A vigil for Cindy

I attended one of more than 1500 vigils for Cindy Sheehan earlier this evening. It was not so much a protest as a quiet remembrance of those who have died for Bush's little war.

Before I left home, I checked my e-mail and read a posting from the local organizer, Dave Lambert, who said 102 people had signed up to attend the vigil. At the high count, there were more than 120 people. Considering the size of Fort Wayne, the fact Indiana is basically a Republican State and many people didn't know about it, I'd say the turnout was pretty nice.

A little before 7:30, Dave had us all get into a large circle on the Courthouse Green. We all lit our candles and after a few words from Dave, we listened as the names of all Indiana servicemen who have died in this war were read aloud. The simple fact that this took some time and two men to complete the reading of the list was a little sobering. This is just from Indiana!

After the list, they played the song, "I Have Come to Take My Boy Home" by Jym Mooney. The song was about a parent who actually goes to the battleground to retrieve their offspring. Others spoke, as well as Linda Hilton, who had just returned from Camp Casey in Crawford.

As the vigil continued and darkness fell, I looked over at the old Courthouse and wondered if justice would ever be served to the men responsible for the senseless deaths of all the men mentioned at locations all over the country.

The shadowy figures holding candles on the courthouse lawn were juxtapositioned by the lights of corporate America. It was a stark contrast. As this was happening, big money had the light and the ear of the President. The little people in the dark were the ones without a direct voice. But there is hope. I looked to my left and saw a mother standing with her young son. This is what Cindy is doing. She is standing with her young son. While most of us see Casey Sheehan as a warrior struck down in battle or a pawn of the Bush administration, Cindy can still see the little boy she raised. Cindy can see the boy she bandaged up after a scraped knee. Cindy is grieving for the child she thought would outlive her. I looked down at the photos of my own children and felt a tear on my cheek.

I had a chance to speak to a few people and here is what they had to say.

Decatur, IN resident, Randy Hifner said, "I’m here ‘cause the war is wrong . . . wrong for us to start wars based on lies. It’s wrong for us to have a military budget that’s equal to the combined military budgets of the rest of the world, when we’ve got people dying every year because they can’t afford health care. And it’s time for people to open their eyes and put a stop to it."

Local Fort Wayne peace activist George Emmert had this to say. "I think from the outset it (the war) was sold on the wrong terms and that the American people were basically manipulated into it. I think that we were told that the Iraqi people in leadership were directs threat to our national and personal security. You may be aware of an interesting little story that showed up just before the troops crossed into Iraq and that was a back channel communication saying, ‘wait a minute, wait a minute, you know, you guys can come in, you can look around, you can do anything you need to do to assure yourselves that these weapons you’re so afraid of don'’t exist.’ And that communication was just snuffed out. We weren’t interested; at least the leadership wasn’t interested. I think it was massive incompetence, massive hypocrisy and massive dishonesty. And I’m as upset as anything with how we Americans responded to this war. I suppose that we allowed a lot of the media to sell us a bill of goods on it and the media machine certainly worked overtime. This is an un-American war and it’s un-American of us to support this war and it’s frightening to me how many of us are willing to be, to that extent, un-American."

Linda Hilton who just returned from Crawford told me a little bit about her experience. "My first night there I had to sleep in my car because it was too late to set up my tent. So I stayed at the Peace House in my car. About four in the morning I looked up on the porch and Cindy was up there giving hugs to some old Vietnam vets . . . older I should say . . . and I got out of my car and said, ‘Cindy, you don’t know me but I want one of those too.’ Of course she gives out hugs to everybody. She’s definitely filled with peace and . . . I don't know the word . . . she’s just the real thing. She’s very down to earth, very approachable, at least when she’s not surrounded by the media.

They say that there were hundreds of them (anti-Sheehan protesters) down there. We had three groups of protesters come in. If you added all of them together, you might get two hundred. But on our side, we had seven hundred coming in per day, up to two thousand come in every day. Only about a hundred of us stayed overnight and camped though. Most people would leave at night and go back to the hotels or back to the town. We by far out-numbered them but some of the media tried to make it look like there were only a few of us and a lot of them. And they thought they were hurting us, but actually, they just broke up our day. And they stayed separated, there was absolutely zero danger of any conflict between us. In fact some of our guys went over and talked to them. We decided don't get mad, sympathize with them and where they’re coming from."

And finally, a word from the evening's organizer, Dave Lambert. "For a long time I had a lot of really gut wrenching hatred for Bush, but I thought, that’s not productive. So I put that aside and I said, ‘wait a minute. Stop focusing on that man, stop focusing on Dick Cheney, stop focusing on his old administration and start focusing on what needs to be done’. And what needs to be done is, we need to end the war, we need to bring the troops home now. We need to take the money we’ve been pouring into Iraq, and they’re figuring it’s close to $300-Billion before it’s all over, and put it into the infrastructure, services and programs in this country here. That makes a whole lot more sense than spending it on guns and weapons that kill people. To me it does. And I don’t think anybody could argue against it. And you see, the rub is, that Cindy Sheehan says the same thing and that’s what she wants to talk to Bush about. But Bush knows what she wants to talk to him about and he’s not about to talk to her. But that’s the arrogance of power."

It was a positive experience for me. I now know there are others in this town who feel as strongly about the lies of the Bush administration as I do and that is somewhat comforting. Tonight we all gathered to stand with Cindy, to grieve with Cindy and to feel a sense of brotherhood about Cindy's own vigil and our combined desire to see a real change in the way this country is run. It gives me faith.