Americans need to be careful…
Posted : August 30, 2004 at 12:03 am [America/Los_Angeles]
When the demonstrators reached Madison Square Garden — where a large neon sign welcomed the Republicans to New York — many began hooting and blowing whistles, shouting curses about the Bush administration. An antiwar group carrying more than 100 flag-draped coffins began shouting “Bush must go” as they passed.
The marchers were met with spirited, if limited, opposition. A large group confronted people on the sidewalks holding pro-Bush signs, for example, and heated exchanges took place. Ruben Israel, who was holding a sign that read: “Support President Bush - Trust Jesus,” at one point was surrounded by angry marchers at the corner of Seventh Avenue and 34th Street.
“The Big Apple is rotten, and all of you are lunatics,” said the Los Angeles man, who described himself as a “right-wing conservative Christian.” He began shouting “Trust Jesus!” to marchers, who responded with the chant: “Who would Jesus bomb?”
Farther up the march route, near Macy’s in Herald Square, a woman held a sign reading “Kerry is Unfit” — referring to Democratic presidential nominee Sen. John F. Kerry; she was engulfed by marchers shouting “Shame!”
“I’m angry at the animosity shown at this march toward the president,” said Kathryn Wells of St. Augustine, Fla. “He’s more qualified than Kerry.”
During the Presidential Elections of 2000, I found myself and a very good American friend and a colleague of mine on the opposite sides of the political spectrum. He felt candidate George Bush was the way to go and I was for ex-Vice President Al Gore. While we were (and still are) good friends, I distinctly remember times when we both would get pretty passionate about our candidates. And then the whole Florida fiasco unfolded. That took a real toll on both of us (indeed the whole nation). We stopped talking politics for obvious reasons. I guess you can say we “agreed to disagree”.
As I was reading this excerpt, I was not sure what to make of it. Is it a sign of a healthy democracy or is it getting a little too personal? Needless to say, I was pretty disturbed with the highlighted (in bold) sections of the excerpt. When the attacks get personal and has religious overtures to it, you know something is not right. I have seen the dangerous consequences of mixing politics and religion from a fairly close proximity back in India. Trust me when I say, America as a nation should not even think of going there.
Let’s hope all this passion (on both sides) translates into something positive for all Americans. Like, getting more VAP (voting age population) to actually go register to vote and then “actually” go vote come November 2nd, 2004!
- Anand
Category: United (or not) State of American Politics 2004