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Sparrowhawk
08-29-04, 11:16 AM
"You are known by the company you keep," is a familiar saying and if those demonstrating the RNC are an indication of who supports Kerry for president it tells you a lot.

From Tom Hayden who earlier today described how to commit civil disobedience to Liberal lawyers offering free legal advice to those planning to turn themselves into human cannonballs and attacking police this weeks RNC will be played out in the streets by the media and the message inside may not be heard.

Everybody N their brother from sing-sing to Cambodia, from Commies to clowns will be there supporting Kerry.


The message they bring is very clear, it all against every moral belief the majority of Americans holds.



<hr>

Huge Anti-Bush Protests Expected in NYC




Aug 29, 10:46 AM (ET)

By TOM RAUM


NEW YORK (AP) - Demonstrators took to the streets on Sunday to protest President Bush's foreign and domestic policies as Republican delegates gathered to nominate the president for a second term.

A day ahead of the start of the Republican National Convention, up to 250,000 demonstrators were expected to march up Seventh Ave. past the Madison Square Garden convention site in midtown Manhattan. The protesters were denied a permit to demonstrate in Central Park, but many said they would go there anyway.

As the protesters gathered 20 blocks south of the convention site Sunday morning, New York police said more than 300 people had been arrested through Saturday night for disorderly conduct and convention-related incidents.

Meanwhile, Bush reflected on his role in the war on terrorism. "I'm not the historian. I'm the guy making history," the president said in an interview with Time magazine.

Asked what he learned from the past four years, Bush said he'd learned "that Washington is a much more bitter, ugly place, dominated by special interests, than I ever envisioned."

Pre-convention polls showed the race evenly split between Bush and Democrat John Kerry, although the challenger has lost ground since his convention in Boston a month ago. The four-day Republican convention opens Monday.

On the eve of the convention, politicians of both parties made the rounds of television talk shows.

Sen. Zell Miller, a Georgia Democrat who will deliver the keynote address Wednesday night, said he'd never voted for a Republican for president "but I'm going to this time."

Kerry "is not in the mainstream of this country. He's way to the left of this country," Miller said on Fox News Sunday.

Bush went to church Sunday morning, rode his mountain bike and was flying later to Wheeling, W.Va., for a rally. He was campaigning in battleground states as he makes his way to this overwhelmingly Democratic convention city.

Kerry was spending the day at his beachfront home in Nantucket, Mass., where he planned to plot strategy for the final two months of the presidential campaign.

"We've got 66 days to go, and I'm in a fighting mood," he said on Saturday during a campaign visit to Washington state.

Meanwhile, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-N.Y., said that Bush's re-election "would be a disaster." Interviewed on NBC's "Meet the Press," Clinton accused the president of "four years of unaccountable use of power" and of a failed economic policy.

Asked if she agreed with Kerry's call for Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld to resign, Clinton said, "I'm hoping the entire administration is fired on Nov. 2."

On Saturday, thousands of abortion rights protesters marched across the Brooklyn Bridge.

Besides the protest march past the convention site, several other events were planned, including a gay rights demonstration and a vigil in Central Park by a group of Sept. 11 families opposed to the Iraq war.

The New York Daily News made a front-page pitch for calm on Sunday, publishing a front-page editorial with the headline, "Play Nice."

The convention site is several miles north of Ground Zero, where two hijacked planes destroyed both towers of the World Trade Center on Sept. 11, 2001. Nearly 3,000 people died there, at the Pentagon and at a crash site in Pennsylvania.

Thousands of police guarded New York roadways, bridges, tunnels and ports, while vehicle restrictions in an 18-square-block area around the Garden snarled traffic in a city already congested.

Inside the hall, the transformation from sports and entertainment center to convention site was complete, with a custom-made podium filling one side of the hall and thousands of balloons above.

A small group of delegates have been here since the middle of last week for platform hearings, but scores were arriving on Sunday.

Bush arrives Wednesday. He'll spend one night in New York before bolting for the battlegrounds of Pennsylvania, Ohio and beyond shortly after accepting the GOP nomination.

The delegates were arriving under unprecedented security.

Convention attendees were greeted with a list of prohibited items that included guns, explosives, fireworks and knives - "regardless of size" - as well as some less obvious items such as umbrellas.

"Umbrellas - especially the big golf-type ones - they could be used in an improper way as a weapon," said Ann Roman, a spokeswoman for the Secret Service.

yellowwing
08-29-04, 11:24 AM
I do not expect that the DNC fringe groups will maintain the disciple of the likes of the VVAK in Boston.

I saw a news clip of one idiot punching a GWB supporter. He was rightly and promptly arrested.

I don't see orderly protests lined up. I think it will be a mess. I pray that the line of blue are ready.

radio relay
08-29-04, 12:23 PM
The goofballs are hoping and praying for a repeat of the '68 Democratic Convention in Chicago, which spawned the likes of Abby Hoffman (thank God he's dead), Tom Fonda, nee Hayden, and the rest of the Chicago seven. Which, in turn, produced the great show trial of the late sixties, and made them all media darlings, and celebrites of the left.

The police are a hell of alot more savvy to the tactics and goals of the left, than they were 36 years ago. There will be protests and disruptions, but I predict the outcome will disappoint the slimebags of the left.

I'm more concerned that there will be a major terrorist attack. Maybe if enough "anarchists" get wasted by an islamic terrorist attack, they'll start to be more appreciative of the "law and order" needed to stop islamofascist terror.

Sparrowhawk
08-29-04, 03:13 PM
John Kerry must be foaming at the mouth right now....


Stupid idiot demonstrators will only encourage terrorist to commit acts of terror because they will see these misfits as supporting their belief's much like the Commies did in the 60's.

and the latest is that Michael Moore will be USA Today's representative as their RNC Reporter.

eddief
08-29-04, 05:33 PM
The terrorists don't need encouragement from protesters to commit terrorist acts. They believe God is on their side, and that's plenty enough to motivate them. Also President Bush encouraged them to "Bring it on!" as well.

radio relay
08-29-04, 06:08 PM
Hmmm.. coulda swore that was the hard charging, combat decorated, veins in his teeth, war hero, motor boat captain who yearns to be CIC, John "Fonda" Kerry, that said "bring it on"... guess maybe my hearing is going out on me...

MAJMike
08-29-04, 06:40 PM
"The message they bring is very clear, it all against every moral belief the majority of Americans holds."

That's strange - because I thought that the "moral belief" that the "majority of American's hold" is the right of free speech, the right to express one's self, the right to form and voice an opinion and the right to vote for our elected leaders...

...or, do you mean the spoon fed diatribes of Sean Hannity, Rush Limbaugh et al, who would do your thinking for you? These are NOT the moral beliefs of the MAJORITY of Americans!! Any one who does not drink the right wing Kool Aid is "loony?" God help us!

There are Marines in IRAQ right now laying their lives on the line to give the Iraqis the rights of free speech and to express their political views that you would seem to deny our own citizens.

This country was formed in the cauldron of political protest. We protested against unfair governance by the British crown. We have had political protests in virtually every generation. It is the right of every citizen.

Some of us, and many of us on this forum, seem to want to inhibit the rights of those who don't think the way we do; we want to label them as "loony" or "crazy" and discredit their right to act as a US citizen.

I served my Corps to protect those rights and hand them down from generation to generation. What did you fight for?

radio relay
08-29-04, 08:11 PM
Nope, we mean the spoon fed diatribes of Al Frankin, Janeane Garofalo, Michael Moore, et al... They're pretty looney tunes, and sorry Major, they ain't the voice of the masses. In fact, they're a whole lot farther from representing the majority, than any conservative spokesperson.

Seems to me the lunatic left is enjoying their freedom of speech, as well as their freedom of expression, just fine. Wearing crazy costumes, or for those who forgot their's, just going nude. Depicting our President as a muderer, and parading around in costumes representing a tarnished Statue of Liberty with a death's rictus. You don't think that's looney, then what's in your koolaid?

That "fighting for their rights" b.s. mantra is old and tired. Those Marines in Iraq aren't fighting for the rights of idiots to disrespect them, or their country, or their Commander In Chief. Just like we weren't fighting in Vietnam, for John Fonda Kerry's, right to stab us in the back, while exercising his "free speech" and tell lies before Congress, in 1971, while also wearing a silly costume, by the way.

We here don't want to "inhibit" anybody's rights. Seems you don't like hearing us exercise our freedom to call the leftwing protesting fools, the lunatics, a$$holes, and scum of the earth that they trully are!!!

Sparrowhawk
08-29-04, 08:57 PM
Are too far to the left of me, to allow them to do any talking for me.

Bush who's father served with the CIA, should have exposed Kerry's commie connections that have never been fully exposed.

But, for now let me see who's been today's spokesmen at those demonstration.

Several of the same people that protested the Vietnam war were there. Some were blaming the Christians who they said, see the anti-terrorist war as a holy war.”

The causes varied as much as the people shouting support: immigrants’ rights, gay rights, universal health care, the Palestinian cause, an end to the killing in Sudan. Tracy Blevins, a biomedical researcher who recently left New York for Houston, dyed her Maltese pink and carried the little dog in a baby pouch to advocate peace.



'They exploited 9-11 by having it in New York at this time.”



Commie Tom Haden, Hillary rotten Clinton, Jesse Jackson, as well the gays and lesbians, the baby killers. The pro drug addicts, and here's some other 'sthat reveal the moral believes of this crowd.


Hillary Rotten Clintonhttp://graphics7.nytimes.com/images/2004/08/29/nyregion/29cnd-protest.slide5.jpg

The anarchists resembling terrorist like those that attacked the world trade center. Yep, a real nice happy lot.

http://www.latimes.com/media/photo/2004-08/14033145.jpg

but you may be right they may not be looney, just crazy and anti-American values, that's for sure.

yellowwing
08-29-04, 09:47 PM
That's right these left wing malcontents have more leadership impact than what we have now. Thanks to our elected leadership the looines have run of the asylum. But of course its not the elected Anministarion's fault. He can't make good use of a majority of Congressional and Governorial majorities.

Michael Moore must be the better leader! He gets paid better anyway.

Sparrowhawk
08-29-04, 10:22 PM
http://hosted.ap.org/photos/N/NYDC10608292336-big.jpg

An anti-Bush group "Clown Army" marches on the Great Lawn in New York's Central Park on Sunday, Aug. 29, 2004, the day before the start of the Republican National Convention

Sparrowhawk
08-29-04, 10:29 PM
http://www.pe.com/dayphotos/news-2004-08-29/notting-hill_carnival29_600.jpg


Ooophs, wrong one.. well it could have been one.. LOL

here's the one I was gona post...

http://vvakerry.bizland.com/moorejesse.jpg

eddief
08-29-04, 10:55 PM
Some of the protesters may be looney, but at least they're not neocons with dual loyalty (they love Israel more than America) fighting a war for Israel's security (because it sure as hell aint for our security).

radio relay
08-29-04, 11:04 PM
Eddie..

A suggestion: Take your meds, and make sure they kick in, before posting.

Thanks, man.

eddief
08-29-04, 11:05 PM
NYC doesn't like the neocons. Maybe they should have had their convention in red state territory. Preferably in Nebraska where the crap they're shoveling would have been good fertilizer for the corn crop. Or better yet, they could have had it in Israel with their buddies- the Likuds.

eddief
08-29-04, 11:11 PM
radio relay
If you're going to insult me at least come up with something original and funny.

yellowwing
08-30-04, 03:08 AM
If we had such an Uber-Leader they would not even be there. Perhaps he has no clothes.

radio relay
08-30-04, 06:06 AM
It's not an insult, Eddie. Nor, is it a joke.

It's a plea for rational thought.

HardJedi
08-30-04, 06:16 AM
Originally posted by eddief
NYC doesn't like the neocons. Maybe they should have had their convention in red state territory. Preferably in Nebraska where the crap they're shoveling would have been good fertilizer for the corn crop. Or better yet, they could have had it in Israel with their buddies- the Likuds.

WHY do you always have such a hate on for the Jews, eddie?

radio relay
08-30-04, 06:20 AM
Yellowing

This ain't 1930's Germany, there is no "uber-leader". We have Presidents, and Democracy, here in the United States.

The Nazi's were socialists. It's the Canadians who love socialism, from what I hear. You all Nazi's up there with all your clothes on?

Sparrowhawk
08-30-04, 08:08 AM
There were lots of angry, hate filled signs with a bunch of dirt-bags carrying them that were fully anti-war, ant-iAmerican that you got a glimpse of on the networks, but they have yet to appear on the national news or on the front page of our newspapers?







Talk about a cover-up, some of the sign carriers were Arab-American protesting the war in Iraq and Afganistan, carrying the flag upside down John kerry style... what happened to those pictures...

instead they showed the nice people's pictures...

the New York Times had even a collection of them for all to see..
http://graphics7.nytimes.com/images/2004/08/29/national/30voic1.jpg


just one small pic of the radical left that support Arab anti- American agenda...


http://www.latimes.com/media/photo/2004-08/14034948.jpg




Were they too hard for even the media to print? Or would they have revealed the real dark side of the political agenda we will be strap with if Kerry wins?

Is "United for Peace and Justice," the sponsor of the NY protest one of Teresa Kerry's hidden charitable organizations receiving funds from her? If so, shouldn't she have to pay for the extra police service and decalre it as a political donation?


http://www.latimes.com/media/photo/2004-08/14034941.jpg


Just things of interest, I would like to know the answers to...

radio relay
08-30-04, 08:43 AM
Note: not all taken at the current protest, but I'll bet they are in NYC somewhere

http://www.protestwarrior.com/gallery/lefties/55.jpg
http://www.eyeambic.com/pics/2-15-03march/march7.jpg
http://www.protestwarrior.com/gallery/lefties/48.jpg

CplCrotty
08-30-04, 08:44 AM
Truly, a picture is worth 1,000 words, and more . . .

radio relay
08-30-04, 08:48 AM
It was taken in NYC, yesterday!

http://us.news2.yimg.com/us.yimg.com/p/ap/20040829/capt.nygb10408291817.cvn_protests_nygb104.jpg

Sparrowhawk
08-30-04, 09:02 AM
Right after the flag drapped cardboard coffin carriers were finished using the flags, a picture I caught a glipse of showed a flag patch work or flags thrown on the ground with a protestor standing on them.

Where is that pic?


Our local newspaper about a year ago, cut off a picture at the edge of the picture. They printed it on their front page when the Arab Americans were protesting at our local university .

The part they choose to cut off read;

"Terrorism, it's closer then you think."

radio relay
08-30-04, 09:25 AM
a common tactic of the leftwing press. I'll watch for the entire pic, and post it if I find it.

Here's a good one. Possibly posted here already. Not at the current protest, but priceless:

http://www.diodon349.com/Attack_on_America/images_attack/old_gl1.jpg

OLE SARG
08-30-04, 09:54 AM
These turds ought to be real proud of themselves - bunch of MORONS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I hope the hell he got blisters on his eyeballs!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

SEMPER FI

enviro
08-30-04, 11:12 AM
It's really ironic that the majority these protesters are there to protest the war in Iraq / Afghanistan - while those wars have given millions of other people the right to protest now without the fear of being killed.

I look at it as this:

They are protesting the right of others to protest and be free.
Free without state sponsored terrorism....
Free without state sponsored killings and rapes....

Sometimes, I wonder if what we all do / did for our country was even worth it. They have taken the right to free speech as an invitation to being an idiot.

eddief
08-30-04, 01:25 PM
HardJedi
I don't hate the Jews. I just don't like the influence that the Israeli lobby and the Likud party has on our leaders- especially the neocons. We have too many people in our government with dual loyalties. Have you heard about the spy the Israelis had in the Pentagon? I'm sure there are more than just that one person. But if you want to think I'm being anti-semetic for criticizing a foreign government (not the Jewish race), then what can I say? That's your perogative.

eddief
08-30-04, 01:27 PM
radio relay
If my comments are over your head, then just say so.

eddief
08-30-04, 01:31 PM
enviro
I supported the war in Afghanistan because that's where Al Qaida was. Iraq had nothing to with 9/11 and was a war of choice. I watched the protests on CSPAN. The only war I saw being protested was the one in Iraq- the war of choice and not necessity. Iraq has nothing to do with the war on terror and everything to do with American Empire.

Sparrowhawk
08-30-04, 01:44 PM
Originally posted by eddief
enviro
I supported the war in Afghanistan because that's where Al Qaida was. Iraq had nothing to with 9/11 and was a war of choice. I watched the protests on CSPAN. The only war I saw being protested was the one in Iraq- the war of choice and not necessity. Iraq has nothing to do with the war on terror and everything to do with American Empire.

They showed the protest agaisnt Afganistan on Cnn, MSNBC and ABC and just mentioned it on Fox News.....

eddief
08-30-04, 01:54 PM
Sparrowhawk
The protest against Afghanistan must not have been that big a deal if Bush's Fox News only mentioned it. The vast majority of Americans supported going into Afghanistan to get Al Qaida. There were no massive demonstations against that operation like there were for Iraq.

eddief
08-30-04, 02:27 PM
NYTimes.com

Families and Individuals Join in Anger and Frustration
By MARC SANTORA

Published: August 30, 2004


For every young man with an unorthodox piercing in a seemingly painful place, there was an elderly woman who walked in the midday sun for hours.

For each wildly costumed, madly gyrating, drum-beating protester, there was a family that had made the trip into Manhattan together to march as one.

And for all the chants denouncing President Bush as a terrorist, for all the obscenities screamed full throated, there were just as many people, young and old, who expressed in more subdued tones their anger with the Bush administration.

Whether it was a mother who has a child fighting in Iraq or a father wanting his children to see history in the making, the march past Madison Square Garden yesterday had the distinct feel of a family affair.

Susan Catalano, 66, and her daughters, Adrienne, 34, and Victoria, 39, had come to their opposition slowly. But the three, all from New York, marched enthusiastically.

"I was in support of the war in Iraq when it began," Adrienne said. "Although, at the time, my mother said not to believe all the hype."

She smiled, hand on her mom's shoulder, and said, "Older and wiser."

Victoria held an umbrella over her mother's head to shield her from the sun on the cloudless afternoon. She said her mother was a registered Republican who does not vote along party lines.

"I think people are really fed up with the war," said Victoria, who works as an assistant to an investment banker in New York City. "I think people feel really duped."

Adrienne agreed, saying: "I don't like the war. They tied the war in Iraq to the war on terrorism."

Although Adrienne said she believed that herself, she said she now feels betrayed. "Where is bin Laden? Al Qaeda attacked us, so why are we in Iraq?"

Dorothy Miller, 84, of the Bronx, and her husband, Alex, 86, looked like they could have been heading off to a Florida vacation.

She wore a floral button-down shirt that flapped in the breeze and a bonnet pulled tightly on her head, while he held her arm, camera slung around his shoulder. It had taken the couple two hours to amble the 10 blocks from 23rd Street to Madison Square Garden.

Mrs. Miller, whose husband was in the Army Air Corps during World War II, said: "We don't do this often. But what is happening in Iraq is really just terrible."

Members of the Larson family worried that they would not be able to get into the city to make the march because of traffic and security. Peter Larson, 50, said they had decided to drive from their home in Burlington, N.J., to Staten Island and take the ferry over.

Mr. Larson was joined by his wife, Michele, 40, and their children, Andrew 13, and Kirsten, 16. They were part of a group called Military Families Speak Out.

Mrs. Larson said they had been going to various rallies since Sept. 11, 2001, but when a good friend's son died last February in Iraq, it drove home how much the war is costing average families.

Kirsten said that among her high school friends, nobody is very concerned about politics. "But the other day someone brought up the draft," she said. "That got everyone excited, I guess because it affected them personally."

Among the thousands of people marching were many bearing signs with messages like "Draft the Bush twins,'' and: "My kids are in Iraq Mr. Bush. Are yours?"

At the end of the parade, marchers carried 1,000 cardboard coffins wrapped in flags meant to represent those killed in the war.

Nearby, a group calling themselves the "Raging Grannies" sang songs that spoofed Mr. Bush, set to familiar melodies. For instance, to the tune of "The Battle Hymn of the Republic,'' they sang: "No more lies from Dick and Georgie/We deplore their wartime orgy."

The Daniels family from Vermont woke up at 3 a.m. to make the drive into the city. Bryan, 38, and his wife, Terri, 42, were joined by their children, Taylor, 14, and Callie, 11. They also had their dog, Ellie, named after Eleanor Roosevelt.

"We felt we had to come to make some kind of statement," Mr. Daniels said. "We know there are a lot of complaints that there is not a lot of a difference between Bush and Kerry, especially regarding Iraq, but there are small differences that could have a big impact."

radio relay
08-30-04, 04:27 PM
That must be it, Eddie, Your lunacy is way too complicated... You're much too deep to comprehend.

Yeppers. You're one complicated nutcase. Guess that's why you worship other nutcases!

Might want to find a more credible source, if you're going to look for something in print to support your lame brain notions. The NY Times is just about as believable as that other waste of trees, the L.A. Times.

GySgtRet
08-30-04, 05:05 PM
It looks to me as the country is being torn apart not by the parties but plants in the parties. Of which I don't know who they are yet. But a country torn apart will make an excellent target for terrorists.

Semper Fidelis

eddief
08-30-04, 05:25 PM
radio relay
I just wanted to show a little balance when it came to the protests. Not all the protesters are looney like some of them obviously are. As for worshipping looneys, the only "looney" I worship is God the Father, Jesus the Son, and the Holy Spirit. As for my contention that the Israeli lobby and Likud party have a big influence on our government, that is a matter that is debatable. I feel they have too strong an influence on our government. You obviously feel otherwise and that's okay. We can agree to disagree. But to insinuate that I'm crazy and need medication are insults that I've never thrown out to anyone on this forum. My comment about stuff being over your head was tongue in cheek (maybe I should have put a damn smily face next to it) and just meant to maybe make you smile and drop the insult game. But if you want to play the personal insult game, then you have the wrong Marine. In the future if you wish to hurl insults at me please send them to me thru private messages. That way the forum is spared from having to read them.

Sparrowhawk
08-30-04, 05:50 PM
Originally posted by eddief
Sparrowhawk
The protest against Afghanistan must not have been that big a deal if Bush's Fox News only mentioned it. The vast majority of Americans supported going into Afghanistan to get Al Qaida. There were no massive demonstations against that operation like there were for Iraq.

Just last week there was a mass demonstration against the US.

The protest was in Iraq, and the demonstrators were all terrorist and those that support their views, you know, the same animals who told us BEFORE 9-11 that they were at war with us.

Isn't it ironic that the hardest fighting we have done in Iraq for the past year has been against terrorists that hold that view?

And if they have vowed to strike at us at home and on foreign shores what makes you think they wouldn't be here now, if we weren't fighting them in Iraq?

Look at what is happening to French, they kidnapped French workers because the French government won't allow Muslims to wear headscarves at work or in their schools?

Make that a law here and see the scumbags come out of the woodwork. Here in America, American-Arabs that hold duel citizenships but whose allegiance is with Iraq, Iran, Afghanistan, Saudi Arabia, Syria, etc.

These terrorists will not stop until they have the Muslim religion as the state religion in America, unless we fight them now wherever they are. Iraq is as good as any and isn't it amazing that those that have been fighting us the most just happened to be in Iraq, and just happened to have all the connections there? All the weapons they needed? And its been proven that Saddam was playing host to them for years, including terrorist that were striking at Israel, remember Saddam was even paying for those actions?

The Terrorist have said, Israel is their primary target and they have already said, that once they eliminate Israel, America is next and that they would do it from within.

The majority of Iraqi citizens according to our own troops support that we are there.

It was the same way in Nam, the citizens 80-90% supported us in the villages around our compounds because we had eliminated most of the communist treat from their midst. The communist like the Islamic terrorist are doing now in Iraq who held those people captive. But it was at home that the protestors were demonstrating against the war and Hanoi was encouraged by those protest movements to continue to fight us, yet here we are doing the same thing. Demonstrating against our warriors in Iraq and it only encourages the enemy.

That is the truth, demonstrate against the war in Iraq and you support the enemy. Just like it happened before.

Iran is next, because their leaders are supporting the terrorist, not the young population, but the leaders, who are paying the terrorist in Iraq to fight us there.

eddief
08-30-04, 06:10 PM
Sparrowhawk
I don't buy into the argument that everyone fighting us in Iraq is a terrorist. They are people that want their country back. They're glad Hussein is gone, but they don't appreciate America putting in a CIA man and former Baathist (Allawi) into power. They believe that America is there to loot their main natural resource- oil. The longer we stay there and the more bases we build over there will only make more of the Iraqis question our motives in Iraq. Now don't get me wrong. If they're fighting and trying to kill our troops then they are our enemy and we have to take them out. As for the protesters, most of the protesters aren't protesting our troops. They're protesting the neocons that sent them to Iraq. I totally agree with the protesters that the neocons have to go. As for Iran, let the Israelis take care of their reactors. They owe us bigtime for Iraq. No more American blood for Israel.

eddief
08-30-04, 06:27 PM
Almost 3 out of 4 Iraqis see Coalition Forces as occupiers and not liberators. They loved that we took out Saddam, but now they want their country back. I say give it to them and let Iraqis fight and die for their own damn country.

THEY'RE ANGRY ABOUT THE OCCUPATION AND WANT U.S. TO LEAVE

By Daniel Sneider


Before he skipped town, America's viceroy in Baghdad, Ambassador Paul Bremer III had this pronouncement about the people who have been his subjects for the last year or so.

``You won't find more than 2 percent of all Iraqis,'' he told the New York Times, ``for all their complaints they're making now, who think it would have been better if we had never come.''

Perhaps Bremer should have said ``2 percent of the Iraqis I talk to.'' The feelings of Iraqis are clearly a mystery to the departed occupation boss.

A majority of Iraqis, nearly 60 percent, now feel it was wrong that the U.S.-led coalition forces invaded Iraq, according to a just-released poll. Back in February, nearly that number felt the invasion was right. That reversal does not mean, opinion poll experts point out, that Iraqis are unhappy Saddam Hussein is gone. But it does reflect the deep despair, even anger, over the United States occupation and Iraqi eagerness for Americans to leave.

Unfortunately, growing anti-Americanism is not the only result of this occupation. Iraqis continue to believe that democracy is a worthwhile objective, but somewhere down the road. Now, they tell pollsters, what Iraq needs is a strongman who can provide security, take control of the country from the Americans, and keep Iraq together.

These are only some of the disturbing findings revealed this week by Oxford Research International, a University of Oxford-based organization that has conducted four national surveys of Iraq since autumn 2003. The data is based on face-to-face surveys of almost 12,000 people across the country, done in collaboration with Iraqi universities. Polling experts consider the survey both thorough and scientific in its method.

Among the highlights of the Oxford poll:

• Falling optimism -- a majority of Iraqis feel their lives are good, the same or better than before the war and expect them to be better a year from now. Unfortunately, those holding that optimistic view have declined from eight out of ten in February to a little over six of ten in June.

• Democracy vs. a strongman -- Not surprisingly, security and stability are the top priorities of Iraqis, along with reviving the economy and rebuilding infrastructure. Compared to last autumn, when democracy topped the list of things Iraq needs in 12 months time, half of all Iraqis now want a strongman. Five years down the road, though, they would like to see a democracy in place.

• Who provides security? -- A large majority believe security will improve after Iraqis take over. A third of Iraqis want coalition forces to leave now and a third think they should stay until a permanent government is in place. But even among those who want them to remain, almost all want the troops to pull back to remote areas where they would act only if the Iraqi government asked them to.

• Occupiers, not liberators -- almost three out of four Iraqis see the coalition forces as either occupiers or a force that exploits Iraq. Only about 17 percent describe them as a ``liberating force.''

• The Abu Ghurayb effect -- almost half the Iraqis surveyed have a more negative view of the U.S. over the past two months. The reason? The prison abuses at Abu Ghurayb, followed by the attacks on Al-Fallujah and the holy Shiite cities. The only silver lining is that a majority of Iraqis believe the prison abuses were the work of fewer than 100 people.

• Who has the confidence of Iraqis? -- Iraq's religious leaders top the list of organizations that inspire confidence, followed by police and the new Iraqi army. The United Nations is next. At the bottom of the list? The U.S. and British occupation forces.

• Leaders -- Three Shiite leaders, including Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani and radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr were among the top four national leaders that Iraqis trust.

• And him, they didn't pick: The prime minister of the new interim government, Ayad Allawi, didn't rate even a mention. He did rank sixth, however, on the list of those whom Iraqis do not trust at all. Based on the poll results, however, Allawi clearly has a future if he convinces Iraqis he is a strongman -- and not a puppet of the Americans.

For the full details on what Iraqis are thinking these days (Bremer, Paul Wolfowitz and new U.S. Ambassador John Negroponte, take note), go to: www.oxfordresearch.com/publications.html.

DANIEL SNEIDER is foreign affairs columnist for the Mercury News. His column appears on Sunday and Thursday. You can contact him at dsneider@mercurynews.com.

Sparrowhawk
08-30-04, 06:46 PM
Originally posted by eddief
Sparrowhawk
They are people that want their country back. They're glad Hussein is gone, but they don't appreciate America putting in a CIA man and former Baathist (Allawi) into power.

Untill they have a voice in the matter, untill they can vote without fear for their choice.

I agree that those that are in power right now, are not the best choice, but for fear many are not up to stepping up to be counted at this time.

Everyone of those that stepped up for our country during
The Revolution suffered for their committment, some were killed others lost great wealth. It was the price of freedom, and some were accused of being supportive of the British.



"There is overwhelming evidence that the colonists were satisfied with their status within the British Empire.

Even as the Declaration was being debated, Congress took the militia into Continental service and appointed Colonel George Washington commander-in-chief of the American forces.

Yet, despite the military involvement and the appointment of a commander-in-chief, the idea of complete separation from England was still repugnant to many members of Congress and to a large part of the American people.


Public opinion was not yet ready for such drastic action. It was obvious, however, that the colonies could not forever remain half in, half out of the empire. Moderates persuaded themselves they were not fighting the King but the ministry and, as late as January 1776, the King's health was toasted nightly in an officer's mess presided over by General Washington."


An Outline of American History (http://odur.let.rug.nl/~usa/H/1954uk/chap2.htm)

Iif Iraq succeeds, in obtaining their freedom it will be a torn in the Arab world, because they will have been given the opportunity, many in those other Arab countries can only secrely dream about.

You better believe if they prevail, other Arabs will flock there. for the freedom they desire.

If they don't then they will be nuked and prophesy will be ful-filled faster then we would want it to come to pass.

radio relay
08-30-04, 07:09 PM
Ok Eddie, fine. Sorry, for picking on you.

However, I do think your views on Israel, are off base. You're also incorrect in your support of people who obviously hate the United States... nuff said

eddief
08-30-04, 07:16 PM
I'm just so damn tired of Iraqis not stepping up for their country. Iraqi security forces have a desertion rate of over 80%. So that tells me we're going to continue to do the majority of the bleeding for a long time to come. Deep down I hope it's worth it, but I have to admit that I don't think these people are worth dying for.

eddief
08-30-04, 07:47 PM
radio relay
Apology accepted and fair enough about Israel, but where do you get that I support people who hate the US? Do you mean the protesters? Because if that's what you mean, then you're painting them with a very broad brush. Sure there were those who have no love for the US. Most of the people I saw were just peacefully marching because they disagreed with the President (Bush isn't America) about Iraq.

HardJedi
09-05-04, 03:44 PM
ya know, all I really have to say is this. If you are serious about protesting something that youare against, then do so. No cheap theatrics. No silly ass costumes that you think make a cute statement or flashy photo op. research yourissues, and present them in a clear and concise manner, and then be prepared to rebut those who challenge your opinion.

why is that so hard for people to do?

( that being siad, I have been known to throw balloons filled with P*ss at those hippie freaks! LOL ) :D