another one - with a different spin
Rally hails troops in Iraq, takes protesters to task
D.C. event draws hundreds to Mall
By Leef Smith and Jonathan Abel, Washington Post | September 26, 2005
WASHINGTON -- The last time Robert Young participated in a
demonstration, he was protesting the Vietnam War as it wound down.
It took more than 30 years to make it happen again, but Young joined
hundreds of others on the National Mall yesterday to support the
nation's troops in Afghanistan and Iraq, among them his son, Croft, 32.
''I'm a quiet person," said Young, 65, who traveled from Atlanta with a
full-size Marine Corps flag. ''I don't really believe in
demonstrations, but I wanted to come here to support my son," a Marine
who left Camp Pendleton, Calif., on Wednesday for Fallujah.
The afternoon rally was small in comparison with Saturday's antiwar
demonstration, which D.C. Police Chief Charles Ramsey estimated at at
least 100,000. But participants waved flags and placards adorned with
such slogans as ''Keep the Promise to Iraq" and cheered the dozens of
speakers.
Deborah Johns, the mother of an Iraq war veteran, travels across the
country speaking in support of the war. She directed some of her
comments yesterday at antiwar activist Cindy Sheehan, the mother of a
soldier killed in Iraq, saying Sheehan speaks neither for Johns nor the
public.
After praising President Bush, Johns said she knew what she would like
to do with Sheehan and the antiwar protesters who descended on
Washington on Saturday: ''I'd like to ship them to Iran." The comment
earned applause.
The rally was largely peaceful, punctuated by a few small clashes with
antiwar protesters.
By 1 p.m., a small band of antiwar demonstrators had lined up behind
the rally stage, where they delivered such chants as ''Hey, Bush,
waddaya say? How many kids have you killed today?"
Other antiwar activists spread out across the city.
In the ballroom of a Holiday Inn on Capitol Hill, about 350 ''jurors"
sipped coffee and polished off desserts as they watched a mock trial of
Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, former CIA chief George J. Tenet
and US Attorney General Albert Gonzales. The men were accused of
violating US law and the Geneva Convention in supporting torture.
A few blocks away on the Mall, about 200 people who planned to be
arrested today if President Bush would not agree to meet with them
gathered in tents for a workshop on what to expect from police.
Over the weekend, four antiwar protesters were arrested on charges of
disorderly conduct.
Serving as a backdrop to yesterday's rally was a gigantic flag created
by children at Fort Benning, Ga., who decorated 900 red and white
squares to reflect what ''freedom means to me." At the back of the
crowd, participants held a banner that read ''God Bless Our Soldiers
Liberating the World One Tyrant at a Time."
Attending the rally were many who said they traveled far to support
soldiers they said are protecting the cause of freedom, some at the
cost of their own lives.
Antia Grater, 60, and her husband, John, 59, traveled from their home
near Niagara Falls, N.Y. Their son and his wife were stationed in the
Persian Gulf country of Qatar until they returned to the United States
a year and a half ago. Grater said the military is a family that has to
stand strong.