Thousands converge for peace

SAN FRANCISCO AND WASHINGTON, D.C. “”mdash; Tens of thousands
marched in the streets in the City by the Bay and an estimated
100,000 rallied in the nation’s capital Saturday, in a loud
and often outraged protest against a possible war with Iraq.

“(I’m here today) to show my support for everyone
else that’s doing something and to show the people that are
on the fence that they can do something, that (peace) is worth
fighting for,” said Julia Wallace, a fourth-year UCLA history
student, who made the trip to the Bay Area for the march.

Wallace was just one of thousands from all over the West Coast
to pour into San Francisco in protest. Students from UCLA, UC San
Diego, UC Berkeley, UC Davis, UC Santa Cruz, the UC Hastings School
of Law, USC, CalTech, Stanford, the University of Oregon and other
universities joined elderly people in wheel chairs, mohawked
anarchists, high schoolers, aging hippies, babies in strollers and
middle-aged suburbanites in opposition of a strike against
Iraq.

The demonstrations were part of an international campaign of
anti-war actions held in London, Berlin, Mexico City and Rome.

In San Francisco, as the crowd of over 40,000 marched a
mile-long walk from the city’s financial district to City
Hall, people held signs reading “Drop Bush not bombs,”
“No blood for oil” and “Bombing for peace is like
(having sex) for virginity.” One demonstrator passed out
bumper stickers reading “Iraq is Arabic for
Vietnam.”

Others carried signs and wore T-shirts honoring the late Sen.
Paul Wellstone, a Minnesota democrat who died in a plane crash
Friday. Wellstone’s last significant vote in the Senate was
to oppose a resolution giving President Bush the authority he
sought to attack Iraq. Wellstone was the only Senator involved in a
close election to oppose the legislation.

Protesters were not so kind to Bush, using words like
“tyrant,” “terrorist” and
“murderer” ““ words often saved for the likes
of Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden ““ to describe their
president.

After gathering in a park near City Hall, the crowd heard from
numerous speakers, including Peter Camejo, Green party
gubernatorial candidate John Burton, the president of the
California state Senate Dolores Huerta, the co-founder of the
United Farm Workers Association, and Congresswoman Barbara Lee,
D”“Berkeley, a hero to many peace activists who last year was
the lone member of Congress to vote against U.S. military action in
Afghanistan.

“You are the true American patriots,” Lee said to a
cheering crowd. “You are the people preserving our democracy
… keep the heat on, my brothers and sisters!”

So far, however, “the heat” seems to have had little
affect on Bush and not much more on the rest of the country. Bush
was away from Washington over the weekend, attending an Asian
Pacific Economic Cooperation summit in Cabo San Lucas, Mexico. Bush
““ having already won congressional support ““ was
reportedly lobbying world leaders there to support U.S. plans for a
preemptive strike in Iraq.

As far as the American public goes, a recent Gallop poll showed
that support for war is not waning, even as the anti-war movement
picks up. Fifty-six percent of Americans favor invading Iraq in an
attempt to remove Hussein from power, while 37 percent oppose such
a plan, the poll said. The percentage of Americans who support war
was up 3 percent compared to a Gallup poll taken at the beginning
of the month.

Some protesters in both San Francisco and Washington wondered
how effective they could be.

“I’m here to prevent war, but I don’t think
Bush is going to (stop war) anyway,” said Fat Mike of the
rock band NOFX.

In Washington, as Emily Jones, a first-year Yale student, tied a
white peace ribbon around her arm, she said it was hard to tell
what kind of impact the demonstration would have on Bush’s
policies.

“So far they have ignored protests like this one,”
Jones said. “One can only hope this is a democracy and that
our leaders will listen to the voice of the people.”

Sloshing through the muddy ground near the Vietnam Veterans
Memorial, the tens of thousands of Washington protesters composed
the largest demonstration police and demonstrators could remember
since the Vietnam war.

For more than three hours, protesters in Washington listened to
speakers like Jesse Jackson and actress Susan Sarandon before
marching to the White House.

Telling demonstrators “when young America moves, the whole
world moves,” Jackson acknowledged the large numbers of teens
and 20-somethings in the crowd.

“Today Dr. (Martin Luther) King would be happy to see so
many young people energizing a new peace movement in
America,” Jackson said.

Sarandon, meanwhile, questioned whether invading Iraq would lead
to the regime change the administration is seeking and said she
wanted to know how much it would cost to maintain stability in the
region.

Sarandon also challenged the notion that it is unpatriotic to
challenge the government post-Sept. 11, 2001.

“I’m here because I’m tired of being
frightened to speak out,” Sarandon said. “Mr. Bush, you
have hijacked our pain and our fear.”

Volunteers from the International ANSWER Coalition ““ the
group that organized both demonstrations ““ traversed the
crowds carrying red buckets and asked for donations.

A 79-year-old Virginia woman, who identified herself as
Gertrude, was handing out copies of the Communist Party newspaper,
“The People’s Weekly World,” to passersby. She
said protests like this were essential at a time when the media
have been ignoring the anti-war movement.

“It is as if the politicians aren’t hearing the
voice of the people,” she said.

Isaac Menashe, a UC Santa Cruz senior studying political theory
was at the Washington demonstration and said he was hopeful that
more publicity would lead more people to publicly express their
concerns about war plans in Iraq.

“The opposition has been nearly invisible in the media
thus far, and the Bush administration has effectively set the terms
of the debate so far along in the war process that it will be hard
to catch up,” Menashe said. “Whether the people will
raise their voices rapidly and loudly enough is
uncertain.”

With reports from Daily Bruin wire services.