Cindy, Cindy!

I've been a cheerleader for Cindy Sheehan's effort since she first began to speak out many months ago, have lauded her stakeout in Crawford, and applauded her march on D.C. Even though I don't support immediate pullout, I've been glad someone is so publicly calling for an end to it.

HOWEVER, when I tuned in today to C-Span and the first person I heard was someone complaining about how 10% of all Arabs were under occupation by "the U.S. and its allies" (and we know just who is meant by that), followed by someone connecting Bush with the President of the Philippines, I despaired. It went on from there, as ANSWER and UNITED FOR PEACE AND JUSTICE did their usual "drag out all the issues" number on the gathering.

I marched against the war in Vietnam, and remember too clearly how the protest events were co-opted by people with all kinds of other agendas, eventually driving away crowds of people. I wish that Cindy and the good people who support her effort would realize how damaging it is to allow the hangers-on to grab the microphone and in doing so obliterate her message.

I doubt very seriously that UNITED and ANSWER really have Cindy's question to the President at the top of their agenda; they come with their own.

And if either of them can marshall a huge demonstration on their own, I say more power to them, and I might even listen.

As for me, my efforts as a public critic of the Bush administration have now been complicated by the fact that I need to digress in order to explain why what I'm writing has nothing to do with politics in the Philippines.