhood, who’s a professor of English in Chicago who I know and who I have not received some official endorsement from. He’s not somebody who I exchange ideas from on a regular basis.

And the notion that somehow as a consequence of me knowing somebody who engaged in detestable acts 40 years ago, when I was 8 years old, somehow reflects on me and my values doesn’t make much sense, George.

The fact is that I’m also friendly with Tom Coburn, one of the most conservative Republicans in the United States Senate, who, during his campaign, once said that it might be appropriate to apply the death penalty to those who carried out abortions. (See Byron York article)

Do I need to apologize for Mr. Coburn’s statements? Because I certainly don’t agree with those, either.

So this kind of game in which anybody who I know, regardless of how flimsy the relationship is, that somehow their ideas could be attributed to me, I think the American people are smarter than that. They’re not going to suggest somehow that that is reflective of my views, because it obviously isn’t.

CLINTON: Well, I think that is a fair general statement, but I also believe that Senator Obama served on a board with Mr. Ayers for a period of time, the Woods Foundation, which was a paid directorship position.

And, if I’m not mistaken, that relationship with Mr. Ayers on this board continued after 9/11 and after his reported comments, which were deeply hurtful to people in New York and, I would hope, to every American, because they were published on 9/11, and he said that he was just sorry they hadn’t done more.

And what they did was set bombs. And in some instances, people died. So it is — I think it is, again, an issue that people will be asking about.

And I have no doubt — I know Senator Obama’s a good man and I respect him greatly, but I think that this is an issue that certainly the Republicans will be raising.

Raising the Ayer-Obama connection is being called “racist” by the Obama campaign and the mainstream media. Ayers is white and discussing him and the Obama connection is not off-limits.

The Woods Fund in 1999 granted $50,000 to the Annenberg Challenge — that is one organization on which Obama and Ayers served giving funds to another headed by Ayers and on which Obama also served as chairman for three years beginning in 1995 and then as a board member until 2001.

Another recipient of the Woods Fund largesse was the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), an organization infamous for its left wing agenda.

During Obama’s time on the Woods Funds ACORN received grants of $45,000 (2000), $30,000 (2001), $45,000 (2001), $30,000 (2002), and $40,000 (2002).

Stanley Kurtz writes:

“Just think of Code Pink’s well-known operations (threatening to occupy congressional offices, interrupting the testimony of General David Petraeus) and you’ll get the idea. Acorn protesters have disrupted Federal Reserve hearings, but mostly deploy their aggressive tactics locally. Chicago is home to one of its strongest chapters, and Acorn has burst into a closed city council meeting there. Acorn protestors in Baltimore disrupted a bankers’ dinner and sent four busloads of profanity-screaming protestors against the mayor’s home, terrifying his wife and kids. Even a Baltimore city council member who generally supports Acorn said their intimidation tactics had crossed the line.”

Barack Hussein Obama would like the discussion of his professional and “neighborhood” relationship with a domestic terrorist to go away. Fat Chance, indeed!