We Resist!

Today there was a protest at the Tucson Convention Center against the arrival of George W Bush to Tucson. Naturally I was there. I held up a sign that said "Artic Drilling now= Damage Forever." This is in response to the Senate proposal to drill for oil in the Artic Wildlife Refuge
-this is supposedly protected land people!- which would have a damaging effect on the ecosystem. I'd have liked to have represented all of my queer, feminist, anti-war peeps, but not all of the causes would have fit on a sign. How can they when they take up so much room in my mind? It wouldn't have sat well with my conscience if I went to work and sat around all day. This fits perfectly with my current motto is : Its better to regret something you did than something you didn't do. I think that Iggy Pop actually coined that phrase. There were a few protesters from groups such as Move On (www.moveon.org), Billionares for Bush(www.billionairesforbush.com) and Planned Parenthood (www.plannedparenthood.org), but most of them were individuals. There were college students, retirees, kids and their parents, artists, hippies and the homeless. I'm not sure of the number of people that were there against bush but I'm guessing that it was in the hundreds. Part of the protesters were centered at the side of the building on a ramp that usually leads into one of the ballrooms when its not being cordoned off, and the other half was over in the parking lot holding signs and jeering the mostly white, mostly rich, and mostly serious crowd of rich men and their well- polished stepford wives that were waiting in line. I thought that it might come to blows when one of the Bushies starts screaming about Social Security and his four kids so adamantly that I thought that the vein in his neck might burst and another one screams back at him that his kids are gonna get drafted. But fortunately, it didn't escalate and most of the protesters moved away anyway once the Bushies all went inside and they lined up along the main thoroughfare waiting for the presidential caravan. The caravan arrived about a half an hour later with about fifteen motorcycle cops in front and ten cop cars in the back. The entourage consisted of two SUV'S, 2 limo's, and a City of Tucson van. All of the vehicles went into an underground parking so as to spare our president the wrath of the unpaying public. All in all this protest was very peaceful and the police harassed very few, if any people. Yesterday I was walking and I saw a slogan that was spray-painted into the street with a stencil. It read "Your heart is the same size as your hand. Keep loving. Keep fighting." Dissent doesn't (have to) come from hate. I was speaking my conscience. And I will speak it again.