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News :: Peace |
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85 People Protest Iraq War In Terre Haute, IN On Oct. 10 |
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by Cathy McGuire, Stop War On Iraq
Email: stopwaroniraq (nospam) yahoo.com (unverified!)
Phone: 812-235-8351 |
11 Oct 2002
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85 people representing youth to the elderly came together on Thursday, Oct. 10 as the Senate was debating the War Resolution at City Hall to protest the war and to speak to Sen. Evan Bayh's staff person David Lewis. |
85 people from the Terre Haute area rallied in front of City Hall on Thursday, October 10th, as members of the U.S. Senate were debating the war resolution. Four demonstrators came from Bloomington, but the rest were from the Terre Haute area. About 25 members of the Sisters of Providence demonstrated as did students from both St. Mary of the Wood College and Indiana State University.
After a short rally and responsive reading of the Not In My Name pledge, some demonstrators went out to Third St. in front of the courthouse to hold their signs, while fifty of the demonstrators met with a member of Sen. Evan Bayh's staff. The format of the meeting with Bayh's staff member was that any person who wanted to say something did while the staff member took notes to report to Bayh. Nearly everyone took advantage of the opportunity to speak over a 1 and 1/2 hour time period.
Among the speakers were an Iraqi-American who told how he had come to the U.S. in the 70's to get away from the repression in his country; he then gave a history of U.S. intervention in Iraq. He pleaded that the Iraqi people be spared as they have suffered so much. Another speaker was a 17 year old young man who spoke about his fear of being drafted to kill innocent people. An 84 year old man who had served in three wars from 1941 to 1961 and was a former member of the Indiana senate talked about this not being a just war and that people who are opposed to the war should not be characterized as being "unpatriotic."
Elden Tipton, the career Navy man also spoke about how it is always the poor who go into military servcie. He told a story about a depressed town of 1500 people which had produced 36 fighter pilots during WWII because there were no civilian jobs available. He also said he had known the Bayh family all the way back to Bayh's great great uncle. They were all people known for their high integrity and he was disappointed with Evan Bayh's posturing for the presidency. Many people in the group expressed their dissatisfaction with Mr. Bayh.
Earlier at the rally, a woman who is a volunteer teacher of English as a Second language spoke about her work with war refugees in the community. She said they were different from other ESL students because of their fear. She pointed out that the first thing that happens after a war is that both sides sit down to negotiate. She asked why don't they talk before the war. A retired African-American educator talked about the great poverty among children in the United States and said the war is distracting the country from discussion of these needs.
The next demonstration of Stop War On Iraq will be on Saturday, Oct. 26th in support of the national march in Washington D.C. The demonstration will be in front of the Crossroads of America sign at the corner of 7th and Wabash in Terre Haute. A demonstrator from Bloomington told the crowd that their group will be taking a bus to D.C. and he encouraged Terre Haute protestors to travel with them. Press coverage of the event was greater than the previous demonstration in Terre Haute when only the local media came. Two out of town radio stations called for interviews. |
See also:
http://www.indymedia.org/front.php3?article_id=208680&group=webcast
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