Hillary Agrees to Meet Cindy Sheehan

Hillary’s decision comes after Sheehan told the press she was “so frustrated” with the Democratic all-star for not endorsing immediate, unilateral withdrawal from Iraq. At a rally on Sunday, Sheehan reassured her supporters Hillary is “waiting for the best political moment to say” she favors the pullout, warning Hillary in no uncertain terms: “You say it, or you’re losing your job.”

Sheehan’s fiery rhetoric represents a new tactic: targeting prominent Democrats for defeat if they do not parrot her solution to Iraq. “It’s time for them to step up and be the opposition party,” Sheehan said. Learning the lessons of Vietnam, Sheehan forecasts, “This war is not going to end unless the Democrats are on board with us.”

Sheehan has already alerted the public that Sen. Dianne Feinstein “will also go on our Hall of Shame” for opposing her cut-and-run plan – which experts agree will lead to massive bloodshed and the collapse of the new democratic government. (Sheehan claimed the aide Feinstein dispatched to meet with her acted “defensive and borderline rude” – and probably sexist, too.)

In her open letter to Congress, she threatens politicians of both parties, “Meet with us, answer us, and show us that there need not be a Camp Casey in your district.”

No fewer than 17 Congressmen have heeded the call and scheduled face time with “Mother Sheehan,” including such Democratic Party statesmen as:

Inexplicably, Sen. Arlen Specter has scheduled a meeting with the professional griever. Two other Republicans also have Cindy Sheehan penciled in this weekend: Rep. Ron Paul, R-TX, a libertarian and outspoken critic of this war; and Congressman Jeb Bradley, R-NH, who supported the war.

This list does not include the five supportive Congressional Democrats who have already met with Sheehan, including Charlie Rangel, Maxine Waters, and Henry Waxman. Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert refused to indulge her. An aide from Tom DeLay’s office spoke to her by phone. (See her “Hall of Fame/Hall of Shame” here.)

This list also excludes those Democratic and “Progressive” figures who bolstered Sheehan when she first came to national prominence, still yet knee-deep in a Crawford ditch. Congresswoman Jan Schakowsky, D-IL, a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, phoned in her support for Sheehan. Ralph Nader penned a letter of commendation. Former Howard Dean presidential campaign strategist Joe Trippi joined with California Democratic Party fundraiser Jodie Evans and the website Democrats.com to produce a webcast from Crawford. And 2004 Democratic Party presidential hopeful Al Sharpton kissed her cheek during his visit.

Now the most exciting figure in the Democratic Party will join their ranks. Hillary Clinton will embrace Cindy Sheehan – as she did Suha Arafat – knowing her full agenda and history of extremism.

This move comes after Cindy Sheehan called terrorists “freedom fighters”; after she told enlisted soldiers, “Refuse to kill innocent people” (by which she meant the aforementioned “freedom fighters”); after she told Chris Matthews it was wrong to topple the Taliban; after she called convicted terrorist lawyer Lynne Stewart – who illegally passed messages from a terrorist murderer to his overseas followers – “my human Atticus Finch”; after she said, “America has been killing people on this continent…since it was started…This country is not worth dying for”; after she called President Bush a “lying bastard” and “the biggest terrorist in the world”; after she hypothesized “9/11 was their Pearl Harbor to get their neo-con agenda through”; after she wrote that her son “was killed for lies and for a…Neo-Con agenda to benefit Israel” (and then seemingly lied about writing it); and after she endorsed a measure to kick military recruiters out of Bay-area high schools, a move that would cost the school system its federal funding.

Sheehan’s behavior has hardly abated since events of actual importance displaced her from the national spotlight. She has called New Orleans “a city that is occupied” and portrayed National Guardsmen bringing relief to Hurricane Katrina victims as murderous thugs:

I saw soldiers walking around in patrols of 7 with their weapons slung on their backs. I wanted to ask one of them what it would take for one of them to shoot me…George Bush needs to stop talking, admit the mistakes of his all around failed administration, pull our troops out of occupied New Orleans and Iraq, and excuse his self [sic.] from power.

Cindy Melts Down, Savages Grieving Pregnant Widowed Vet

This lachrymose radical – who, in her own mind, has achieved “almost icon status” [sic.] – sheds no tears for those who do not share her far-Left political views, describing these grieving mothers as “brainwashed”:

I don't understand how any mother could want another mother to feel the pain we feel. I am starting to lose a little compassion for them. I know they have been as brainwashed as the rest of America, but they know the pain and heartache and they should not wish it on another.

She proved her lack of compassion Monday night during an exchange on CNBC’s little-watched “The Big Idea, with Donny Deutsch.” After a courageous pregnant veteran said she was 12 days from delivering the child she conceived with her late husband, a Navy corpsmen killed in Iraq by al-Qaeda operatives, Sheehan lovingly interjected, “Well, Sweetie, they weren't there before [U.S. troops] invaded and opened the doors borders to the terrorists.” Sheehan then taunted the widowed patriot, “You know what? Your baby is going to be fatherless for a lie, for two lies: Weapons of Mass Destruction and terrorism.” The grieving woman responded, “My child will never be fatherless because his father is an angel.”

None of those legions of angels inspired Sheehan’s backers in New York. Earlier that day, Sheehan’s supporters called New York’s finest “pigs,” “fascists,” and “Stalinsts” (further proof that leftists have no sense of irony). The NYPD shut down a Sheehan rally in NYC’s Union Square – which drew all of 150 people – after organizers used an amplifier for which they did not have a permit. The Village Voice records, when police finally acted, “an enraged crowd of about 50 people stormed after the police.” That is, one-third of her adoring fans – fighting for “peace” – were willing to provoke a confrontation with uniformed law enforcement officials.

The crowd may have been emboldened by the words of one of the speakers leading up to Sheehan. Dustin Langley of the Troops Out Now Coalition [1] encouraged the crowd to “open a new front of resistance right here. Bring Fallujah to New York and shut it down!”

As I’ve noted, leftists regularly excuse, endorse, or exhort the use of violence to achieve their political ends. An article that received wide circulation on the Left before the 2004 GOP convention instructed protestors to “Bring Najaf to New York.” Other protestors tried to block the Oakland seaport to prevent ships from taking supplies to U.S. troops in Iraq, staked out U.S. military bases, stormed military recruiting centers, and blocked traffic in several major metropolitan areas. Sheehan’s friend and sponsor, Medea Benjamin, directed the violent 1999 WTO riots in Seattle; last year, her organization, Code Pink, donated $600,000 in cash and supplies to “the other side” in Fallujah. By contrast, conservative protests, to the extent such events occur, tend to consist of people gathering to pray the rosary.

Despite the long history of violence surrounding left-wing protests, the antiwar Left was outraged yesterday morning when the Capitol police told Sheehan’s entourage, “RVs aren’t allowed on Capitol Hill.” The officer informed the leftists, “That’s standard procedure. Any trucks that come on Capitol Hill are stopped and turned around.” Campers, such as those who wanted to spend the night in front of the White House, are prohibited “unless they’ve been previously authorized.” The Village Voice seemed at a loss to comprehend how bomb-sniffing dogs were necessary in a mass rally its planners allege will draw 100,000 angry left-wingers.

Bussing the “icon” of this movement is hardly the way for pseudo-centrist Hillary to enhance her Homeland Security credentials, let alone the undeserved reputation she has as a hawk guiding the Senate Armed Services Committee. It is, however, the apex of the activist base's control over the party, the fruition of MoveOn.org's boast: “In the last year, grassroots contributors like us gave more than $300 million to the Kerry campaign and the DNC, and proved that the Party doesn't need corporate cash to be competitive. Now it's our Party: we bought it, we own it, and we're going to take it back.” It began with the ascendancy of Howard Dean and his capturing the apparatus of the DNC. Now the base is issuing a no-win ultimatum to the party's presumptive presidential candidate before her coronation: become unelectably left-wing or face mutiny from the far-Left.

The antiwar Democrats (as opposed to pro-war Democrats) have this coming to them. They made Cindy Sheehan the face of the antiwar movement because, like Sheehan, they wanted to exploit her son’s death in order to score maximum political damage against President Bush. Although they did not share her plans for immediate troop withdrawal, they demanded the president meet with her and listen to her foreign policy views. Now she is using her “absolute moral authority” to blackmail the Democrats into supporting her platform – or else. They may yet regret their untimely embrace of this anti-American radical.

1. TONC, which will be at the D.C. rally this weekend, shares the full agenda of the Hate America Left. One of its webpages lists “4 facts you should know.” Fact number five (ahem) is, “NO LINK BETWEEN SADAM HOUSAN/IRAQ [sic.] AND AL-QUIDA [sic.] PROVEN.” (Screaming illiteracies in original.) One of its flyers for Sunday’s rally demands America “Stop the Threats Against Venezuela, Cuba, Iran, Africa & North Korea!” and insists America get out of Afghanistan. Similarly, they want “Military Recruiters out of our Schools” and “Support the Palestinian people’s Right to Return.” After Sunday, TONC will be gearing up for Louis Farrakhan’s “Millions More March” in October.

www.powerline.com

The Friends of Cindy Sheehan [Ya Can't Make This Stuff Up Alert]
Powerline ^ | Sept.16, 2005 | John Hinderaker

Posted on 09/16/2005 10:12:06 PM PDT by conservativecorner

The Summer of Cindy is over, and just in time. The mainstream media have drawn a discreet curtain over the activities of the woman they followed breathlessly for weeks, milked for all the anti-administration propaganda she was worth, and then dropped like a hot potato.

Maybe no one cares about Ms. Sheehan any more. Many, of course, never cared about her in the first place. But, given the Madonna-like status that she was accorded during her "vigil," it seems only fair to shine a bit of sunlight on Sheehan's current activities.

Sheehan is still blogging on Michael Moore's web site. Today she wrote from New Orleans, where she has taken her traveling road show:

After we arrived at Camp Casey III, we took the Veterans for Peace "Impeachment Tour Bus" into New Orleans after stopping at the distribution center to pick up some supplies in Covington. I saw in the paper that George Bush said the recovery in the Gulf States would be "hard work." That's what he said about sending troops to Iraq and looking at the casualty reports everyday: "It's hard work." That man has never known a day of hard work in his life. The people on the ground in Covington scoffed at George's little junket to Louisiana yesterday. He stayed in the French Quarter and a Ward that weren't even damaged a bit.

Malik Rahim, a new friend of ours and resident of Algiers, told us stories of the days after the hurricane. ...People were running out of food and water and they were being forced to go to the Superdome. They didn't want to go to the Superdome.

In Algiers, in the space of 2 short weeks, Malik and his community has opened a clinic which also doubles as a food and supply distribution center. We need more help in Algiers. Malik and the other dozens fine volunteers are planning on opening 2 more clinics in Algiers.... Malik has also set up a communications center in an apartment next to his house which is for the community to use. The aid that is being given in Algiers is completely driven by the needs of the community. They have a saying in Algiers: Not Charity, Solidarity.

Who is Cindy's "new friend" Malik Rahim? He is conventionally described as a "veteran of the Black Panther Party in New Orleans," and was recently a Green Party candidate for local office there. But the truth is somewhat worse. Rahim is a Communist. Here is a speech he gave to the Communist Manifesto conference in December 1998; it begins:

I'm here on behalf of two revolutionary freedom fighters that have spent the last 26 years in solitary confinement in Angola, a state prison in Louisiana. I met these freedom fighters as a political prisoner in 1970. I was in a shoot-out with the police in New Orleans as a member of the Black Panther Party. The Communist Manifesto conference was reported on by the Workers World Party ("Workers & oppressed peoples of the world unite!"). The Workers World Party is currently the most active Communist group in the United States, in its own name and through its subsidiaries International ANSWER and the International Action Center, which is headed by former attorney general Ramsey Clark. See this critique of the Workers World Party and its affiliates by fellow far-leftists. We have commented on the Workers World Communist network here and elsewhere. As we noted in the linked post, the Workers World Party is the result of a schism following the 1956 Russian invasion of Hungary: the Workers World Party supported the invasion.

Cindy Sheehan's association with these Communists is no fluke. They are among her most fervent supporters (or, perhaps, manipulators). Sheehan has announced that she will participate in a climactic anti-Iraq war protest in Washington on September 24. Who is the co-sponsor of the September 24 demonstration? International ANSWER. Who has promoted the "Camp Caseys" that have sprung up here and there? the Workers World Party. Who has a special web page devoted to "supporting Cindy Sheehan"? the International Action Center.

What makes these associations doubly sick is that the International Action Center, International ANSWER and the Workers World Party were, prior to the Iraq war, staunch supporters of Saddam Hussein and his Baath regime. See, for example, this tirade by Ramsey Clark, leader of the IAC, who later volunteered to represent Saddam.

Cindy Sheehan has staunchly aligned herself with the enemies of her country, even with those who murdered her own son ("freedom fighters," as she calls them, or "Minutemen" as her patron Michael Moore says). She has gone even beyond that perverse outrage: she has sought out and lent support to the very most extreme, twisted, hateful remnants of the Communist movement, and the last survivors of the Black Panthers. Cindy Sheehan is a hater: nothing more, nothing less.

The question is, why is she not just a hater, but a famous hater? Obviously, because she was a mainstream media darling throughout the summer. But where are the media, now that her cover has been blown? A curtain of silence has descended. Once again, the American press accepts no accountability for misleading the American people, and it has no intention of correcting the fictitious record that it, alone, created.

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.