Posted on 09/03/2006 5:21:28 PM PDT by kristinn
CRAWFORD, Texas - This one-stoplight town, especially the road winding between pastures leading to President Bush's ranch, turned out to be much quieter than it was last summer.
The 700-resident town's streets were clogged as more than 10,000 people began streaming in over the 26-day vigil, which started when Cindy Sheehan demanded to talk to Bush about the war that claimed her oldest son's life in 2004. Weekend rallies last year drew several thousand people, and a few celebrities even showed up.
It was a different picture last month when war protesters returned, this time on a 5-acre lot closer to downtown, where 50 or so camped in tents and RVs. A couple of weekend events drew about 100 people, but the group held most activities in other cities.
"We always knew that last August could never be replicated. It was a once-in-a-lifetime phenomenon," said retired Army Col. Ann Wright, who resigned as a senior diplomat at the U.S. Embassy in Mongolia in 2003 to protest the war with Iraq.
The group, which held Thanksgiving and Easter protests that drew a couple hundred people, attributed lower numbers to Bush's absence this summer. He cut his usual monthlong working vacation to just 10 days in the first part of August.
Also, Sheehan was hospitalized twice, lessening her time at the camp that officially ended Sunday.
But some conservatives say the attendance shows that Sheehan's support is fading.
"I think generally people are bored with Cindy Sheehan on one hand, just because they've gotten to know her and her extreme politics," Kristinn Taylor, spokesman for FreeRepublic.com, said Sunday. "Last year she was called the Rosa Parks of the (anti-war) movement. This year no one's calling her that."
Taylor traveled to Crawford last summer for a pro-Bush rally that drew several thousand people, some from a cross-country caravan. But he said conservative groups did not feel organizing such a counter protest was necessary this year.
"(Going to Crawford) obviously wasn't worthy of the time and effort on their (war protesters') side of the issue too," said Taylor, who lives in Washington, D.C.
Because polls show that fewer than half of all Americans support Bush's handling of the war on terrorism, the Crawford protest indicates that any tactic loses its effectiveness over time, said one professor who has written about peace movements.
Lawrence S. Wittner, a history professor at the State University of New York at Albany, said the anti-war movement is taking several types of actions, such as backing political candidates and lobbying Congress. Also, protesters show up at many Bush events across the country.
"While there was a sudden flare-up around Cindy Sheehan, a lot of the fuel for that is lighting other fires at this point," Wittner said. "I do think she's still a vital part of it."
Among the Crawford group's actions this summer was disrupting a reception before White House adviser Karl Rove spoke at a fundraising dinner in Austin.
Some protesters went several times a week to nearby Killeen, handing out brochures entitled "Do you know enough to enlist?" outside military recruiting offices. They spent much time outside the gates of Fort Hood, giving passing motorists cards with information about war resisters' rights.
Sheehan said she wanted "Camp Casey" to become a refuge for soldiers who don't want to deploy to Iraq. She said her lot, which she bought in July with $52,500 in insurance money after her son Casey's death, would provide information and moral support to war resisters.
"I just want to lead where my heart goes, and my heart is with soldiers who don't want to go to Iraq for the second or third or fourth time," Sheehan said Sunday. "I think that's where the heart of our movement is now, to support soldiers ... and peace activism, to try to change the paradigm of this country from one of constant war to one of constant peace, and changing it from an anti-war movement to a peace movement."
Sheehan said the monthlong protest was a success because it spread the word that she is helping war resisters. She said some demonstrators who did not attend are investing their money in candidates' campaigns or instead plan to travel this week to the "Camp Democracy" protest in Washington, D.C.
She won't be there because of previous commitments but plans to resume the Crawford protest at Thanksgiving.
Sheehan has said she was still in shock and did not confront Bush about her son's death when she and other grieving families met with him in 2004. Two of Bush's aides met with her on the first day of her protest last summer, but he never did.
"If he had met with me last year, I would have gone away," she said. "This year, we have to keep plugging away, keeping peace in front of us."
Yep, nobody came to hang out with Cindy in Crawford this year because they had better things to do. Not even Joan Baez came back this time.
Cindy's last days.
I went to support the troops both times last year, I never gave a damn about her.
The best part is yet to come in a couple years when she tries to sell this patch of pasture.
That was absolutely my reason for helping to organize as well as attending these rallies.
These things are a lot of work, and a lot of expense. FR holds "Support the Troops" rallies around the country on a regular basis. The first one that comes to mind is the DC Chapter's manning the 4 street corners at the entrance to Walter Reed Hospital every Friday night. They have made a shambles out of the Code Pinkos who started to protest there.
Maybe her 5 acres can't support enough port-o-potties for a crowd of 10,000. Time for her to pack up camp and go home to 'Vacantville'.
And I cherish the memory of meeting you, basil.
(Leapfrog)
"I just want to lead where my heart goes, and my heart is with soldiers who don't want to go to Iraq for the second or third or fourth time," Sheehan said Sunday. "I think that's where the heart of our movement is now, to support soldiers ... and peace activism, to try to change the paradigm of this country from one of constant war to one of constant peace, and changing it from an anti-war movement to a peace movement."
Exactly what our enemies wish for all of us to do, while they continue killing Americans and Israelis all over the world.
It's meaningless. She didn't pay for it. Her backers paid for all this crap. Where do you think this ditz got the money to go to Europe. She's broke except for the morons that contribute to her campaign or whatever she calls her "Piss On Casey's Grave." I hope she burns in Hell for what she did, and continues to do, to her son.
You're so sweet--and it was certainly my pleasure to meet you! Thank you for your service.
She will. When all is said and done, and Bush is a civilian again, and the Iraq intervention is history, she will be stuck with the awareness that she burned her bridges for a mess of pottage--not only alienated her family but betrayed her son. She will have to face that she has no friends, only users who got what they wanted out of her and ditched her.
She is already discovering that the media has moved on to other curiosities, and that without the lure of media attention, nobody cares about her and her pathetic little camp-out in the field. The money will have dried up shortly, and the big-shot travelling will be over. Let's see whether, in the end, she does the honorable thing for someone who has perpetrated what she has...
Cindy Sheehan's five minutes of fame are over.
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