http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/01/27/AR2007012700629_pf.html
Washington Post
Tens of Thousands Rally in D.C. for Troop Withdrawal
By Michael E. Ruane
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, January 27, 2007; 12:44 PM
Tens of thousands of demonstrators from across the country converged on the Mall in Washington this morning to urge the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq as President Bush is proposing to send more troops in an effort to stabilize the country.
The event, which authorities said could draw 100,000 people, began with a rally at 11 a.m. Among those expected to address the crowd are Jane Fonda, Danny Glover, Susan Sarandon and Jesse Jackson.
The march, organized by the group United for Peace and Justice, is scheduled to start at 1 p.m.
It will proceed eastward toward the Capitol along Constitution Avenue, head south on First Street NE, then make a U-turn and retrace the route before passing the western front of the Capitol and returning to the Mall along Fourth Street SW.
But main events began, a smaller rally was held at the Navy Memorial on Pennsylvania Avenue. About 3,000 people, many wearing pink or carrying pink signs, showed up for an antiwar protest sponsored by a women-run peace organization called CodePink. Actors Jane Fonda and Sean Penn briefly addressed the group.
Medea Benjamin, cofounder of CodePink, told the crowd, "We're sick and tired of this damned war in Iraq, and we want to bring the troops home now."
Oriana Futrell, a Spokane, Wash., resident who said she has grown weary of going to the funerals of her friends' husbands, carried a sign also urging the return of her husband, an Army lieutenant in Iraq.
Across the street, however, was a counter-protest, staged by the Washington chapter of the conservative organization FreeRepublic.com. Those protesters, who organizers said feared that the antiwar march would hurt the U.S. anti-terror efforts, yelled and sported signs, such as one that read, "Go to hell traitors. You dishonor our dead on hallowed ground."
At least one veteran from the Iraq war tried to bridge the divide between the groups. Cpl. Joshua Sparling, 25, from Port Huron, Mich., who lost his right leg below the knee in an 2005 explosion in Ramadi, spoke to both groups.
Near the end of the CodePink rally, Sparling, a patient at Walter Reed Army Medical Hospital who used crutches to walk, went to the microphone and told the protesters that they are entitled to the right to demonstrate and must fight for what they believe in. But he reminded them that the situation is dire for many Iraqis and U.S. troops there believe that they are fighting to help provide a better option for the people of Iraq. He was rewarded with general applause, although a few feint boos could be heard.
When he finished, he walked across the street and spoke with the FreeRepublic group also.
U.S. Capitol Police officers said that road closures will go into effect around the Capitol during the march. Metro said that its normal Saturday schedule will be in place but that eight-car trains would be put in service if necessary.
The event is expected to draw groups of many stripes. The chart for the assembly site shows sections reserved for veterans and labor, gay and peace organizations, in addition to others dedicated to opposing global warming, nuclear arms and torture and a group called End Israeli Occupation of Palestine. In addition, at least one group is protesting the protest.
Henry Singleton, 55, of New York, helped organize a contingent of health care union members who came to the rally from Washington, Baltimore and New York. He said the group had 55 buses coming into Washington from New York carrying protesters.
"This war is a problem for our members and it's a problem for our members' children, he said. "It's sad to see our members in the National Guard told to go to war and then to come back and have problmes getting their jobs back."
Some of the demonstrators began gearing up yesterday.
Amid frigid temperatures and a biting wind, CodePink and the group Iraqi Voices for Peace held a rally at noon on the Mall in front of the Capitol.
With songs and speeches, the groups unveiled an installation of several thousand shoes in and around a clear plastic bin, which they said symbolize Iraqi civilians who have died since the war began. The shoes bear tags with names that the protesters said are those of Iraqis killed in the war, along with a few details of their deaths.
"We don't talk enough about the suffering and the pain that the Iraqis are experiencing," Jodie Evans, co-founder of CodePink, said on the Mall yesterday. "We do a lot of talking. But when you visually see a pair of shoes with a tag on it that says, 'So and so, aged 3, died in a bombing in Fallujah,' it becomes very real for you, the cost of this war."
Evans said the shoe installation, which she said the group used during last year's election campaign, was inspired by the display of concentration camp victims' shoes at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. "I remembered how powerfully it affected me," she said.
In Arab culture, shoes can be a sensitive issue, said Aseel Albanna, a District architect, Baghdad native and co-founder of Iraqi Voices for Peace. The improper display of the bottoms of shoes can be impolite, and shoes are traditionally left at the threshold of a house upon entering.
But in this case, she said on the Mall yesterday, symbolism is more important than tradition.
The groups cited a study by Johns Hopkins University last year that estimated that almost 655,000 civilian deaths in Iraq have occurred as a result of the war. President Bush had placed that number at 30,000, and a British-based group research group at about 50,000.
"We were surprised" at the study's findings, said Shannon C. Doocy, a Hopkins research associate who co-authored the study. "I don't think anyone intended the war to have this large of a consequence."
Washington Post
Tens of Thousands Rally in D.C. for Troop Withdrawal
By Michael E. Ruane
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, January 27, 2007; 12:44 PM
Tens of thousands of demonstrators from across the country converged on the Mall in Washington this morning to urge the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq as President Bush is proposing to send more troops in an effort to stabilize the country.
The event, which authorities said could draw 100,000 people, began with a rally at 11 a.m. Among those expected to address the crowd are Jane Fonda, Danny Glover, Susan Sarandon and Jesse Jackson.
The march, organized by the group United for Peace and Justice, is scheduled to start at 1 p.m.
It will proceed eastward toward the Capitol along Constitution Avenue, head south on First Street NE, then make a U-turn and retrace the route before passing the western front of the Capitol and returning to the Mall along Fourth Street SW.
But main events began, a smaller rally was held at the Navy Memorial on Pennsylvania Avenue. About 3,000 people, many wearing pink or carrying pink signs, showed up for an antiwar protest sponsored by a women-run peace organization called CodePink. Actors Jane Fonda and Sean Penn briefly addressed the group.
Medea Benjamin, cofounder of CodePink, told the crowd, "We're sick and tired of this damned war in Iraq, and we want to bring the troops home now."
Oriana Futrell, a Spokane, Wash., resident who said she has grown weary of going to the funerals of her friends' husbands, carried a sign also urging the return of her husband, an Army lieutenant in Iraq.
Across the street, however, was a counter-protest, staged by the Washington chapter of the conservative organization FreeRepublic.com. Those protesters, who organizers said feared that the antiwar march would hurt the U.S. anti-terror efforts, yelled and sported signs, such as one that read, "Go to hell traitors. You dishonor our dead on hallowed ground."
At least one veteran from the Iraq war tried to bridge the divide between the groups. Cpl. Joshua Sparling, 25, from Port Huron, Mich., who lost his right leg below the knee in an 2005 explosion in Ramadi, spoke to both groups.
Near the end of the CodePink rally, Sparling, a patient at Walter Reed Army Medical Hospital who used crutches to walk, went to the microphone and told the protesters that they are entitled to the right to demonstrate and must fight for what they believe in. But he reminded them that the situation is dire for many Iraqis and U.S. troops there believe that they are fighting to help provide a better option for the people of Iraq. He was rewarded with general applause, although a few feint boos could be heard.
When he finished, he walked across the street and spoke with the FreeRepublic group also.
U.S. Capitol Police officers said that road closures will go into effect around the Capitol during the march. Metro said that its normal Saturday schedule will be in place but that eight-car trains would be put in service if necessary.
The event is expected to draw groups of many stripes. The chart for the assembly site shows sections reserved for veterans and labor, gay and peace organizations, in addition to others dedicated to opposing global warming, nuclear arms and torture and a group called End Israeli Occupation of Palestine. In addition, at least one group is protesting the protest.
Henry Singleton, 55, of New York, helped organize a contingent of health care union members who came to the rally from Washington, Baltimore and New York. He said the group had 55 buses coming into Washington from New York carrying protesters.
"This war is a problem for our members and it's a problem for our members' children, he said. "It's sad to see our members in the National Guard told to go to war and then to come back and have problmes getting their jobs back."
Some of the demonstrators began gearing up yesterday.
Amid frigid temperatures and a biting wind, CodePink and the group Iraqi Voices for Peace held a rally at noon on the Mall in front of the Capitol.
With songs and speeches, the groups unveiled an installation of several thousand shoes in and around a clear plastic bin, which they said symbolize Iraqi civilians who have died since the war began. The shoes bear tags with names that the protesters said are those of Iraqis killed in the war, along with a few details of their deaths.
"We don't talk enough about the suffering and the pain that the Iraqis are experiencing," Jodie Evans, co-founder of CodePink, said on the Mall yesterday. "We do a lot of talking. But when you visually see a pair of shoes with a tag on it that says, 'So and so, aged 3, died in a bombing in Fallujah,' it becomes very real for you, the cost of this war."
Evans said the shoe installation, which she said the group used during last year's election campaign, was inspired by the display of concentration camp victims' shoes at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum. "I remembered how powerfully it affected me," she said.
In Arab culture, shoes can be a sensitive issue, said Aseel Albanna, a District architect, Baghdad native and co-founder of Iraqi Voices for Peace. The improper display of the bottoms of shoes can be impolite, and shoes are traditionally left at the threshold of a house upon entering.
But in this case, she said on the Mall yesterday, symbolism is more important than tradition.
The groups cited a study by Johns Hopkins University last year that estimated that almost 655,000 civilian deaths in Iraq have occurred as a result of the war. President Bush had placed that number at 30,000, and a British-based group research group at about 50,000.
"We were surprised" at the study's findings, said Shannon C. Doocy, a Hopkins research associate who co-authored the study. "I don't think anyone intended the war to have this large of a consequence."