Found them...!

On Monday, I asked, “Where in the hell are the 40%, 50%, 65% or whatever percent of Americans the latest polls are claiming support this insane, immoral military adventure” in Iraq?

Well, I saw not a few of them last evening when I stood out in front of San Diego’s main post office with a small contingent of 50 or so demonstrators, peace signs in hand.

“Money for you, not for war!” didn’t seem to resonate very well with many of the last-minute tax-payers inching grimly by in cars, pickup trucks and SUV’s. Yes, here and there a driver among the hundreds honked for peace. Most, however, pointedly ignored us, looking pained at the very fact we were there. Then there were the memorable few who were unabashedly furious.

Why does the sight of citizens exercising their First Amendment right to oppose this war send certain people right over the edge? One large, heavyset guy actually got out of his car and bore down on a young demonstrator—the one holding our only megaphone. He proceeded to stand over the activist, a regular at local peace protests, and make demands: did we have a permit for the megaphone, if not, we were breaking the law, we should cease and desist immediately, blah blah blah. The activist, a slender guy who wears a yarmulke and looks barely old enough to be in college, held his ground as other protestors gathered ‘round. When the driver found himself dealing with people his own age, he stalked off, claiming he was going to bring back the cops, presumably to arrest us if the megaphone was still in evidence.

He never returned. And what an utterly ineffectual argument! There we were, standing alongside a windswept 4-lane road in an industrial neighborhood, bothering no one—least of all the drivers creeping by in bumper-to-bumper traffic to drop off their taxes before the deadline. But we sure got under this guy's and a few other people's skin.

Invariably, at any peace protest near a roadway, you see this: a large truck, van or SUV slows, the power-window (often tinted) comes down and a face glares toward demonstrators, contorted with fury, lips moving but no words intelligible. A few choice hand gestures clarify the message, then up glides the power-window. Always that last step, sealing in the fury. Against what? The possibility of hearing another point of view, perhaps one more reasonable than your own?

And the most commonly hurled insult is always, “Get a job!” Well you know what? I just spent eight months finding one, no thanks to the policies of the cabal in Washington. And now, like every other employed demonstrator I know, I’m spending large amounts of my meager “free-time” making signs, leafleting crowds and marching against this war. Exercising our Constitutionally-protected right, in other words, to peacefully express our opinions. At least, last time I checked we still had that right.