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CounterPunch
September
19, 2002
Welcome to Vermont,
Dick!
Now Go Home
by
Ron Jacobs
Burlington,
VT. In what local Democrats
perceive to be a serious attempt to effect a regime change in
Vermont, where their party has owned the Governor's office since
1991, Dick Cheney flew into town this morning.
The reason for his most honored visit
was to help the current GOP candidate for governor-a weaselly
man named Jim Douglas-raise some campaign funds via the time-honored
tradition of the $5000 a plate meal. To this end, the Vermont
Republicans arranged to have a breakfast in a building right
at the Burlington Airport.
This meant the Vice President would never
have to leave the secure fences of this federally-controlled
facility. Obviously, this also meant fewer headaches for his
security team. Add to this the fact that the GOP was quite secretive
about when and where their great leader would be and one has
to wonder how popular this guy and his government's war really
is.
The antiwar forces were not to be outfoxed.
After a bit of research, we determined when and where Dick and
the Republicans would be dining and put out the call.
As if Providence were on our side, there
was even a vacant parking lot nearby where protestors from around
the state could park their cars and gather before the march
and noisemaking event. So, the stage was set. People began
gathering at the parking lot around 9:15 Thursday morning. Signs
came out of trunks and folks poured out of cars. By 10 AM, close
to 300 people (which is a lot of people in Vermont, where the
biggest town is only around 40,000 strong) stood along the road,
in the parking lot, and on the sidewalk waiting for the word
to move.
The group included identifiable organizations
like the local branch of the International Socialist Organization,
Women in Black, and the Women's International League for Peace
and Freedom (WILPF), and members of other organized groups like
ACERCA the Vermont Progressive Party, and the local Peace &
Justice Center. In addition, there were dozens of individuals
who belong to no organization or group, but wanted to give Cheney
an earful of their opposition.
Ages ranged from young to old, including
several white-haired men and women, along with high school students
and several dozen folks from the local colleges. Many of the
veterans mentioned to me how many new faces were in the crowd.
Finally, we headed up the road towards
the newest restaurant in town, where brunch cost a mere $5000
a plate and only those with proper politics can dine. As we
walked, several folks in various vehicles-personal and work-honked
their horns and flashed peace signs in support. Occasionally,
an individual with a face twisted by anger and an upraised
middle finger drove by yelling some obscenity or the other at
our entourage.
So intent on getting their message to
us, these drivers barely missed causing several traffic accidents
on the well-traveled stretch of road we marched along.
After thirty minutes, the entire march
reached the part of the airport wherein Mr. Cheney was anointing
his minions. The crowd grew even larger and more boisterous
as diners filtered into the security zone. They dined behind
two lines of police and secret service, a twelve-foot high chain
link fence with barbed wire on the top, and three tractor-trailer
trucks lined up end-to-end.
I hope they enjoyed their breakfast.
Although I can't speak for everyone, it seemed like those of
us in opposition enjoyed disrupting it.
After two hours, I remembered I had to
get back to work and left the scene, which was still just as
raucous and almost as large.
Ron Jacobs
lives in Burlington, VT.
He can be reached at: rjacobs@zoo.uvm.edu
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September
18, 2002
Rep. Cynthia
McKinney
Goodbye
to All That
Jeffrey St.
Clair
Cancerous
Air
Born Under a Bad Sky
Ben Tripp
Smoking
Gun of a Hatchet Job
Peggy Thomson
20 Years
After:
Sabra and Shatila
Thomas Mountain
September
1982
Sabra and Chatila (Poem)
William Cook
Yet Another
Bush Doctrine
Kathleen Christison
Israel's Other Voices
September
17, 2002
Adam Federman
All
That Matters is Oil
Linda S.
Heard
Paranoid
Americans
Hussein Ibish
The Incident
at Shoney's
Francis Boyle
Is Bush's
War Illegal?
Let Us Count the Ways
Heidi Lypps
Bush's
Crackdown on
Medical Marijuana
Riad Z. Abdelkarim,
MD
Why
Do They Hate Us?
September
16, 2002
Wayne Madsen
The Shoney's
Snoop
America's Horst Wessel
Tariq Ali
Debating
Daniel Pipes
on Bush's Wars
Ahmad Faruqui
American
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Kurt Leege
Voices
for Peace
M. Shahid
Alam
A New Theology
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Robert Fisk
Bush's War
Dossier:
Blindness, Hypocrisy & Lies
Dave Randall
Mad, Mad World:
J. Edgar Hoover's Obsession with Mad Magazine
September
14 / 15, 2002
Ben Tripp
Notes for
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Tom Crumpacker
Democracy & US Policy on Cuba
David Vest
Neither-Handed
Behzad Yaghmaian
A Letter
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Jeffrey St. Clair
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Anis Shivani
The Warped
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Uri Avnery
A Witness from the Past
Robert Fisk
Bush Across
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Josh Frank
Lacking Tenacity
Christini, Alam, & Krieger
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September
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Paul de Rooij
A Glossary
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James C.
Faris
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Presidential
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Ron Jacobs
Shelter
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