ON SATURDAY thousands of people came together on the Mall in Washington to stand for one single, unified purpose: to stop the occupation of Iraq, Afghanistan, Haiti, Colombia and Palestine, to end colonialism and capitalism, to support gay rights and abortion rights, to legalize marijuana, and, judging by the plethora of recycled t-shirts, to elect John Kerry.
The official message on stage seemed slightly less eclectic than the hapless jumble of causes reflected in the crowd. But after listening to speeches extolling Castro and condemning Israel, a consistent message emerged: defeating America in everything it stands for.
The rally was led in part by America's favorite flake, Cindy "We-might-not-even-have-been-attacked-by-Osama-bin-Laden" Sheehan. I used to not understand how someone could think that al-Qaeda had never attacked this country, until I learned the truth by attending the rally. For instance, did you know that "the police are the real terrorists," as one 12-foot sign told, or that the collapse of the Twin Towers "exhibited all the common features of controlled demolitions," as a widely distributed flyer read? So now it all makes sense, the World Trade towers were exploded by the police, in order to quench George W. Bush's thirst for innocent blood.
The demonstration was put together by the group Act Now to Stop War and End Racism, or ANSWER, an organization tangled in a web of ties to the militant Worker's World Party and Ramsey Clark's International Action Committee. I had the pleasure of hearing Clark, former Attorney General for Lyndon Johnson, speak at the rally -- an apologist for mass-murderers like Slobodan Milsosevic, and a man whose Web site has fun press releases like "Slobo's Spirit is Unbroken!" After hearing Clark's speech, you can be assured he's still doing all he can to keep murderers' spirits high.
In addition, ANSWER is controlled by a number of Muslim organizations listed as part of like the group's steering committee like the "Free Palestine Alliance." ANSWER published a peculiar statement on its Web site shortly after Yassir Arafat's death called "In Memory of a Fallen Leader." The statement implored everyone to display "Palestinian flags, scarfs, or other symbols of the Palestinian national movement for liberation and justice." The theme of the document is not peace but "struggle for freedom," and ends, "Let every flag and kuffiyya fly high in honor of all those who have passed -- from Falluja to Rafah and from Baghdad to Jerusalem."
Arafat is indeed a fallen leader -- of a relentless terrorist juggernaut that waged perpetual war in Israel. Pause for a minute and think about what sort of people view Arafat as a "fallen leader" and see a terrorist war on Israeli civilians as a "struggle for freedom." These are the people running ANSWER. Now think about why they might align themselves with a group that defends murderous tyrants from Yugoslavia to Rwanda. Why might they deny the truth about who caused September 11? What might explain ANSWER's extensive links to Hamas -- A commitment to nonviolence?
The highly respected Anti Defamation League said of an ANSWER protest in 2002, "the rally served as a vehicle for supporters of violence and anti-Semitic terror organizations such as Hezbollah, whose flag flew from the speakers' podium."At protests in 2004, ANSWER protesters waved signs that read "Globalize the Intifada" and chanted peaceful things like "Hey hey, Ho ho, Hamas will never go" and "Long live jihad!"
President Bush said we would have to fight the enemy "at home and abroad," but he probably didn't expect them to gather in plain daylight only yards from his bedroom.
The ANSWER terrorists have perfected the art of playing on Americans' oblivious idealism, using them as unwitting pawns to wage political war against U.S. troops. Many of the protesters innocently assume that everyone else in the world is as peaceful and benevolent as they are. They need to take off the rose-tinted glasses and realize that, in the real world, flower-power is helping the enemy sow death and destruction.
America awoke to the real world on Sept 11, 2001. In the real world, there is terror; there is evil. There are even people who will exploit others' naïve ignorance in order to achieve a goal politically that they can't achieve militarily: the victory of terror over freedom and true peace.
At Saturday's rally, no one called on foreign terrorists to stop slaughtering Iraqi civilians. To the contrary, Sheehan has called these murderers "freedom fighters." The rally wasn't about peace, it was about defeating America. If Americans fail to recognize this, the battlefield in front of the White House on Sept. 24 will become the one where terror won its greatest victory.
Herb Ladley is a Cavalier Daily associate editor. He can be reached at hladley@cavalierdaily.com.
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