Anti-War Mom Opposition Mounting

(AP) A Utah television station is refusing to air an anti-war ad featuring Cindy Sheehan, whose son's death in Iraq prompted a vigil outside President George W. Bush's Texas ranch.

Also, a patriotic camp with a "God Bless Our President!" banner sprung up in downtown Crawford, Texas Saturday, countering the anti-war demonstration started by Sheehan. The camp is named "Fort Qualls," in memory of Marine Lance Cpl. Louis Wayne Qualls, 20, who died in Iraq last fall.

The anti-war ad began airing on other Salt Lake City-area stations Saturday, two days before Bush was scheduled to speak in Salt Lake City to the national convention of the Veterans of Foreign Wars.

However, a national sales representative for KTVX, a local ABC affiliate, rejected the ad in an e-mail to media buyers, writing that it was an "inappropriate commercial advertisement for Salt Lake City."

In the ad, Sheehan pleads with Bush for a meeting and accuses him of lying to the American people about Iraq's development of weapons of mass destruction and its connection to al Qaeda.

"I love my country. But how many more of our loved ones need to die in this senseless war?" a weary-looking Sheehan asks in the ad. "I know you can't bring Casey back. But it's time to admit mistakes and bring our troops home now." The ads were bought by Gold Star Families for Peace, co-founded by Sheehan.

In a statement Saturday evening explaining its decision, KTVX said that after viewing the ad, local managers found the content "could very well be offensive to our community in Utah, which has contributed more than its fair share of fighting soldiers and suffered significant loss of life in the this Iraq war."

Bush carried nearly 70 percent of the vote last fall in Utah, one of the most conservative states north of the so-called Bible Belt.

Station General Manager David D'Antuono said the decision was not influenced by the station's owner, Clear Channel Communications Inc.

Celeste Zappala, who with Sheehan co-founded Gold Star Families for Peace, said she was puzzled by the decision.

"What stunned me was that it was inappropriate to hear this message," she said. "How is it that Salt Lake City should hear no questions about the war?"

The e-mail read: "The viewpoints reflected in the spot are incompatible with our marketplace and will not be well received by our viewers." It added that the spot didn't qualify as an issue advertisement.

For the ad to have been considered an "issue" advertisement a ballot measure would have had to be at stake, D'Antuono said.

Mark Wiest, vice president of sales for NBC-affiliated KSL television, said that in the interest of freedom of speech, his station didn't hesitate to run the ad. KSL is owned by The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

"The bigger picture is, by suppressing the message are we doing what is right under the First Amendment and in an open democratic society?" Wiest said.

Salt Lake City's Mayor Rocky Anderson used e-mail this week to call for "the biggest demonstration this state has ever seen," when President Bush appears at the convention Monday.

Anderson says Bush policies are disastrous for the country and that to stay quiet during the president's visit would be send a message of apathy.

The mayor's e-mail called for a collaboration of health care advocates, seniors, gay and lesbian advocates, anti-Patriot advocates, civil libertarians and anti-war folks to protest outside the VFW convention.

Mike Parkin, senior vice commander of a VFW post in Salt Lake City, says the move makes Anderson look unpatriotic.

The Vietnam vet, who says he voted for Anderson, but won't again, says the protest will offend veterans and embolden enemies of the U.S.

In Crawford, Gary Qualls, the father of a slain soldier, explained his reasons for supporting the pro-war camp. "If I have to sacrifice my whole family for the sake of our country and world, other countries that want freedom, I'll do that," said Qualls, who is friends with the local business owner who started the camp. He said his 16-year-old son now wants to enlist, and he supports that decision.

Qualls' frustration with the anti-war demonstrators erupted last week when he removed a cross bearing his son's name that was among hundreds the group had put up along the road to Bush's ranch.

Qualls called the protesters' views disrespectful to soldiers, and said he had to yank out two more crosses after protesters kept replacing them.

***......World War II was not won by Eisenhower. World War II was not won by FDR. World War II was not won by any particular leader. World War II was not won by Patton. Everybody played a role. But without the sons and daughters of the American people, this country wouldn't amount to anything. It is the people who make this country work, and the ease with which those of you on the left disparage the people in this country while you seek to focus all attention on government, is a sight to behold, and it is why you are losing elections; it is why you are losing favor; it is why you are becoming more fringe and extreme and kooky, because you've lost touch. You've lost contact. You've lost all ability to understand who it is that comprises the heart and soul of this country. You have no clue who the backbone of this country is; but I will tell you this: it's not Cindy Sheehan and it's not one member of her entourage in a ditch in Crawford, Texas. Those people are a bunch of squatters. Those people right now are contributing nothing to the greatness or future of this country. Neither are the members of the media who are down there trying to elevate all those people in the ditch to be superheroes. There's not one of them that comes anywhere near rating the title of hero. They are nothing but a bunch of squatters who are miserable and unhappy for who knows whatever reasons and deciding to take it out on people who they think have control over their lives. In this case, with a bunch of liberals, it's government. You want government to have control over your life, you want government to be able to do this and that for your friends and neighbors and help you, but the simple truth of this country is that it's the people who make this country work. It is the people who comprise the economy.

It is the people who comprise the morality. It is the people of this country who determine the ethics. It is the people of this country, and that's what you're upset about because you're in the minority. The people of this country, the people who make this country work differ from you in tremendous ways. They are religious. They are God-fearing. They respect values and morality. They know what's right and they know what's wrong, and they do their best to abide. You are offended by all that, claiming they don't have the right to make such decisions, while you sit around and make no decisions whatsoever because you're willing to totally put your life in the hands of some liberal politician and that will take you off the hook for having to make any decision about your life or anybody else's. Well, that's not how the country works. This country works on the basis of an educated and informed public seeking excellence in their own lives to whatever degree they wish it. People pursuing life the best they can, using freedom, God-given freedom -- and for you to call here and to come up with something as irrelevant as to say this war is not worth it because the president's kids aren't there or because nobody from Washington's kids are there doesn't say a thing about the war effort, doesn't say one thing about it, doesn't make it noble, doesn't make it ignoble, doesn't make it anything, because the war is taking place. Whether you agree with the fact that it's going on or not, we all have come to the decision that it's best that we win it. You haven't even joined us on that. You hope we lose it. You want to lose it because you want to embarrass the leaders of the country. What must your lives be like? .................... ***

http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_081905/content/whose_kids_are_in_iraq.guest.html

Cindy Sheehan comes across as a person whose original claim to grief may have been quite real, but she has allowed others to pack a lot of baggage for her to carry around.

Would she have been on a "hate-Bush" streak if her son had NOT been killed? Very likely, if her other rhetoric is to be believed. Seemingly, what took her off stride in her steady anti-Bush tirades (which evidently predated her son's death), was the warm if brief personal attention given her at the ceremony when the President met with a number of Gold Star mothers and families of soldiers who died in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Now she has continued to express negative responses to the personal consolation offered her by the President, as either "too much", "not enough" or "inappropriate".

For some people there is no "just right".

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