Levellers

Peace Escalation NOW!

Over 400,000 people marched in Washington, D.C. against the war in Iraq, today. As in previous protests, folk gathered on the National Mall, but, unlike past times, did not waste time marching near the White House–since the Official Resident has a habit of dismissing such exercises of the First Amendment as “focus groups.” Instead, they marched around the Capitol and in numerous speeches and chants let Congress know that they expect them to stop the planned surge and to bring the troops home. On Monday, hundreds of trained citizens will meet with legislators in their offices and deliver petitions, emails, letters, pictures of wounded veterant family members, etc. and demand action.

For once the Mainstream Media (MSM) covered the event instead of pretending it didn’t happen. There was still an unfortunate focus on how many celebrities were present, though. I’m here to tell you that most of the young people had no idea who Jane Fonda is, nor why she hasn’t spoken to an anti-war rally in 35 years. They didn’t travel from all over the nation, in cold weather, to star gaze at Fonda or Susan Sarandon or any of the other celebs. They came to send a message to Capitol Hill.

Wasn’t there also a counter-rally? Yep. It drew about 40 people.

Anti-war demonstrations also happened all across the nation: 1,000 people in Denver, CO; 50,000 in San Francisco; 100,000 in L.A.–even 100 people in Lousiville, KY–with many supportive honks and–unlike in previous protests against this war, very few rude hand gestures.

Favorite sign: The Rapture is Not an Exit Strategy.

The only presidential candidate to show was Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), who has consistently opposed this war from the beginning. “Front-runner” Hillary was in Iowa, I later learned, where her answer to a question about her support for this war was “there are no ‘do-overs’ in life” followed by get-tough language that sounded very Bush-like but criticized Bush for doing it badly. So, basically her message is she is bad enough and mean enough to be head war-monger and smart enough to do it right. Isn’t that what we heard from Kerry? I really hope she doesn’t get the Democratic nomination. We don’t need a U.S. version of Maggie Thatcher or Golda Meir. The Times of London pegs her rightly as coldly calculating and ambitious without any principles left.

I wasn’t surprised to see so many presidential hopefuls duck the peace rally, but I had hoped that former Sen. John Edwards would show up. After all, these are the people he has to convince that he has really changed since ’04.

As of now, I am REALLY hoping Kucinich is still in this race by the time of the KY primary. I won’t vote for anyone whom I don’t trust to get us out of Iraq, quickly if we are still there.

Update: Rabbi Michael Lerner and The Network of Spiritual Progressives tried to introduce a positive spiritual dimension to the rally and the march. His reflections on the successes and failures at this point can be found here. A deeply Christian spiritual approach should be evident on 16 March at the Ecumenical Christian Peace Witness in D.C. and I hope tens of thousands of Christians are making plans to be part of that. If you would like to read an ad written by Rabbi Lerner and evangelical American Baptist minister Rev. Dr. Tony Campolo on How to Stop the War, click here. To sign the ad and contribute so that it can circulate in newspapers across the U.S.A., click here. If you are already a signatory and want to make additional contributions, click here.

January 27, 2007 Posted by Michael Westmoreland-White | peace | 1 Comment