Choices

I went to a protest on Tuesday. It was organized by moveon.org, we were protesting Bush's veto of the defense spending bill. It was held a few blocks from my house, and I had the day off, so I rode my bike down to the Friendship Heights Metro, and spent an hour doing my duty as an American citizen. I waved my sign, I chanted things like "Not One More Dollar. Not One More Day!" It was not a big event, just a few local people and organizers, mostly women, and almost all of the protesters were my age or older, some Moms with kids, and a couple of guys in slacks and polo shirts who looked as if they had just left the office. The traffic on Wisconsin Avenue was almost all supportive, the cars honked their horns, we got a lot of thumbs up from commuters, and there was only one negative response that I saw.

It was the most boring protest I've ever participated in.

And maybe that's because my experience as an activist, (well maybe a part-time activist) has been very different. The protests of my youth were about gay rights, or getting more funding for AIDS, and there was a huge amount of mainstream opposition, and just plain bigotry, and you took a risk participating in these actions, because most of the population just didn't like you, and the rest of the population hated you and wanted to hurt you. Even good liberals, who didn't exactly hate gay people, would never give you a thumbs up, they would just turn away and not say anything. There were things thrown at us, we were called a lot of names, but we stayed our ground, and over time, change happened.

One of the women holding an anti-war sign, turned to me in the middle of the protest and commented about the positive response. She was particularly astounded at the enthusiastic support from the taxi drivers, ( I wasn't, most of the taxi drivers are from Islamic countries) and she was anticipating more opposition to our action. But maybe she was new to the cause? Maybe she didn't know that most Americans now favor a timetable for withdrawing our troops from Iraq? For those of us who have opposed this war for 4 years, it seems as if the war should be over, and we are surprised that anyone thinks that continuing to keep our soldiers there will net us anything positive. Even the neocons have deserted the sinking ship of war, the last chance surge of additional troops is proving ineffective, and it comes as no surprise to Americans.

So what's stopping us from leaving Iraq, and ending the war? The country is behind us, the Democratic Party is working to set a timetable for withdrawal, and only George Bush with his veto stands between peace and disaster. If the Coalition Forces leave Iraq, there will certainly be bloodshed, and the conflict will most certainly develop into a proxy war, with Iran and Syria supporting the Shiites, and Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and Jordan supporting the Sunnis. But humans always have choices, and it's time we give the Middle East the choice to live in peace, or kill each other. If they decide to kill each other, okay, when it's over, we support whatever mullah is left standing. It's a fight that has nothing to do with us now, and as for Israel, maybe if the Sunnis and Shiites have at each other for a few years, the Arabs will be too busy to try to destroy Israel.

America has a choice now. We made a terrible mistake. We can't un-do the damage we've caused. We can should step aside and let the Middle East determine it's fate.

I hope they choose peace.

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