[R-G] Re: NYTimes.com Article: Rally in Washington Is Said to Invigorate the Antiw...

[DavidMcR at aol.com]

 Rally in Washington Is Said to Invigorate the Antiwar Movement
 
 October 30, 2002
 By KATE ZERNIKE
 
 
 http://www.nytimes.com/2002/10/30/politics/30PROT.html?ex=
 1036976537&ei=1&en=ae267069363beda0
 
 Emboldened by a weekend antiwar protest in Washington that
 organizers called the biggest since the days of the Vietnam War,
 groups opposed to military action in Iraq said they were preparing a
 wave of new demonstrations across the country in the next few weeks.
 
 The demonstration on Saturday in Washington drew 100,000 by police
 estimates and 200,000 by organizers', forming a two-mile wall of
 marchers around the White House. The turnout startled even
 organizers, who had taken out permits for 20,000 marchers. They
 expected 30 buses, and were surprised by about 650, coming from as
 far as Nebraska and Florida.
 
 A companion demonstration in San Francisco attracted 42,000
 protesters, city police there said, and smaller groups demonstrated
 in other cities, including about 800 in Austin, Tex., and 2,500 in
 Augusta, Me.
 
 "The rally was like a huge gust of wind into the sails of the
 antiwar movement," said Brian Becker, an organizer of the Washington
 protest. "Our goal was not simply to have a big demonstration, but
 to give the movement confidence that it could prevail. The massive
 turnout showed it's legitimate, and it's big."
 
 Building on those demonstrations, a coalition of groups called
 International Answer - short for Act Now to Stop War and End Racism
 - is asking people to vote in a referendum called VoteNoWar.org,
 which organizers hope will serve as a countervote to the
 Congressional resolution in support of military action in Iraq.
 
 The coalition, which has absorbed several smaller groups around the
 country, is also planning another protest on Jan. 18 and 19 in
 Washington, to coincide with the commemoration of the Rev. Dr.
 Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday and the 12th anniversary of the
 Persian Gulf war. Organizers are also planning what they call a
 Grass Roots Peoples' Congress to publicize the results of the
 referendum.
 
 Smaller groups that attended the demonstrations in San Francisco and
 Washington said they were planning their own protests back home.
 Protesters plan to march in New Orleans and Tampa, Fla., this
 weekend; in Charleston, S.C., in mid-November; and again in San
 Francisco on Nov. 22. A group in Louisiana is planning a peace walk
 between Baton Rouge and New Orleans at the end of November, and the
 National Council of Churches is discussing another rally in
 Washington for Nov. 24.
 
 MoveOn.org is conducting an online petition drive and has raised
 about $2 million for candidates, including the late Senator Paul
 Wellstone, who opposed a war in Iraq.
 
 In California, college students are leading teach-ins against the
 war at high schools. Richard Becker, an organizer with Answer in San
 Francisco, said the group was setting up an emergency response plan
 to accommodate a mass protest - complete with sound systems,
 placards, the requisite permits and even portable toilets - on the
 day United States troops enter Iraq.
 
 "There is not going to be one speech or one demonstration, after
 which everyone goes home," said Barbara Lubin, the founder of the
 Middle East Children's Alliance in Berkeley, Calif. "This is a
 movement against war, and it's building momentum."
 
 Those who have been organizing and attending demonstrations for
 several months said the swelling size of the protests showed how
 much antiwar sentiment had increased as the threat of war
 intensified.
 
 In San Francisco, a march on Sept. 6 drew 2,500 people, one two
 weeks later, 6,000, and one on Oct. 6, 10,000.
 
 "People are very emboldened right now," said Mike Zmolek, an
 organizer with the National Network to Stop the War in Iraq. "We've
 been in a financial crunch since we started - suddenly people are
 sending checks out of nowhere."
 
 Mr. Zmolek said his organization had attracted 100 new antiwar
 groups across the country in the last three months.
 
 The march in Washington was planned by International Answer, with
 coordinators of local chapters working in more than two dozen cities
 around the country. It attracted homemakers as well as college
 students, seasoned activists and those who had never attended any
 kind of political rally before.
 
 "It was beautiful," said Merrill Chapman, 35, who called herself
 "just a housewife" in Charleston, S.C. "I'm in a very conservative
 town, and I feel like the lone voice. Being in Washington energized
 me, by seeing I was not alone."
 
 Ms. Chapman had never been to a protest before the demonstration in
 Washington, but got involved after organizing a group called
 Thinking People in Charleston. She is planning a rally for Nov. 16
 in her city.
 
 In Houston, Lois Wright, a 46-year-old saleswoman in a drapery
 workroom, said she felt compelled to take the two-day bus ride to
 Washington, because the Bush administration seemed "hellbent on
 going to war."
 
 "It's O.K. to do stuff in Houston, but nobody gets to hear about
 it," she said. "I felt if we were right in their faces, they
 couldn't ignore us."
 
 Polls show that about 50 percent of Americans support sending ground
 troops to Iraq to remove Saddam Hussein from power. Antiwar
 organizers acknowledge some public support for military action, but
 said that until now, the voices of those who do not support the
 policy have not been heard.
 
 "I think the president has considerable support," Mr. Zmolek said,
 "but I think the nation is pretty divided on this."
 
 Certainly, there is still debate. In Austin, the University of Texas
 student government passed a resolution on Oct. 22 opposing an
 attack, by a vote of 20 to 17. Some students seek to have that vote
 overturned, saying it does not reflect the sentiment of the campus's
 50,000 students.
 
 
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