Home > Poles apart: US opinion on Iraq increasingly polarised
Matthew Wells
Mildred McHugh leaned against a steel crowd-control
barrier on Manhattan’s Third Avenue and wondered
whether her son Steve was alive or dead.
Steve is serving in Iraq, and although they spoke
recently, events move fast. "Four died in my son’s
division today and I don’t know that he’s not one of
them. People are dying at an astounding rate, while the
president paints a rosy picture of a country being
reborn," she said.
Most days she rides around her New Jersey town on a
bicycle, anti-war slogans emblazoned across her
reflector vest, but yesterday she was in the heart of
New York as part of a protest organised by the largest
US anti-war coalition, United for Peace and Justice
(UPJ). She campaigns mainly with a group called
Military Families Speak Out
"There’s more and more opposition to the war, and I
have noticed a big difference in the last month," she
said. "I ride around and I haven’t had anyone come up
to me to say what I’m doing is wrong. Before, that was
pretty commonplace."
But Manhattan is not New Jersey, and several passers-by
express their difference of opinion with alacrity.
"Fuck you," said one bespectacled grey-haired gentleman
in a suit.
"Do you want to talk about it?" asked one protester,
hopeful for a good old-fashioned argument.
"Just fuck you," comes the reply. It is even easier to
be abusive from the comfort and safety of a passing
car. "Fucking morons!" the driver of a silver Porsche
shouted.
The organisers rallied outside the offices of the
state’s two Democratic party senators, Hillary Clinton
and Chuck Schumer. "She [Clinton] supported the war
effort right from the get-go," said UPJ’s national
organiser, Leslie Kagan. "Most recently, she’s
supporting the idea of more troops going in, and her
position goes against what most New Yorkers want."
In fact, almost the entire Democratic elite - including
New York’s pair of senators and the party’s
presidential candidate, John Kerry - have supported the
Bush administration in Congress throughout the Iraq
conflagration. Voting against - or even abstaining - is
seen as political suicide in election year.
"It’s outrageous that the so-called opposition party
has provided so little opposition. We’re concerned that
despite slight emphases, the Kerry agenda is basically
the same as Bush: a foreign policy based on what’s best
for big American corporations," Kagan said.
Disillusionment with both main parties was widespread
throughout the crowd on the sidewalk, in which a priest
rubbed shoulders with the local leader of Veterans for
Peace. Together they form a largely middle-class and
middle-aged group of survivors from the earlier and
angrier movement that helped derail the war in Vietnam.
They brought a cardboard coffin with them, strewn with
rather sorry-looking flowers. They cast white cards
bearing the names Iraqis and Americans who had died
since the invasion began into the makeshift casket one
by one, reading the names out loud as they did so.
Some of the people present did not need symbolism to
represent loss. Sue Niederer’s son Seth was an army
lieutenant who died three months ago as he tried to
diffuse a bomb near Baghdad. It was not something he
was trained to do, but someone had to do it.
"When he was last here for two weeks’ R&R, I asked him
if he wanted to go back," Niederer said. "He said ’No,
we’re not making any progress over there, but I have 18
men I’m in charge of, and I must bring them home
safely.’ Hopefully, I can help realise his final wish."
"Anyone who watched Bush’s last press conference could
see his arrogance, his indignity, his lack of
credibility, and lack of feeling towards the people who
have been lost," she added.
I asked her if she thought the president was being
disingenuous about the war. Did she at least accept
that he believes passionately in the moral case for
being in Iraq? "I think he’s greedy, and self-
righteous. This war was a personal vendetta, and if the
American people return him to office, we are going to
suffer greatly," she replied. "We accomplished what the
Iraqis wanted us to accomplish, which was toppling
Saddam Hussein. Now it’s time to let them govern
themselves. We don’t have to force our democracy and
our ways on everyone else. They want us out - let’s get
out."
Flowers for the dead are placed outside the buildings
where the Clinton and Schumer teams perform their
constituency duties, but no one from the protest is
allowed in to make their case in person. Nor is anyone
prepared to meet them downstairs, leaving the
demonstrators to fill Third Avenue with the chant of
"Hillary, Hillary, shame on you - you voted for this
war too."
An attempt to get inside the Clinton office building
threatens to turn ugly until the burly security chief
barring the way explains that he is a disabled war
veteran. "I’m on the real side. I’ve seen these flowers
and I won’t let them sweep it. I give you my word," he
said.