Posted on 08/31/2005 4:39:01 PM PDT by kristinn
CRAWFORD, Texas (AP) — After a 26-day vigil that ignited the anti-war movement, Cindy Sheehan took her protest on the road Wednesday, while a handful of veterans pledged to continue camping off the road leading to President Bush's ranch until the war in Iraq ends.
Rather than heading home to California, the grieving mother of a 24-year-old soldier who died in Iraq boarded one of three buses heading out on tour to spread her message.
"This is where I'm going to spend every August from now on," Sheehan said as she smiled and waved through a bus window, after hugging dozens of fellow protesters.
The group plans to stop in 25 states during the next three weeks, then take Sheehan's "Bring Them Home Now Tour" to the nation's capital for a Sept. 24 anti-war march.
Sheehan had vowed to stay in Crawford until Bush's monthlong vacation ended or until she could question him about the war that claimed the life of her son Casey and nearly 1,900 other U.S. soldiers. She missed a week of the protest because of her mother's stroke.
"We're going to keep on questioning him, and we're going to keep on until our troops are brought home because there's no noble cause," she said Wednesday. "And that's why George Bush couldn't come out and talk to me because he doesn't have a noble cause" for the war.
While two top Bush administration officials talked to Sheehan the first day, the president never did during her Crawford stay — although he said that he sympathizes with her. His vacation ended Wednesday, two days early, so he could monitor federal efforts to help hurricane victims on the Gulf Coast.
While dozens of protesters packed tents and anti-war banners Wednesday, a few tents remained so at least two Veterans for Peace members can keep camping there 24 hours a day until the war ends, said Carl Rising-Moore of Indianapolis.
"What happened here has created a shift of conscience on a global basis. It's famous. It needs to be remembered," Rising-Moore said. "And President Bush spends an incredible amount of time here."
Sheehan's first stop on the bus tour was Austin for a rally later Wednesday. On Friday, protesters plan to go to U.S. House Majority Leader Tom DeLay's office in the Houston area.
Sheehan said some 10,000 people visited "Camp Casey" since she started camping Aug. 6 in a ditch off the main road leading to Bush's ranch. Most stayed a few hours or days at the original roadside camp or at the second, larger site about a mile away on a private lot offered by a sympathetic landowner.
Also Wednesday, at a smaller pro-Bush camp in a ditch across the street from Sheehan's site, about a dozen people began taking down their tents, canopies and signs and putting away cases of water and food.
The counter camp sprung up slowly about a week after Sheehan arrived, and initially a few people stood with pro-Bush signs several hours a day. Later, several hundred people were there on weekends and a few dozen on weekdays.
Presidential adviser Karl Rove stopped by the site Tuesday night, and he hugged and thanked the Bush supporters, said Valerie Duty, who helped expand the pro-Bush camp two weeks ago.
"I love the troops and I love President Bush, and I support his decision on the war all the way — 100 percent," said Mary Hitt of nearby Valley Mills, who spent much of the past 10 days at the site that Bush supporters dubbed "Camp Reality."
Congrats to those folks who stood up for our country at Camp Reality.
Here's hoping she decides to salvage the rest of her life instead.
This worthless author is every bit as bad as the hag! No damn anti-war movement was "started". These f***ing commies have been around bitching since before we invaded Afghanistan!
Kristinn...you truly are a dedicated foot soldier. Most of us just whine, but you walk the talk. I just wanted to tell you how much I admire you.
But will anyone care?
"After a 26-day vigil that ignited the anti-war movement,"
I guess the author hasn't read the poll that says nearly 80% were totally unaffected by it, and probably half of the remaining 20% were galvanized AGAINST the anti-war movement by Sheehan's shenanigans.
"This is where I'm going to spend every August from now on," Sheehan said as she smiled and waved through a bus window, after hugging dozens of fellow protesters."
It's a free country, Crazy Cindy. Do just as you please. I know your kids are so proud.
Thinking that having Michael Moore and Al Sharpton on her side is somehow beneficial demonstrates how utterly retarded the MSM has become.
Yeah, some conflagration that.
Cindy is such a bright spark.
Because???? Does she think Bush will be in office forever? Nice thought, but SINdy, get a grip hon, if you continue to "vacation" on the front lawn of Bush's ranch I'm thinking you will be removed for stalking.
Perhaps it would be a good place to open a rattlesnake farm.
The Sheehadi's are quickly falling off the radar screen, which is why (I betcha) she granted an interview to a Spanish paper (amazingly, there were no cell phone signal problems)..
She hasn't done what she wanted, and the leftist MSM is figuring out that their darling of the month didn't work out..she's gonna be in a real fix when the reality hits her that NO ONE CARES what she has to say..
Presidential adviser Karl Rove stopped by the site Tuesday night, and he hugged and thanked the Bush supporters, said Valerie Duty, who helped expand the pro-Bush camp two weeks ago.
Awesome. It's like having the President's personal thumbs up.
I'm thinking that the way some in the main stream media continue to embrace Cindy, that we need to start asking them why?
Why does the main stream media continue to embrace Cindy when her supporters are people such as that racist David Duke, and those terrorist sympathizers and harassers of our wounded soldiers Code Pink, and even Cindy herself with her Jew hating anti-semitic rhetoric.
Her vacant eyes and the way she talks points to an IQ in the sub 100 range.
SHEEHAN CHANGES FIRST NAME TO KATRINA,
VOWS CONTINUED FIGHT FOR AIRTIME, HEADLINES
Bullcrap. She doesn't give a damn about her son. I'm surprised the other son and two girls haven't given her a cinder block ride in a lake.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.