[rocklobster11]

Check out more of Bob McIlvaine's opinions from this March 2003 story: Anti-War protestors arrested...

Outside the U.S. Capitol, demonstrators Monday marched and waved signs that read "Stop the Slaughter of Innocents in Iraq" and "No Blank Check." Fifty-four protesters were arrested when they broke police lines. Three of them had relatives killed in the September 11 attacks.

"We can't simplify these world problems with evil and good. The problem is so complex, so great, and diplomacy is the only way to go," said Bob McIlvaine, whose son was killed in the attacks on New York's World Trade Center.

McIlvaine said he is certain his son would not have supported war against Iraq.

[jmstein7]

Typical Democrat tactic... suppress speech you don't like instead of fighting it with a substantive response.

[My2Cents]

This guy is a narcissitic moron if he thinks that 9/11 was a "private tragedy" reserved only for the immediate victims of 9/11. This was a national tragedy. We were all shocked. We all cried for the victims. We all prayed for their families. This guy is the one playing politics with 9/11, and it angers me.

Here's a letter to the editor I sent today to the Sacramento Bee on this topic. Feel free to use it to send a version of this to your local papers:

Dear Editor:

I have to take issue with a headline on today’s front page (3/5). In reporting the “furor” over President Bush’s campaign ads, the Bee headline stated that the ads “feature stark images of Sept. 11th. First, the image (singular) lasted only half-a-second (hardly the “feature” of the ad), and the image was not of the destruction, per se, but of a flag lifted up within the rubble of the World Trade Center. The image spoke not of destruction, but of American resolve, renewal, unity, strength, and defiance in the face of terrorism – characteristics all shown by Pres. Bush’s leadership, which the Democrats would like the nation to forget.

As to the “furor” over the image, Debra Burlingame, who lost a brother in the 9/11 attack, said on “Hardball” with Chris Matthews, “Those images belong to all of us. We were all attacked.” Like it or not, 9/11 affected the entire nation. It is part of our history. To claim that Pres. Bush cannot refer to the 9/11 attacks in his reelection campaign would be akin to saying that Franklin Roosevelt could not mention Pearl Harbor or World War II in the campaign of 1944.

In one of America's darkest hours, President Bush provided leadership, strength, comfort, and moral clarity. The Democrats want us to forget that. I haven't forgotten. On that day, this nation was shaken to its core in a way we had not been probably since the Civil War. But we had one shining, poised, genuine beam of light guiding us during that time. That beam of light was named George W. Bush. His tears were our tears; his anger, our anger; his resolve, our resolve. He lifted us up then. So I have no intention of abandoning him, nor forgetting the leadership he has provided.

[isthisnickcool]

Another story about people that yearn to be members of the "900 club". I suppose 9/11 gave some of these poor folks the time and money they needed to feed their desire for fame and recognition.

[Tacis]

Someone needs to remind these survivors that they each got millions of dollars as compensation for the deaths, they did not get ownership of anything else. They are trying to use the concept in opposition to Bush. They can try but they own nothing but the gold they've already received.

[Stormyta]

Isn't everyone curious about the thought processes every time one of these family members of the victims spends any of the money received from the same USA Government?????????

[OpusatFR]

Kerry wants to have a "dialogue" with the terrorists.

The images of 911 and the pentagon and the crash in PA and the stunned faces of every single American are not what the DNC wants to contrast with Kerry's

Talking points.

[Wild Irish Rogue]

"..using footage of the wreckage of the towers "

You have to wonder if any of these people actually saw the ads. The words tacky and insensitive were universally used to describe them.
Last night, I surfed between the ABC/NBC/CBS and the ads were covered the same way.
The ads were not shown,but, " discussed " by the anchors and correspondents.
Then images of the burning and collapsing towers were shown in the background. Since the ads were not shown, the impression the media wanted to convey,was that the ads showed graphic images of planes flying into buildings and towers collapsing.
What is tacky and insensitive is the way the families have been used and manipulated by the Democrats and their media toads.

[dirtboy]

Among those angered was Bob McIlvaine, who lost his son Bobby when hijacked planes destroyed the Twin Towers..."My son was murdered on September 11th," he said. "To argue that using footage of the wreckage of the towers to further someone's political career is 'tasteful' really needs to be rejected outright, and I condemn it."

Bob, you gotta realize that we live in the age of Google. So a simple search (thanks, rocklobster11) reveals that you are more than willing to politicize your son's death for your political views and agenda.

McIlvaine said he is certain his son would not have supported war against Iraq.

Shame on you.

[dead]

Check out this information, originally researched and posted by DeBug=int13, about "Peaceful Tomorrows":

The real name of the outfit is September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows

 

And from all appearances it is a fund-raising front for the Tides Center (EIN 94-3213100) of San Francisco - and "Peaceful Tomorrows" doesn't try to hide that they are affiliated on their contribute page. I know some Freepers are familiar with the Tides Center, and for those who are not, it is a non-profit organization that rakes in fairly big bucks ($63+ mill in FY 2002, which included $5+ mill in Government grants) to distribute out grants and allocations to various and sundry "social" projects and causes, with left-wing groups getting decent cuts of the action - they consistently lay out a good bit of change to anti-second amendment groups, for instance. September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows doesn't appear to be necessarily autonomous from the Tides Center. Interestingly, the P.O. box listed on the "Peaceful Tomorrows" site shares the same location address and zip in the neighborhood with such notable organizations as The New Formulation: an Anti-Authoritarian Review of Books (a biannual journal examining the value of recent publications to the development of contemporary anarchist theory and politics), Institute for Anarchist Studies, Radical Magick (an "Eclectic Ceremonial Based Magick Group"), South Asian AIDS Action, Lesbian and Gay Labor Network, Dyke Action Machine! or DAM! - not that there's anything wrong with that (in Jerry Seinfeld voice). The Fellowship of Reconciliation website that is also mentioned on "Peaceful Tomorrows" contribute page says it all - offices in Wash. DC and also San Francisco.

 

Though they may splash New York this and New York that all around, "Peaceful Tomorrows" is created and based in Oakland California, founded and directed by Barry Amundson and sister-in-law Kelly Campbell, with the web technical matters being handled by Steve Simitzis of Saturn5 Productions in San Francisco, which has an apparent mission statement of providing web consulting and "hosting for artists, online communities, activist organizations"

 

Amundson is Designer and IT manager for the San Francisco branch of Fenton Communications, a "public interest communications" company that has offices in Washington DC, New York NY and San Francisco.

 

They have a rather interesting list of clientele that include -

 

MoveOn.org
People For the American Way
Nelson Mandela - Presidential Election
Greenpeace
Ben and Jerry's

Rock the Vote (which is also a "top five" paid contractor for the Tides Center)

 

Can probe here for the whole listing.

 

 

 

 

 

Here's a bit from lengthy LA Times article about what they do and the crowd they hang with - I think the Moderators won't have a cow over this excerpt -

 

October 1, 2002
Operation: Peace
Antiwar movement reflects a different America than in past eras, but diverse allies keep the spirit alive.
By REED JOHNSON, TIMES STAFF WRITER

 

"We want to poison your mind," teases the woman with slate-colored hair outside First Baptist Church in Koreatown. Swathed in natural fibers and sporting an anti-Dubya button, she's minding a table piled high with books, pamphlets and stickers decrying the sorry state of the planet--wars, corporate malfeasance, environmental disasters-in-the-making, and so on--along with half a dozen copies of the revolutionary rabble-rousings of Chairman Mao.

 

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 

But the rally's emotional climax occurred when Kelly Campbell and Barry Amundson, members of September Eleventh Families for Peaceful Tomorrows, a group composed of relatives of 9/11 victims, embraced beneath a giant video screen where images of the burning twin towers had flashed by moments earlier. Barry Amundson, 32, is the brother of Craig Amundson, a 28-year-old Army multimedia specialist who was killed when the hijacked American Airlines Flight 77 crashed into the Pentagon; Campbell is his sister-in-law. Both were in Los Angeles to voice their conviction that the response to last year's attacks on New York and Washington shouldn't be more mangled bodies and grieving relatives.

 

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

 

 

 

 

And over at Indymedia -

 

9/10 Event in L.A. Features Peaceful Tomorrows
The Nation | 08.09.2002 20:19

 

"starring" Tom Hayden, Robert Scheer, Alfre Woodard, Ramona Ripston, Medea Benjamin, Maria Elena Durazo, Rev. George Regas and Rabbi Allen Freehling.

 

(Interesting links on that page)

 

 

[CheezyD]

September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows is a farce as documented in another thread here. This is nothing but pseudo outrage manufactured by the DNC and MoveOn.org. They're afraid of Bush's leadership and courage following 9/11. They want to pretend 9/11 never happened and want us to forget Kerry's votes to weaken our intelligence gathering capabilities and his claim that the threat of terrorism is exaggerated.

These "Peaceful Tomorrows" people had no problem using images from 9/11 at their own rally as documented in this LA Times article... http://www.latimes.com/features/lifestyle/la-lv-peace1oct01.story

It's OK for Kerry to "exploit" 50,000 plus deaths in Vietnam in his ads? OK for FDR to "exploit" Pearl Harbor in his campaign? Come on, leftists, this is weak even for you pinheads.

[CWOJackson]

FDR: "Remember Pearl Harbor."

John Kerry: "Forget 9/11."

[backhoe]

Cross-link:

-BUSH TRADE CENTER AD SPARKS CONTROVERSY--Judge for yourself--

BTW, maybe I'm simple-minded, but if a fella- or a group of fellas- is trying to kill me, my wife, family, neighbors, etc.- I see them as "evil."

Pure & simple. Kill or be killed.

[veronica]

The latest anti-Bush volleys came at a news conference held by September 11th Families for Peaceful Tomorrows.

The leftwing nutter crowd. SHAME ON THEM!

[Wombat101]

I have several issues with some of the things said in this report (and others)by the relatives of the 9/11 dead. I think there are some people (understandably) that are letting their grief do their thinking for them.

The brouhaha is over the use of 9/11 as a campaign war cry and the apparent lack of taste such use implies. This, I remind you, comes from people who have forgotten the other 9 million people in this city and would love to see "Ground Zero" turned into a Disneyland of grief with a 19 acre memorial. Talk about poor taste?

There are some of us, like ,myself, that were fortunate and were not injured, nor did we lose family and friends, but who are also scarred by the events of 9/11. While we understand the need to remember, we also do not see the need to keep prime commercial real-estate vacant. We need jobs, the City needs money and business needs a place to conduct business if this City is to recover and survive. Your grief and bitterness do not entitle you to keep the rest of us hostage to your whims, and some of you should stop wearing 9/11 as a badge entitling you to dictate the course of events. We have an elected government for that and people with investment capital to spend to help it along.

In that regard, some of the things said in these articles rub me the wrong way. Especially the remarks about Bush having the nerve to refer to 9/11 when it occured on his watch.

True, Bush was in the White House and granted, the intelligence services and law enforcement failed us on that day. However, I remind you that Bill Clinton was offered Osama's head three seperate times and refused, presumably because he was too busy screwing the hired help. We must also take into account that Al Gore's tantrum in November 2000-January 2001 prevented Bush from getting his team in place, possibly in time to do something, anything, about 9/11 before it occured. That, of course, is pure conjecture on my part. This does not obsolve Bush and Co of all responsibility for someone being asleep at the wheel, but it does mitigate the circumstances somewhat. I can guarentee you that had Al Gore been in the White House, we'd still be having our giant Oprah-moment and not fighting back.

Does the use of 9/11 as a campaign issue smack of poor taste? Debatable, in my opinion. I can tell you that any politician worth his salt would use 9/11 in some form to make his case for either keeping his job or of replacing the encumbant. Democrats, of course, would use it emotionally, Republicans tend to think of it as being used logically. Regardless, someone would have used it.

However, Bush is actually doing something about 9/11 and when viewed in that light, I don't see the problem. We've scattered the Taliban, removed a dangerous regime in Baghdad and gotten the Libyans to play ball. We've idenitifed (finally) our enemies as such, and we're working towards solutions. Those solutions may not be to everyone's tastes, but they are still better options than launching cruise missiles at aspirin factories, which was the previous administration's modus operandi.

The only way to prevent more 9/11's is to exercise American power, something that has been out of fashion for the last 30 years or so. I'm not talking about bombing the rest of the world flat (although some places deserve it), but using American power and influence to change things for the better. Have a disgusting dictator who threatens the world with WMD's and the support of terrorism? Invade his country and eliminate him. Got a madman in the mountains of Afghanistan with a God complex and a sh*tload of money? Kill or capture him before he becomes Dr. No.

It just makes sense.

I personally do not see any problem with Bush using 9/11 as a politial issue when you consider that his potential opponents would rather have American policy and defense subordinated to the United Nations or France. Espcially when the opposition's solution revolves around pap psychology and flawed theories/beliefs about the efficacy of international law.

We are committed to a course of action now, for better or for worse, and to continue on the present course makes more sense than to have gone this far only to pull up stakes and pack the tent away, which is what John Kerry would do. Unfortunately, there are some people out there who still don't get it and they need reminders in any way, shape or form they can get them, because the average attention span is measured in MPH. If a Bush commercial depicts the events of 9/11, so much the better, because a picture is worth a thousand words. Sometimes you have to shock and outrage to get your message across. The message is that we are in a life and death struglle with pathological killers who aren't particularly picky about their targets.

[kdmhcdcfld]

I have no recollection of any, but did Bubba's campaign use any images of Oklahoma City when he ran for re-election in '96?

[dighton]

The 'Offended' 911 Group “Peaceful Tomorrows” is funded largely by Teresa Heinz

[ladyinred]

Don't do it President Bush!!!! I am just so disgusted by this obvious left wing socialists ploy!!!!! They ought to be ashamed!

[Constitution Day]

BTTT

[jmstein7]

FReeper 9/11 Memoriam Ad: Remember (Download Here)

[cynicom]

Ask those "victims" if any of them took the money offered after 9/11.