Blah, blah, blah

Across the country, United for Peace and Justice, CodePink,  Students for a Democratic Society and many other antiwar organizations held protests today to mark the 5 year anniversary of the Iraq War. In Washington, D.C., the groups had events planned throughout the day.

The response? Military officials are pushing for extended troop presence in Iraq–a 6-week “pause” of troop withdrawal.

I could only make it to the afternoon march on the Democratic National Committee Headquarters. The turnout was very low. Not more than a couple hundred people were protesting. The conditions weren’t optimum for a large crowd. It was raining. It was in the middle of the week and people had to work. It was the last action of a long day of events and many people had already been arrested for civil disobedience. And I came an hour after the march had begun. But for the 5 year anniversary, that is disappointing.

The police, however, did not forget to come, nor did the press. I think the protesters and the media were pretty evenly matched. And there seemed to be more police than the protesters and press combined

People did get arrested for civil disobedience. Getting arrested yields greater media attention than singing or marching.

Annoying people seem to always get the megaphone. This guy had it for a long time. I don’t know why that happened. He kept talking about 9/11 as an inside job. Why do conspiracy theorists insist on pushing this inside job crap? It’s not a helpful way to try to stop the war that was not even about the trade center bombings.

I don’t think it’s germane to the 5 year anniversary of the Iraq war and the millions of Iraqis who have died violent deaths due to the U.S. occupation. Many people in the nation are still misinformed about Iraq. It was not related to the world trade center bombings. Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction. The United States has occupied and shit on the country for 5 years based on known lies. Millions of people have died and will continue to die until the U.S. military leaves.

To end on a positive note: nice drum.