This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Category: Antiwar crowd

  • Shiftless hippies unimpressed by IVAW

    Photo from People’s Press Collective

    Readers may remember back in March the IVAW put out a call to ANSWER, World Can’t Wait, Code Pink, et al. to hold off their protests on the March 15th anniversary of the Iraq War so that the IVAW/VVAW/VFP/SEIU could conduct their Winter Soldier II theater at Silver Spring, MD without competing for the attention of the media. WSII fizzled and got virtually no attention from the media (despite a large presence of media) and a result, the protest against the war which happened five days later, on a Wednesday, drew less than a thousand protesters and, in turn, fizzled out, too. Many of the non-IVAW protest organizations blamed the IVAW for their piss poor performance.

    Well, that bit of history seems to be repeating itself. According to one of the shiftless hippies caught in the theater of the IVAW yesterday;

    It was at this point I started to wonder that we’re doing as well in Iraq as we are.  If these tactical geniuses are any indication of the military resources we have at our disposal, it’s a wonder every one of them hasn’t been slaughtered.

    Anyway, back at Larimer and Speer, the I.V.A.W. negotiated some more (with someone), declared that the delegates had heard their message (somehow), and disbanded.

    […]

    The problem is that the I.V.A.W. assholes had put a call out to the more militant protesters, claiming that they were gonna end the march by breaking through police lines and doing their damndest to confront the delegates face to face.   As such, they had a few hundred folks in the march who were ready and willing to put their bodies on the line for the assholes, and ended up wasting the entire day being herded around by police and ordered about by Medea Benjamin types.

    I guess, I’d  point out to this shiftless hippie that these are largely the military’s rejects. Their tendancy to lie and their inability to lead is generally a result of living among the American population, not a result of their training.

    I’d also pass along a warning to the Minnesota law enforcement – since Kokesh and Millard are there getting ready for next week’s protests, I’ll be betting they’re going to try and bulid their reputations up a bit. This may be their last chance. Kokesh has been willing to get arrested on countless occasions in the last year and he has yet to pay a price…he keeps testing his boundaries and since this war is winding down, he’s losing his cachet. I’d expect a grand last gasp gesture next week.

  • IVAW, police face-off

    Photo from Reuters

    While the Democrats were enjoying their convention last night, IVAW was leading an estimated crowd of 3500 protesters (varying sources put the number at 5000 and 7000, so you tell me) and demanded they be given time at the DNC podium to read Barack Obama their three aims. Those aims being;

    Removing U.S. troops from Iraq immediately, providing full health care benefits to returning veterans, and paying reparations to Iraqis for the damage done during the war.

    According to the Denver Post, there was a “tense stand off” between police and the veterans;

    The veterans were arrayed in formation and in uniform, marching slowly toward a line of police, who had warned them they could be pepper sprayed and arrested. They were being watched by a crowd estimated by police at more than 5,000, many of whom had marched with the veterans from the Denver Coliseum.

    As the vets got within a few yards of the police, the cavalry arrived in the form of two white-shirted Obama staffers who asked a representative of the veterans to be escorted inside the security zone.

    After a brief conversation, a veteran’s representative said they had been promised a meeting with Obama’s liason for veteran’s affairs. A cheer went up, the veterans did an about face, and the Democrats appear to have avoided providing John McCain with some very unflattering video footage of veteran’s being pepper-sprayed hogtied and handcuffed outside their convention.

    Another story, however shows up on the Indypendent;

    The march was met with a line of more than 100 Denver Police Department officers clad in riot gear and armed with batons and pepper ball guns at the intersection of Market and 17th Streets. The police refused to let IVAW or the thousands of antiwar demonstrators closer to the convention. After long moments of contention between the demonstration and the police, finally one IVAW representative, former U.S. Marine Liam Madden, was allowed to cross police lines to meet with representatives of the Obama campaign.

    As Madden left on his mission, it seemed as if more than 50 IVAW members were prepared to engage in non-violent civil disobedience and likely arrest. Less than 10 minutes later, at approximately 7:40pm (CT), an announcement was made by IVAW to the crowd, indicating that Obama had endorsed their three points of unity, causing the crowd to uproar in applause.

    Some veterans were visibly emotional by the end of the march. In a highly stirring and symbolic moment, members of IVAW gave a peace salute towards the direction of the Pepsi Center. There was then a moment of silence for casualties of the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan.

    “Sen. Obama, we won’t forget this,” said Jeff Engelhart, IVAW member who served in Baquba, Iraq, with the U.S. Army 1st Infantry Division, to the crowd via microphone and loud speakers. He went on to indicate that if Sen. Obama did not make good on his endorsement, more antiwar protests would come.

    Well, there’s no confirmation that Obama endorsed their three points, in fact his website hasn’t changed one word of his plan for Iraq. The Rocky Mountain News confirms the Denver Post story that all the veterans got was a meeting, no endorsement of their three points;

    Iraq War veterans who led a march through the streets of Denver won a meeting with a liaIson from Sen. Barack Obama’s campaign.

    The news ended a tense standoff between the veterans and riot police near and entrance to the convention, and brought tears to the eyes of several vets.

    So, the Leftist independent media either got it wrong, or they intentionally lied. If they honestly think that Obama will ever agree to reparations to Iraq or immediate withdrawal from Iraq, they’re seriously deluded. I wonder if John Solz is taking notes on the people in the picture above and getting ready to dress them down for expressing political views while wearing a uniform.

    I have yet to see the big guns of the IVAW in Denver, yet. Apparently, they’re in Minnesota for the Republican convention.

  • Where are all of the protesters?

    Wall Street Journal’s Stephanie Simon writing at on the Washington WIre asks where are all of the protesters. Just like I’ve complained over the last few months, she discovered the anti-America Left just can’t turn out the numbers they used to command.

    They’ve produced some striking visuals. Demonstrators in orange prison jumpsuits, with black hoods over their heads, protested the U.S. prison camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Others marched in Mardi Gras masks, black bandanas, or pink princess hats. Some toted giant puppets.

    Yet their numbers have been modest, their impact small.

    Glenn Spagnuolo, leader of the group Recreate ’68, says crowd size is unimportant. “All I hear now is ‘How many numbers [of protestors] do you have, Glenn?’” he said. “No one says, “How many dead Iraqis are there? How many incarcerated African-Americans are there? I don’t play the numbers game. If I have to march alone, I’ll march alone.”

    He blames the low turnout on the massive police presence. Law enforcement is everywhere – on horseback, on motorcycle, on foot, often in full riot gear. “You have guys looking like robo-cops coming in with all this gear on and it’s very intimidating,” Spagnuolo said. “Even I’m scared.”

    “I don’t play a numbers game”. You can bet if the numbers were in the thousands he’d be shouting it from the rooftops.

    Well, you know, the answer could be that it’s a lie that 65% of Americans condone the protesters as they like to tell us. Seems to me that if that figure were true they’d be able to attract a whole lot more. Their message is old and worn out. Their chants are empty platitudes. They live in an echo chamber and prey on the young and stupid – and everyone is beginning to see they’re only in it for the money and fame.

    Michael Heaney…blames activist leaders as well, for using confrontational rhetoric as they geared up for the convention. “Both the protest organizers and the police, over the course of this entire year, have been overreacting to each other,” said Heaney…

    Well,, again, if they had the numbers you would have see the confrontation. The last big protest the anti-American Left assembled was in January 2007 when they stormed the Capitol and spray-painted their slogans on the steps. That triggered the Gathering of Eagles and Eagles Up movements across the country which has also caused the anti-America crowd step back and take a look at themselves and their behavior. Now they can’t get ten protesters together without attracting counterprotesters. That hurts their morale and affects their numbers.

  • Back to the IVAW Theater

    The street theater that got Adam Kokesh in trouble last summer in DC has been brought to Denver. Pretending they’re on a patrol, IVAW members start face-planting random spectators as if they were suspects in terrorist attacks;

    Suddenly one of the soldiers announced that they were looking for a suspect wearing an orange bandana, who they suspected of planting roadside improvised explosive devices (IEDs). At that the GIs began forcing nearby pedestrians face-first up against a wall and yelling at them to “shut the fuck up.” One man was pinned to the ground in what looked like a stress position. The police officers, from Denver and surrounding towns, did nothing. They had been informed days before, one officer told me, that the Iraq Veterans Against the War (IVAW) were coming to town and preparing to engage in nonviolent street theater on Tuesday and Wednesday. The scared pedestrians pinned to the wall and the sidewalk, I learned, were volunteers. This was all just acting.

    Now, see, here are some more examples of what I’ve been saying for the last six months. IVAW says they support the troops, that they’re only targeting the political leadership, but the political leadership isn’t pinning Iraqis against the wall, or shoving their faces into the pavement. The troops are. The behavior that IVAW claims to be aping is the behavior of our troops. They are intentionally turning public opinion against our warriors to accomplish their political goals. Here’s some video of it;

    [youtube z4LZXm8y-V4 nolink]

    The fellow in uniform in the top picture is wearing a combat patch of the 1st COSCOM (Corps Support Command) which supports the 18th Airborne Corps which, in turn, supports the 101st and 82nd Divisions. This fellow served three echelons behind the front. How many patrols do you suppose he’s been on? My guess is that this was the first time he’d ever seen the process, too. How accurately do you figure he can recreate the effect based on second- or third-hand shit house rumors?

    In the same vein is an article Raoul sent me last night about Adam Kokesh’s latest attempt to smear the troops. He claims that they’re smuggling alcohol into the Iraq theater in violation of their orders. He makes it seem like the practice is wide spread based on his own smuggling practices four years ago. Keep in mind that Kokesh also tried to smuggle an Iraqi pistol back from Iraq, too.

    Now, I don’t know if the practice is wide spread or not, I only know that I’ve never sent alcohol to anyone over there, nor would I if asked. But, Kokesh can only speak about his narrow experiences as well. There’s no way he can broadly paint our troops as closet alcoholics drinking brake fluid behind the motor pool with any accuracy. He can’t get away with recycling the old Vietnam era rumor that our troops were drug addicts in these new days of urinalysis, but he figures he can still make them seem to be substance abusers.

    Before you climb on your high horse, Army Sergeant, think about what these disingenuous portrayals of our soldiers and Marines are doing to their mental health now and down the road.

    And crap like this from Kokesh doesn’t help much either;

    [youtube AYPVujav9PQ nolink]

  • On the periphery of the Convention

    There’s an awful lot of stuff on this convention that’s not showing up on the news, so I thought I’d troll around around a bit and bring back some of the news you might have missed.

    Here’s the IVAW misfits in their class photo (yes, I see you, AS);

    Ace of Spades has AliceH on the job getting video and still of the event. You can go to her YouTube channel (and see fake waterboarding demonstrations) or to her photo blog to see the latest. Photos like this (that make parents so proud);

    The Funk the War protest conducted by IVAW among the Code Pinks and assorted anarchists was videoed by a freelancer in Denver. You can watch this video about the horrible police state in which we’re living narrated by a bunch of spoiled brats who aren’t being arrested and tossed in jail.

    [youtube 6CLsVbD1ox4 nolink]

    The Weekly Standard‘s Jonathan V. Last tells us about the police state inside the Convention. From the American Prospect’s blog TAPPED, we find out not all of the delegates are pleased about Obama getting the nomination;

    You have a Hillary shirt and a John McCain button.

    Karen Brown: She was my first choice. Now I’m going to vote for McCain.

    Why?

    KB: I don’t like Senator Obama. His choices are all wrong. I feel secure with John McCain.

    Where do you feel McCain and Hillary have overlap that Obama doesn’t?

    KB: I feel that Hillary would make me also feel safe as far as terrorism goes while I think Obama would be thinking about it. As he said in an interview, I’ll “confront evil.” John McCain said I’ll “defeat” evil. I feel Hillary would’ve said the same thing. I want to feel safe here in America.

    And a photo to go along with the transcript;

    My mentor, Zombie, is still on the job, of course, sending out photos that will be the hallmarks of this cluster in Denver;

    UPDATED: Zombie got in too deep last night.

  • IVAW drama queens in Denver

    Army Sergeant complains that the Denver Police are looking for potential “direct action” perpetrators. I guess this little monument to drama completely escaped the police;

    Here are the anti-war heroes of the IVAW in Denver. All the Left loves them.

    (more…)

  • Moonbattery reaches new heights

    When a small city is packed with news cameras and satellite trucks, it’s inevitable that every crackpot with something to say will show up, and that’s what we’ve got in Denver this week. Folks we haven’t heard in so long are busting ass to Denver so’s they can get in front of the cameras.

    (more…)

  • Counter-Convention looking good

    ComeuptoDenver.org has been begging “progressive social change groups” from across the country to do just that for the Democrat Convention this week, and it seems that every one without a job is complying;

    And the police seem happy, too;

    PBR seems to be the beverage of choice for the sign-makers at Tent State.

    And Veterans For Peace are just there to be in rallies – it doesn’t matter what the rally is for or against (CBS4 Link);

    Robert McLaughlin held aloft a banner supporting abortion rights. He avoided eye contact with a man with a guitar who belted out an anti-abortion song: “It’s a baby, not a molecular glob!”

    McLaughlin tried to ignore the heated exchanges around him, shifting his weight between his feet and looking like he was trying to find his ride home.

    “I don’t know. It’s weird,” said the decorated 67-year-old former staff sergeant, wearing a “Veteran for Peace” T-shirt at the dueling rallies Saturday outside the Planned Parenthood of the Rockies’ headquarters.

    McLaughlin is one of several thousand demonstrators in Denver for the Democratic National Convention that begins Monday. When pressed why he was a counter-demonstrator at an anti-abortion rally, he confessed it was his first one.

    “I’m really here to protest the Iraq war,” he said.

    But in the meantime, you can hold a poster supporting infanticide while you’re waiting for the Iraq Veterans Against the War. Pathetic, actually.

    In the meantime, police are on the lookout for Weapons of Mini-Destruction;

    Denver police are on the lookout for stockpiles of a dozen items ranging from pipes to bikes — things they say could be used to disrupt the Democratic National Convention next week.

    A police bulletin sent to officers and other emergency workers asks them to look out for “medium and large numbers” of things that violent demonstrators could use as weapons.

    Also on the list are shields, helmets, gas masks, chest protectors used in baseball or softball, protest sign handles, hand-held radios, chemicals and maps.

    Police said some of the items on the list have been used by protesters before during demonstrations at events like the DNC.

    Not from people like Wayward Bill, the top photo in this post, who writes at his blog “Deadheads United”;

    (ps; Don’t forget Counter Delegates that while you are in Denver, your surname is Amerika. Afterall aren’t we all Amerikans!)

    Well, you sure are, Bill.