My day in New York City began in much the same way as it would end several hours later. Around 11 a.m. Saturday, I arrived at the First Avenue site of the massive ‘anti-war’ rally organized by the organization United For Peace and Justice (UFPJ). As I headed toward a suitable vantage point from which to observe the afternoon’s scheduled proceedings, a large contingent of nearby demonstrators repeatedly chanted in unison, ‘We’re gonna beat-beat back the Bush attack!’
Lots of ‘peace’ literature was being handed out, things like leaflets condemning the Bush administration’s foreign and domestic policies, and fliers advertising other upcoming rallies.
Among the many items available was ‘Proletariat Revolution,’ a 24-page socialist pamphlet whose very first sentence was a harbinger of everything that would follow during that afternoon:
“The working class and every opponent of imperialism must join in action to stop the murderous attacks on Iraq by the U.S. imperialist war machine.”
“War against Iraq,” the piece continued, “has been going on ever since the 1991 Gulf War. . . . [E]conomic sanctions deprived the Iraqi people of food and medicine.” Reading on, I learned that the United States is “the world’s greatest terrorist power” whose ”war aim has nothing to do with Saddam’s weapons of mass destruction . . . [but] everything to do with conquering a major oil-producing country and asserting military dominance over the Middle East.” The Bush Administration, said the article, “is seizing the opportunity granted by Sept. 11 to show the world who is boss.” And for good measure, I was informed that “the undoubted crimes of Saddam Hussein” are dwarfed by “the misery and devastation [that] imperialism inflicts on the world. Any socialist worth the name would take sides in wartime against the imperialist enemy of humanity — in this case, in defense of Iraq.”
During the ensuing four-hour rally, not a single speaker would utter even a sentence contrary to any of those assertions. It can be said with great certainty that the vast majority of the demonstrators in attendance thoroughly detest President Bush. They clearly deem him an illegitimate president who “stole” the 2000 election, a man of dreadful character whose motives for threatening war are firmly rooted in his own economic self-interest.
Consider the slogans borne by some of the placards on display: “The Unelected Idiot Is Going to Start World War III”; “Bush, Stop Your Terror”; “Bush the Baby Killer”; “Illegally Installed, Immorally Behaved: He’s Not My President”; “President-Bush is an Oxy-Moron”; “George W’s War Drums Dishonor and Destabilize Lawful Democracies”; “Spoiled Fascist Cowboy”; “Bush Exploits 9/11 Tragedy for Dirty Oil”; “Bush Likes to Steal Presidential Elections and Iraqi Oil”; and “No More Lies: Regime Change Here.”
In the speeches that followed, this abhorrence of Bush was closely paralleled by a vehement hatred directed against the United States; a belief that our country has historically been, and continues to be, uniquely evil; a conviction that America, more than any other nation, threatens peace and justice on earth.
Among the first to speak was a minister who said, “We are the only nation to use an atomic bomb against another nation. For that, L-rd, we ask your forgiveness.” He did not, of course, mention the historical context in which that weapon was used; the ferocity of the unyielding Japanese enemy we faced at the time; the alternative of sacrificing the lives of perhaps a million more Americans, not to mention ten to twenty million Japanese. Instead, he preferred to express how ashamed he was of America’s long tradition of wrongdoing, which he said continues to this day in the Iraq crisis.
