Let's have some context.
The Panthers were a breakthrogh in theory and practice for the U.S. Left: they solved the problem that wracked many for over a century: How one could achieve white-black unity in the struggle. The answr was a revolutionary BlackParty, strongly entrtrenched in the Black community AND committed to full cooperation with the left as a whole. They joined in anti-war demos that were overwhelmingly white: two weeks before his murder Fred Hampton went to Madison to co-lead an anti-war march with the leader there. They never denied any request for cooperation from left groups that honored their independence. Fred Hampton in mid-November of '69 came down to little pipsqueak ISU (it's much larger now, as is Bloomington/Normal, but we weren't all that better than a village then) to speak for an SDS function. Panthers not only followed this practice, they were 'teaching' the Young Lords to follow it. They wren't even driven off from this policy by the boos given David Hiloiard at the San Francvisco Moratorium in November '69 when he declared the rigtht of Blacks to self-defense. They worked with white groups to try to build the Peace & Freedom Party in 1968.
Fred Hampton spent the last months of his life going from black highschool to black highschool in Chciago to speak -- and the core of his speech was a criticism of the Weatherman -- because it was splitting that potential unity of Blacks and White with its individualist, stupid childish violence for the sake of violence, its utter contempt for serious organizing of anykind. See Mark Rudd's self criticism published in several places. I'm rather ticked off that Monthly Review has seen fit to publish stuff by Berndine Dohrn.. She has neer let out a pep of self-criticism for her central role in the destruction of SDS.
Jan and I drove up to Chicago in October of '69 t join the RYM II demos there. We drove over with a woman from Chicago and a couple other people from Bloomington to leaflet at a white high school in a working class district. I parked the car on a one way street leading back towards the high school. We stood in front of a candy store to pass out our leaflets. (Background we didn't know about: The preceding we ek Weathermen had been there with their stupid filthy tactic of "Are you for imperialism or against it? 60 seconds to decide." Thenb they beat up a couple of students.) The woman with us mentioned SDS and it seemed as though a thousand persons materialized out of the air -- and they were angry. I've never been so fucking scared in my life. I ran back down the street, got the car, and drove slwoly back into the mob picking up our people as I went along. Yikes!
And that is the sort of thing those Fucking Spoilers the Weather People did. There is not one single good thing to say for them. And current romanticvizing of them is anti-left, inexcusable. I've like manythings Ron Jacobs has written, but he was totally wrong to excuse the Weathermen. They grounded their 'theory' in the claim that the American Working Class was irredeemably racist (as though there were no Black or Latinmo workers!) but they were the racists for letting their little revolutionary egos lead them to completely smash the racist unity that the Panthers and others were trying to build.
Carrol