The Signs of the Times
Wednesday, March 26, 2003
As I approached the pro-Bush demonstration in Times Square, I saw a lot of people carrying sings that had bland slogans like "Support our troops." I also saw a tall guy in a yarmulke holding a sign with a more colorful slogan. "Nuke Iraq" it read in big letters. "And Boycott France" it read in smaller letters below.
The guy's name was Heshy Friedman. He told me he lives in Brooklyn, just across from the mosque at which Sheik Omar Abdel-Rahman spent considerable time before the first attack on the World Trade Center. After that bombing in 1993, Friedman told me, he and his friend began collecting information about the goings-on at the Al Farooq mosque. The FBI wasn't interested until after the 11th of September, 2001. Earlier this month, the feds cited the mosque as the center for raising millions of dollars for Mideastern terrorists.
That sort of thing certainly justifies some arrests. But does it justify nuking Iraq?
"If it saves just one American life, then we should do it," Friedman told me.
He was smiling as he said it and I surmised that, though he wouldn't admit it, his "Nuke Iraq" sign was not meant literally, but symbolically, much in the same spirit as those "Nuke the Whales" bumper stickers that lampooned extreme environmentalism some years ago.
It was in that spirit that many of the passers-by seemed to interpret it. "Nuke Iraq and boycott France?" said one wag. "How about the other way around?"
The pro-Bush crowd behind Friedman was having a great time. To the tune of "Give Peace a Chance," they sang "All we are saying, is kick Saddam's ass." A contingent of New York City firefighters rode past in four trucks with the sirens blaring, all hands waving to the crowd.
The people passing the demonstration were largely supportive. Though this is Manhattan, the sidewalks of Times Square on a Sunday are filled with a very middle-American crowd. The latest polls show that about 70 percent of Americans support the war in Iraq, and that seemed to be the way sentiments were running. It's true that the antiwar demonstration the day before had been much larger. But the antiwar protesters tend to be the type of people who have lifestyles. The pro-war people just have lives, and they need to get on with them.
Heshy noted that some of the antiwar people carried signs alleging that the 9/11 attacks were an inside job. "When you have that type of mentality out there, you've got to go to the other extreme to even things out," he said by way of justifying his sign.
There's always somebody who takes things literally, however. A reform rabbi walked up and began debating Heshy about the sign. Heshy is orthodox, so the debate quickly ascended into esoteric theology. I repaired to Starbucks for a "venti," which is what they call a real big coffee.
When I got back 20 minutes later Heshy and the rabbi were still arguing, so I went off to watch some more of the demonstrators. An Hispanic woman was in front carrying a sign that said "No rights for women in Iraq." She was loud and persistent. Every once in a while, an antiwar passer-by would make a comment back to her. "If you were over there, you wouldn't have any rights!" she'd yell back. The cops loved her. So did the tourists.
As the afternoon wound down the crowd dwindled to half a dozen people. Off to the side was a middle-aged man dressed neatly in a white shirt and tie and holding an American flag. He hadn't said a word, so I asked him why he had come. In heavily accented English, he said his name was Joseph Rivera and he came over from Union City. He had five family members in the war, two in the Air Force and three in the Marines.
That's why he had come to the demonstration that and the fact that he had lost some friends in the collapse of the World Trade Center. He worked for Verizon in a building right next to the towers, he told me.
As we were chatting, one of the demonstrators got into a loud argument with a passer-by who had said that the president had "no smoking gun" to invade Iraq.
"You need a smoking gun?" the pro-Bush demonstrator yelled. "There was smoke all over the city. People were jumping out of windows."
Rivera turned to me. "I seen that, man," he said quietly. "I seen one guy jump and the wind caught him. He flew three blocks because of the wind."
That was shortly before Rivera heard the rumbling that preceded the collapse of the first tower. He ran toward the river. Some people on the sidewalk near him made the mistake of running uptown and were killed in the collapse, he said.
Another antiwar type walked by, a well-dressed young man. He stopped to scream at the lady with the "No rights for women in Iraq" sign.
"Murderers!" he yelled. "You're all murderers!"
The other five rose to the bait and yelled back. Joseph Rivera didn't say anything. He knew who the murderers were.
Paul Mulshine is a Star-Ledger columnist.
Paul is a Conservative, probably the only one writing for a major newspaper in New Jersey.
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