Bill's Bonhomie and the Banality of Evil

Bill Maher to Ward Churchill with an amicable smile, "Professor, someones gotta walk out there on the edge to know where it is." Does this also apply to those adorably 'edgy' jihadists, neonazis or any other killer with an fondness for self-justificiation? Or does Bill Maher appreciate only those who apologise for them?

In the interview, Churchill defended himself by arguing he was concurring with Hanna Arendt's characterization of the banality of evil, thus aligning himself with one of the 20th century's radical intellectuals. Paul Krassner documents some of Churchill's own radical, edgy history in this weeks New York Press:

This brings up a phone call I got from a friend of 30 years. I'll call her Atria. She attended Bradley University in Peoria at the same time Ward Churchill did.

"He's a phony radical from way back," she said. "He snitched me out to the police in 1970. He came over to my house one time and—the very first pound of pot that I ever bought—I sold him an ounce. I didn't get arrested, but I had to suffer the wrath of my parents. They just went nuts. It's one of the reasons I moved away from Peoria."

"What do you think was Churchill's motivation?"

"My guess is he's been arrested before, and his fingerprints are probably still in existence. He may have had it expunged. I think obviously they had him on something else. He might've had a felony conviction. And he went around and ratted everybody out. And I wasn't the only one. He was the campus snitch. I'd love for him to be able to say anything he damn well wants, but he's not the authentic article." - NYPress - Paul Krassner

Hanna Arendt might not be so flattered by the comparison.