Let it be a lesson to you, UPFJ, you can't trash A.N.S.W.E.R. to the press and get away with it. You can't insist to the press that A.N.S.W.E.R. is "controlled by Communists" while hiding your own ties.
Well you can and you did and how'd it work out for you?
You got a little bit of press on your Friday actions. Not much, just a tiny little bit. You might have thought you'd rule the news for your Saturday actions. But no one was interested. Or as Aimee Mann once sang, "No one is watching you now . . ."
Geez, what's the world coming to when closeted Communists can't start a red-baiting whisper campaign against A.N.S.W.E.R. without it biting them in their own useless butts?
As The Red Queen found out in April 2008, piss off the wrong ones and there's hell to pay. So her little event got no coverage. And neither did Leslie's event this year.
Poor UPFJ -- United For Pathetic and Juvenile. Thought they could piss all over A.N.S.W.E.R and, fact of the matter, A.N.S.W.E.R. and other groups turned out a huge crowd in DC for their March event. UPFJ?
Did Saturday's 'crowd' make it to 200?
There's the world of the real and the world of the fake and UPFJ is all about the World of the Fake.
They are far from alone. John Stauber (PR Watch) reported on the Center for American Progress and other front groups last week:
CAP and the five million member liberal lobby group MoveOn were behind Americans Against Escalation in Iraq (AAEI), a coalition that spent tens of millions of dollars using Iraq as a political bludgeon against Republican politicians, while refusing to pressure the Democratic Congress to actually cut off funding for the war. AAEI was operated by two of Barack Obama's top political aids, Steve Hildebrand and Paul Tewes, and by Brad Woodhouse of Americans United for Change and USAction. Today Woodhouse is Obama's Director of Communications and Research for the Democratic National Committee. He controls the massive email list called Obama for America composed of the many millions of people who gave money and love to the Democratic peace candidate and might be wondering what the heck he is up to in Afghanistan and Pakistan. MoveOn built its list by organizing vigils and ads for peace and by then supporting Obama for president; today it operates as a full-time cheerleader supporting Obama's policy agenda. Some of us saw this unfolding years ago. Others are probably shocked watching their peace candidate escalating a war and sounding so much like the previous administration in his rationale for doing so.
We're really going to miss John Stauber who's leaving the Center for Media and Democracy. He was always a voice who would call out the faux action, who would refuse to cheer on the do-nothings of WalkOn.org. We need strong voices even more today than we did when Bully Boy Bush occupied the White House.
In fact, they're in such short supply that we debated including Laura Flanders' latest in this editorial. We finally decided that if any of us could quote a full sentence from Flanders' blog post at The Nation without cracking up, we'd include it. None of us could. Because we haven't forgotten the disgrace she made of herself over Barack Obama (starting in November 2007). Haven't forgotten it and can't forgive it until she owns her mistake. She was happy to publicly endorse, she should be happy to publicly apologize.
The Iraq War drags on and on, each and every day. And it does so because faux 'peace' groups derailed the movement. A recent Christian Science Monitor article (no link to trash) attempted to push VoteVets as a peace organization. It's not. It never was. It is a front group which exists solely to elect Democrats.
The same bad article swallowed CODESTINK's claim that they're about 'economic justice' these days. No. They're about being soft and cushy for Barack Obama. Jodi didn't bundle all that money in a (failed) attempt to become a power player for nothing, now did she? (Despite all that money and a PR makeover that's ongoing, Jodi is not and will not be welcome at the White House. As Diana Ross once said to Mary Wilson, "It's taken care of.") So Jodi and Medea got their man into the White House and now they want to pretend that a president's not responsible for a war. Now they want to WalkOn, WalkOn.org.
The same bad article mentions the Out of Iraq Caucus. Here's the question you should ask: How many months will it be before someone speaks publicly about how Barbara Lee sold the caucus out or what it took to buy her off?
John Stauber's leaving at a time when the loss will really be felt but it's also true that the fakes and phonies in the 'anti-war' movement are doing a pretty good job these days of exposing themselves.
The ongoing, illegal war passed the six year mark without Pacifica ever giving it a program of its own. (Flashpoints, for example, began as an attempt to cover the first Gulf War.) But one thing we do have is Cindy Sheehan's internet radio program. And though it will deal with many topics, you can be sure Iraq won't be disappeared from it the way it has been from so many other 'left' programs and magazines.
In the meantime, those who really believe in ending the illegal war will continue pressing on. And take comfort in the fact that we only have to carry ourselves, not the egos of Tom Hayden, Leslie Cagan, Carl Davidson and so many other do-nothings.