This is a disgrace

[Jeffersons Ghost]

COLUMBUS, Ga. — The annual November protest here at the gates of Fort Benning used to really be something.

At its peak a few years ago, more than 17,000 people streamed into town, united in their effort to shut down the School of the Americas, a United States Department of Defense center that they believe has trained Latin American military leaders to torture and murder.

Hundreds of people would cross onto the base and get arrested in mass acts of civil disobedience. Catholic groups staged workshops. Old lefties treated it like a family reunion. Vendors sold bumper stickers and Guatemalan hacky sacks...

But the times, they are a changing. This year’s protest, the 20th, drew its smallest crowd ever over the weekend. Both the police and organizers agree that fewer than 5,000 people showed up.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/22/us/politics/22protest.html?ref=global-home

Is this the only way an antiwar protest can gain publicity? If the turn-out had been better, I'm sure the news would not have been posted on page one of the online version of the New York Times.

[HillbillyBob]

1. Its a shame that there even has to be a protest

and If i were better of $ wise I would attend many.
Being partly disabled and sick I can't just up and go like I used to.

[court jester]

2. what was once wrong is now not

what was bad is now good

didn't gore say something like that?

[monmouth]

3. If there were no results, why bother?...n/t

[WHEN CRABS ROAR]

6. Not true, the funding for the school was almost cut, it lacked

a couple of votes.

[NightWatcher]

4. cross the line at the SOA and get treated like shit, nah I'll stay home and stay safe

wont do any good anyway, sorry

[WHEN CRABS ROAR]

5. Lack of caring for our fellow man, lack of knowledge about

what's going on in the world, even here on DU, need to become more aware people!

[gratuitous]

7. And how much coverage did the Times give the protest when it was "really something"?

And if the numbers swell again - and they will - how much coverage will the Times devote to it? Sounds like a crowd at least as large as your average Tea Bagger rally was in Columbus this weekend. Compare and contrast the relative amounts of coverage of each in the popular media.

Ah, but this year it's just a remembrance of the good old days of the dirty fucking hippies, their family reunions and their wacky hacky sacks! Extra points for quoting a Dylan song. Oh, those hippies!

[Jeffersons Ghost]

8. finally a post that gets the point. For those who wrote, "why bother?" here's why:

Gandhi said, "All that is necessary for evil to succeed is for good men to do nothing."

[gratuitous]

9. Yep, put me in the Christian Peacemaker Teams camp

Do the right thing without regard to the result, which is out of your hands anyway.

[SlimJimmy]

10. Agreed (nt)

[Atypical Liberal]

11. 1989

This all stemmed from the killing of some Jesuit priests back in 1989. People either don't care about that anymore or just figure by now that the abuses of our government have so dwarfed and eclipsed that event that it's not even useful to protest it anymore.

Couple this with all that has come out about the Catholic church and pedophile priests and a lot of people just aren't up to rally for their cause. Yes I realize it's about the school and not the priests, but their killing is what sparked it all.

[lostnfound]

12. "that they believe" has trained Latin American military leaders to torture and murder

Nice writing there, NYT. Can't bring itself to write it as a fact..