What happened to the antiwar movement?

What happened to the antiwar movement? Cindy Sheehan hits 'hypocrisy' of Left, Democratic allies.

By: BYRON YORK
Chief Political Correspondent
08/18/09 11:19 PM EDT

After my column, "For the left, war without Bush is not war at all," appeared Tuesday, I got a note from Cindy Sheehan, the anti-war activist who was the subject of so much press coverage when she led a protest against the Iraq war outside then-President George W. Bush's ranch in Texas. This is what the note said:

After receiving the email, I asked Sheehan to give me a call, so I could verify that the note in fact came from her. She did, and we discussed her plans to protest next week in Martha's Vineyard, where President Obama will be vacationing. "I think people are starting to wake up to the fact that even if they supported Obama, he doesn't represent much change," Sheehan said. "There are people still out here who oppose the war and Obama's policies, but it seems like the big organizations with the big lists aren't here."

I asked Sheehan about the fact that the press seems to have lost interest in her and her cause. "It's strange to me that you mention it," she said. "I haven't stopped working. I've been protesting every time I can, and it's not covered. But the one time I did get a lot of coverage was when I protested in front of George Bush's house in Dallas in June. I don't know what to make of it. Is the press having a honeymoon with Obama? I know the Left is."

After the protests in Massachusetts -- Sheehan told me she has no idea how many people might show up -- Sheehan will be in Washington October 5, for a protest at the White House to mark the eight anniversary of the start of the war in Afghanistan. Not only is the president escalating the war there, she said, but he's not withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq as quickly as he originally promised. "That's why I was opposed to him," she said.

 

Sheehan More Consistent Than Media: She Protests Bush and Obama, Media Only Bush
By Brent Baker
August 31, 2009 - 11:14 ET

On a Sunday evening in August four summers ago the NBC Nightly News devoted its “In Depth” segment to how Cindy Sheehan was “single-handedly bringing the Iraq debate to Mr. Bush’s doorstep” with her protest in Crawford, Texas. But Sunday night this year, after Sheehan departed Martha's Vineyard without earning any network media coverage as President Barack Obama's wrapped up his vacation there, NBC's Ron Allen began a story: “Hours before President Obama's vacation ended, he treated his girls to ice cream and candy -- the kind of family time the President said he had in mind for the week on Martha's Vineyard. A chance, friends say, to renew himself.”

A week ago, a MRC Media Reality Check asked: “Will Nets Note Sheehan's Anti-Obama Protest? Media Embraced Cindy Sheehan's Anti-Bush Push in 2005; ABC Anchor Now Says: 'Enough Already.'” (NB posting) The answer: No. Though she spent four days on the island and held an event on Thursday right next to the media set up in the Oak Bluffs School, her anti-Obama efforts were ignored by all the networks (cable too) as well as major newspapers.

“Sheehan is using the backdrop of a presidential vacation to make her pitch for peace. It's an effective way to get her anti-war protests attention, she said,” in contrast to the reality of media indifference, the Cape Cod Times proposed in a short Friday story, “Peace activist protests on Vineyard,” in which reporter George Brennan relayed how Sheehan announced: “'We're here to make the wars unpopular again,' Sheehan said. 'If we were right to call them wrong under Bush, we're still right to call them wrong under Obama.'”

She may be consistent, but the media are not. On Friday morning, MSNBC anchor Carlos Watson didn't mention Sheehan, but highlighted how Barack Obama's “taking flack for bicycling without a helmet.”

On MSNBC's “First Read” blog on Friday, Alicia Jennings related: “Sheehan said that she's opposing Obama the same way she opposed George W. Bush. 'The facade has changed but policies remain the same,' she told reporters. 'Integrity in our movement means we have to do same for Obama as we did for Bush.'”

Sad to say, Sheehan has more integrity than the news media.

The AP gave Sheehan four paragraphs, the last from Glen Johnson: “During the Bush presidency, Sheehan and her corps of anti-war protesters lined up near Bush's ranch to protest the war and to honor the memory of her son. It eventually became something of a media circus.”

ABC, CBS and NBC all covered Sheehan -- but only on their Web sites. In addition to MSNBC's “First Read” entry quoted above, the “Political Punch” blog on ABCNews.com had a post by Karen Travers: ”Cindy Sheehan Brings Anti-War, Anti-Obama Message to Martha's Vineyard.”

An archive picture of Sheehan wearing shirt declaring “ARREST CHENEY FIRST” accompanied the CBSNews.com “Political Hotsheet” item, “Cindy Sheehan Protests Obama's Vacation,” by Kevin Hechtkopf.

 

I am shocked! Just SHOCKED! that the media would treat a Democratic politician any differently than a Republican politician.

Just shocked!

 

Anti War movements have a fairly limited lifespan look at the UK same party in power and yet the Anti-War movement has evaporated from the media. You still get a hardcore but these movements are fickle and there was a noticeable decline in the US of anti war protests before GWB left office.

 

I have wondered this as well. Even posted about it a while back, one fool who in their posts usually sucks up to Odumba tried to justify the wars.

Apparently its a good thing when Odumba goes at it alone, the media and the left have not much to say: no photos of body bags coming off of airplanes, no worldcantwaitand ISM rallies, and moveon.pig, what a bunch of losers . . .

 

Also, I have not noticed any Al Franken you-tube tirades against this lack of MSM reporting on the war effort...........

 

Personally I think it was mostly an anti Bush movement, brought on by Bush Derangement Syndrome.

 

they actually voted against the warmongering left, before they voted for it ...

Obama's is in the white-house because conservatives disargreed with Bush's foray into Iraq, or at least they came to disagree with it and those who espoused it ... McCain.

Obama's base believes what ever the hell they are told, ie; liberal-mush-minds.


Peace through strength is not a liberal principle. Actually, liberals have no principles, or at least theirs are fucked in the head. See Michael Moore's latest film... "Capitalism" as an example.