Camp Casey

[welsh]

Don't know if you folks in Europe are hearing about this but the current political stir in the US seems to center on one mother whose son died in Iraq, who has set up tent outside W's Crawford ranch and wants to meet W for a decent explanation of what the fuck is going on in Iraq.

Apparently W did meet with this woman earlier, but he was a bit evasive and something of an asshole.

Oh, poor W. This will put a damper on his 5 week vacation on the ranch.

Oh from CNN-

Soldier's mom digs in near Bush ranch
Senator sees 'echoes of Vietnam' in vigil to meet president

Sunday, August 7, 2005; Posted: 5:31 p.m. EDT (21:31 GMT)

Manage Alerts | What Is This? CRAWFORD, Texas (CNN) -- A mother whose son was killed in Iraq says she is prepared to continue her protest outside President Bush's ranch through August until she is granted an opportunity to speak with him.

Later, in a TV interview, a Democratic senator from California said the episode evokes images that were commonplace during the Vietnam War.

There's that Vietnam analogy again.

Cindy Sheehan's 24-year-old son -- Army Spc. Casey Sheehan of Vacaville, California -- was killed in Baghdad's Sadr City on April 4, 2004. The Humvee mechanic was one of eight U.S. soldiers killed there that day by rocket-propelled grenades and small arms fire.

They are among the 1,829 American troops, including 31 this month, who have died in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003.

The president -- who is spending a nearly five-week-long working vacation at his Texas ranch -- said in a speech Wednesday that the sacrifices of U.S. troops were "made in a noble cause."

Which cause?

Sheehan said she found little comfort in his comments.

"I want to ask the president, why did he kill my son?" Sheehan told reporters. "He said my son died in a noble cause, and I want to ask him what that noble cause is."

Sheehan said hers was one of a group of about 15 families who each met separately with the president one day last June.

"He wouldn't look at the pictures of Casey. He didn't even know Casey's name," she told CNN Sunday. "Every time we tried to talk about Casey and how much we missed him, he would change the subject."

Eyes wide open like a deer caught in the headlights?

Sheehan said she was so distraught at the time that she failed to ask the questions she now wants answered.

"I want him to honor my son by bringing the troops home immediately," Sheehan told reporters Saturday. "I don't want him to use my son's name or my name to justify any more killing."

Sheehan, who co-founded the anti-war group Gold Star Families for Peace, led about 50 demonstrators near the Bush ranch Saturday. Some protesters were with the group Veterans for Peace, which was holding a convention in Dallas.

The protesters stopped their bus miles from the ranch in Crawford, and walked less than a half-mile before being stopped by local law enforcement officials.

A message on the Gold Star Families Web site says, "We want our loved ones' sacrifices to be honored by bringing our nation's sons and daughters home from the travesty that is Iraq IMMEDIATELY, since this war is based on horrendous lies and deceptions.

"Just because our children are dead, why would we want any more families to suffer the same pain and devastation?"

The message also urges Bush to send his twin daughters, Jenna and Barbara, to Iraq "if the cause is so noble."

The site says the group is made up of families of soldiers who have died as a result of war, primarily in Iraq.

Joe Hagin, White House deputy chief of staff, and Stephen Hadley, national security adviser, met with Sheehan for about 45 minutes Saturday, according to White House spokesman Trent Duffy.

Sheehan said that the two men "were very respectful."

"They told me the party line of why we are in Iraq," she said. "I told them that I don't believe that they believed that."

Duffy said Saturday that "many of the hundreds of families the president has met with know their loved one died for a noble cause and that the best way to honor their sacrifice is to complete the mission."

Bush has refused to provide a time frame for U.S. troop withdrawal from Iraq, saying American forces will return home when Iraqis can take care of their own security.

"President Bush wants the troops home as soon as possible, but the U.S. will not cut and run from terrorists," Duffy said.

Sheehan elicited sympathy from both sides of the political spectrum on Sunday.

"What you're seeing with that mom trying to meet with President Bush is echoes of Vietnam," said Sen. Barbara Boxer, a California Democrat. "Because no one is seeing the light at the end of the tunnel."

"I think the president ought to meet with this mother," said Sen. George Allen, a Virginia Republican. "What I would say to her is her son will always be remembered as a great hero and a patriot, advanced freedom in Iraq and the Middle East, has made this country more secure."

Boxer said her own message would be different: "I would tell her to do everything she could to spare other families this grief, to get us off this cycle of violence."

Recent surveys have shown decreasing public support for the war.

In a Newsweek poll released Sunday, 64 percent of those asked said they do not believe the war in Iraq has made Americans safer, and 61 percent said they disapprove of the way the president is handling the war.

The telephone poll of 1,004 adults was taken from Tuesday to Thursday last week and has a margin of error of 4 percentage points.

CNN's Elaine Quijano contributed to this story.

Apparently W drove by her on the way to a big fund raiser with some oil bigwigs.

War foes intensify Tex. vigil

By HELEN KENNEDY
DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER

President Bush got his first look yesterday at the anti-war protest growing outside his Texas ranch when, on his way to a fund-raiser, he drove by the vigil staged by a slain soldier's mother.
As Bush went to party with fat cats who gave $2 million to the GOP, his motorcade didn't slow as it went by Cindy Sheehan and her sign: "Why do you make time for donors and not for me?"

Political expediency?

Though this is turning into a giant Republican media clusterfuck.

"I'm glad that we were there because he rarely gets to see the faces of people who don't agree with him 100%," Sheehan said.

The President's black Chevrolet SUV has tinted windows, so it was not clear if he looked at her, or the growing ranks of demonstrators, or the hundreds of plain white crosses, painted with the names of the dead, they have planted.

But it's a sight that may become familiar to the President: demonstrators energized by the unexpected success of Sheehan's protest now plan to follow him back to Washington at the end of the month.

Sheehan began her dramatic vigil last Saturday. She says she wants to meet Bush face to face so she can tell him to bring home the troops from Iraq and ask him what the death of her 24-year-old son Casey accomplished.

Various factors - including the shocking deaths of 14 Marines, a press corps bored in Crawford while Bush takes a five-week vacation and the simple symbolism of a grieving mother challenging the President - have turned Sheehan into a phenomenon.

"This is the moment. This may be the time when we finally get the attention of the American people," said Linda Waste of Georgia, who stood with Sheehan and about 50 others yesterday as Bush went by.

Waste has three sons, a grandson and a granddaughter either in Iraq or just back. Last week she joined Military Families Speak Out, a group that wants the troops brought home.

Other parents who have lost children are converging on Crawford to join Sheehan today, and supporters of the war in Iraq are staging a counterdemonstration.

"I hope the mainstream media will give as much attention to those of us who think we should stay the course as those who want to create another Vietnam," said Dallas talk show host Darrell Ankarlo.

Bush said Thursday that he feels for mourning parents. "I've thought about their cry and their sincere desire to reduce the loss of life by pulling our troops out. I just strongly disagree," he said.

Otherwise-

 

[Ratty Sr.]

I understand Bush. I wouldn't want to talk to someone whose last name is "Waste" either.

 

[Jahakob]

My personal thoughts of the Iraq-war are that Saddam should have been taken away a long time ago and that the war was not well executed at all.

- EDIT
The government shouldn't have put him there to start with.

I am very sure that the american government had other causes then 'freedom' but as, of course, I don't have any actual pictures with Bush holding a glass of 'IRAQ WAR OIL' I am not going any further into that.

Saddam is an ass, least said. But the way the american gov handled it should be illegal. They could at least ASKED the UN or something, come with a proposition, plan better medical care for the comming victims. And of course, war is not the first option you should consider. BUT, I am not saying that nothing should have been done. Something should have been done a long time ago.

The war is still raging in Iraq, a minimum of 23 456 civilians have been killed in Iraq, in 9/11, 2948 were killed and 1846 american soldiers have been killed in Iraq. I can't find numbers for Iraq militants casualties.

 

[Maphusio]

near 100K of the iraqi liberation forces and reminants of Sadams gang is what i have heard.