BUSH KEEPS HIS EYES TIGHTLY SHUT WHEN HIS LIMO PASSES CINDY ON THE ROAD
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There are some really stand-up men and women in the Democratic Party. Howard Dean is one. He hasn't been corrupted by the allure of Inside-the-Beltway power-madness that seemingly drives politicians from both parties mad. I admire people like John Conyers, Barbara Boxer, Maxine Waters, Bernie Sanders... lots of others, in fact. But, honestly, I didn't expect real leadership to get us out of Bush's war in Iraq from inside the Beltway. I'm not surprised by the "Cindy Sheehan phenomena." Cindy's presence in front of Bush's compound in desolate godforsaken Crawford, Texas is starting to galvanize the country. (Soon she may even get onto CNN instead of the make-believe "celebrities" they create to waste time and help the corporate establishment keep peoples' minds off real problems.)
Today if the cowardly Bush didn't keep his eyes shut in the backseat of his limousine, he got a motorcade view, his first, of Cindy and more than 100 supporters camped outside his made-for-TV-ranch as he was chauffeured to a political fund-raiser next door. He didn't stop. Cindy and the other patriots were forced by police to stand behind yellow tape. This time they didn't shove her in a ditch or force them to leave their makeshift campsite; too many reporters around. Cindy's handmade sign read: "Why do you make time for donors and not for me?"
Riding behind tinted windows, it is unclear if Bush averted his eyes or looked at the demonstrators as his caravan passed. Matt C's report that he threw a beer can out the window has not been substantiated. Bush arrived at his neighbor's ranch for a barbecue just before noon, where he was expected to raise millions of dollars in bribe money for the Republican National Committee, which is
spending a fortune trying to defend convicted New Hampshire GOP vote tamperer Jim Tobin, the man at the heart of the illegal election day phone-jamming conspiracy which delivered NH's electoral votes to Bush and the state's Senate seat to John Sununu. The 200 plus wealthy right-wingers at the 478 acre ranch paid a minimum of $25,000 a head to hear Bush; many are "rangers," or "pioneers," corrupt bribers who give Bush $100,000 or more (in return for favorable legislation and other government favors. One prominent Bush "Pioneer," Thomas Noe of Ohio, is facing 30 years in prison for turning the Ohio Workmen's Compensation Fund into a honeypot for GOP politicians-- including Bush, of course-- and into a personal piggy-bank.
Rather than bring our troops back from Iraq, which Cindy and the majority of people in this country want, Bush said on Thursday that he is considering sending even more troops there before the Iraqi elections in December. Over 60% of grassroots (meaning REAL, as opposed to Beltway) Americans, oppose Bush's Iraq policies, although he is supported by most Republican politicians and by careerist Democrats like Joe Biden and Joe Lieberman, who have lost touch with the voters and whose abandonment of Democratic values should be remembered at election time. Bush wants to send at least another 10,000 Americans to Iraq before the end of the year. Only 38% of Americans agree with Bush's policies in Iraq (and that includes buckets of slime like Biden and Lieberman).
Cindy began her vigil last weekend, declaring she would stay for the entire month that Bush plans to vacation in Texas or until he agrees to meet with her so she can ask him what the
"noble cause" is that he keeps yammering about-- and for which her 24 year old son Casey died. Everyday more and more peace advocates and activists join her, including at least three other parents who have lost children in the war. The Bush Smear Machine is working on overdrive to attack and discredit Cindy, the way the attack and smear every patriot who disagrees with them.
"The president says he feels compassion for me, but the best way to show that compassion is by meeting with me and the other mothers and families who are here," Sheehan said. "All we're asking is that he sacrifice an hour out of his five-week vacation to talk to us, before the next mother loses her son in Iraq."
posted by DownWithTyranny @ 5:39 PM
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People have been asking me to post more Cindy Sheehan interviews. Here's a good one from PROGRESSIVE MAGAZINE that Gordon sent me:
WHY I MUST TELL THE PRESIDENT TO STOP THE WAR BEFORE ANOTHER SON DIES NEEDLESSLY
By Cindy Sheehan
I will never, ever forget the night of April 4, 2004, when I found out that my son Casey had been killed in Iraq.
I will also never forget the day when we buried my sweet boy, my oldest son. If I live to be a very old lady and forget everything else, I will never forget when the general handed me the folded flag that had lain on Casey’s coffin, as his brother and sisters, standing behind me, sobbed. I think of Casey every day as I wait outside President Bush’s ranch in Crawford, Texas, determined to meet with him.
I want to let the president know that I feel he recklessly endangered the life of my son by sending our troops to attack and occupy a country that was no imminent threat to the United States. And I want to let him know that millions of Americans believe that the best thing we can do -- for our own security, for our soldiers and for the Iraqi people -- is to bring the U.S. troops home from Iraq now. Just because it’s too late for Casey and the Sheehan family, why would we want another innocent life taken in the name of this ever-changing and unwinnable mission in Iraq?
I did get to meet with President Bush 2 1/2 months after my son was killed, but I never got to say any of these things to him. I was in deep shock and grief at the time, and all I wanted to do was to show him pictures of Casey and tell him what a wonderful man our son was. But today things are very different. My shock has worn off, and now I’ve got a lot of anger along with my grief.
I’m angry because every reason the Bush administration gave for the invasion of Iraq has been shown to be false. The Sept. 11 commission report concluded there was no link between Iraq and the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. The weapons inspectors gave up searching for weapons of mass destruction and wrote in the Duelfer report that there were none to be found. From the Downing Street Memo, we learned that the Bush administration ``fixed’’ intelligence to justify the Iraq invasion.
And after every supposed milestone in Iraq -- the capture of Saddam Hussein, the transition to Iraqi rule and most recently the Iraq election -- things just don’t get better. U.S. soldiers and Iraqis continue to be killed in greater and greater numbers, the cost of the war skyrockets and there’s no end in sight.
Last week, after 30 U.S. service members were killed, the president reiterated his pledge to complete the mission of our fallen soldiers. But that mission originally was to protect the United States from a lethal attack by Saddam Hussein -- with weapons it turns out he did not have. Anyway, I don’t want the president to use Casey’s memory to justify continuing this war, which will end up only needlessly killing more wonderful young men like him.
Many people have been streaming in to Crawford to support my vigil and persuade the president to listen to the people who want an end to this war. We are camping out in a drainage ditch, in 100-degree weather, but it’s worth it.
If and when I do meet with the president this time, it will be for all of the Gold Star Families for Peace that lost children in this war, for all of the mothers and fathers and husbands and wives who are grieving and who want to tell the president to end this devastating war.
No one else -- not one more mom -- should have to lose her son in Iraq.
CINDY SHEEHAN is the mother of a fallen Iraq war soldier and the co-founder of Gold Star Families for Peace. She wrote this article for Progressive Media Project, which is affiliated with Progressive magazine.
The war in Iraq already takes to many lives away. When the ones who create the wars send their sons to fight there them we could start to believe in them. Bush is so blind that he needs a limo to pay some attention. Best regards to Cindy Sheehan.
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