The Free View-- weblog of a presidential candidate: Thanks to the protestors

January 19, 2003

Thanks to the protestors

I want to thank everyone who joined in the protests all around the world yesterday. Don't worry if the mainstream media doesn't give you the coverage you felt you earned. There are plenty of people who don't rely on mainstream media for their news, and they number in the tens of millions, at the very least. Those people -- the underground of the new millenium -- are tuned in loud and clear, mostly via the Internet (and ever-lovin' C-Span).

Thank you for inspiring us, for representing us, for raising your voices, for dissenting, for taking it to the streets, for honoring Dr. King and the long history of non-violent protest, and just for being you. Great job!

CNN:
Anti-war demonstrators rally on Capitol Mall
Organizers put turnout at 200,000

The People's Daily (China):
Anti-war Protests Worldwide, UN Gets Tough on Iraq
and
Photo News: Anti-war Demonstration around the World (*this one's really sweet)

Yahoo! News/AP:
Antiwar Protests Draw Thousands in U.S.

San Francisco Chronicle:
Nation rallies for peace
Tens of thousands in S.F. demand Bush abandon war plans

Washington Times:
No Iraqi war, thousands say in Mall protest

New York Times:
Thousands in D.C. Protest Iraq War Plans

BBC News:
Global protests against Iraq war

And so on...click here for links to a zillion (176 actually) other stories.

Interesting thing...I saw links to 3 or 4 stories from China's The People's Daily about the protests -- separate stories about different ones all around the world. Not to mention two stories about poll results opposing the war (or the U.S.), in America and Canada -- all listed prominently on their World News page. I wonder if that's them intentionally capitalizing on the protests to influence their people against the U.S. and the war -- or just good journalism? Either way, they get my vote for best protest coverage that I've seen so far.

And a semi-reluctant three cheers for International ANSWER for bringing it all together. I've still got most of the same concerns about them that I've had since I saw their first rally, but I've got to give credit where credit is due. It's due to International ANSWER. And of course to the thousands of organizations and ~~hundreds of thousands~~ millions of people who worked so hard to make the January 18th protests a major worldwide news event. Very impressive. It's pretty sweet to see people all over the world working together to try to stop a war.

Posted by Lance Brown at January 19, 2003 12:40 PM | TrackBack

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