Iraq Invasion and Occupation: Now 4 Years Old
Protest Pictures From Los Angeles
March 17, 2007
It was an amazing turnout, it had to be at least double last year. I estimate 20,000 protesters showed up this time.
I Tivo'd the national NBC news just to check how the protest would be covered. The national broadcast started with 4 minutes about bad weather in the Northeast US, followed by a 2 minute story on
how Iraq insurgents are using dirty tactics, then finally 30 seconds on the main protest on the Pentagon. Within that 30 seconds they mentioned that the police estimated over 20,000 protesters and
that they had to hold back counter protesters, once again showing their joy at giving the official view rather than any of the tens of thousands of protesters. The last thing mentioned in the 30 seconds spot
is that there were lots of smaller protests around the country. From these pictures, you can tell that at least the LA protest was not small!
I also Tivo'd the local CBS news. Once again, all I can do is shake my head. 7 minutes into the broadcast, after covering a "breaking news" story about a car crash, they gave about a minute to the protest.
However, they interviewed just two people. The first was Vicki Castro, who talked about when her son died in Iraq, the second was a counter protester that said we can't allow another Saddam
Hussein to get into power. By my count, there were 20,000 antiwar protesters, and 4 counter protesters, and they got equal time on the news cast. The mainstream news
media are just a megaphone for the elite consensus.
Front of the protest, with the rally stage for musicians (upper right of picture) such as Ozomatli, Ben Harper, Jackson Browne and
speakers Jim Lafferty, Vicki Castro, Helga Aguayo, and Martin Sheen
Veterans for peace are trying to make the point that people are dying every day. This war has to end now.
Rear of the protest just went on forever, I never saw the end.
Ben Harper came out to play a couple songs and mentioned he was amazed and inspired by just how many people came out.