May 6, 2003 - The ACLU is charging that there is a return to the aggressive prosecution of protesters not unlike the days of Vietnam and the Civil Rights struggle. But others see it as a group of throwbacks that refuse to look at the facts and embrace the complexities of a very different world with very different dangers.

The American Civil Liberties Union says there are many examples, like an increase in arrests, the questioning of protesters and the shunning of celebrities who have opposed the war in Iraq. But in this day where the true voice of the majority has expressed its disdain with the vocal minority of protest (remember, the polls were close to 70-30 before military action took place) it is simply the minority not accepting that their opinions are on the loosing end of the stick this time around.

No one can say that celebrities were silenced or kept from exploiting their viewpoints, quite to the contrary. Celebrities voiced their opinions with more vigor and more passion than ever before but because of their sheltered lifestyles so far from the mainstream public of the United States they were unable to accept that the viewpoints of the privileged few, the stars of Hollywood, were not embraced by the populace of the United States. In short, the majority didn't agree with them and for them that was very hard to take, so hard in fact they are refusing to sit still for being the ones who are in the minority by a margin of over 2 to 1.

Protesters took to the streets weekend after weekend and the arrests were few, only those who broke the law were arrested, as it should be. For the most part the protesters were overwhelmed by a majority of people who truly didn't know anything about the reasons they were out there. Their conviction wasn't there as it was during the protests of the Vietnam Era, instead it was more a right of passage that they chose to include themselves in while organizations such as ANSWER exploited their naivety for their own gain (the ANSWER offices are shared and in some cases are the same as the Communist Party offices here in the United States). Only when the protesters turned violent or disruptive to the point of harming others were they arrested and in many cases they were arrested when they lashed out at law enforcement who were initially there to make sure the protesters themselves were safe. In two cases they completely overstepped their bounds; blocking traffic, which kept ambulances from reaching hospitals, and blocking ports where supplies, both military and humanitarian were being loaded onto ships bound for the Middle East. In these cases anyone would have been arrested and therefore they were treated equally within the boundaries of the law.

No, we are not experiencing a flashback to the 60's we are experiencing a group of throwbacks who refuse to understand the very different circumstances in which we live in today. We have an unconventional enemy who wouldn't hesitate to kill as many Americans as possible, this includes the protesters. We have so called allies who we are finding out have not only armed our enemies but have shared information with them against the best interests of the world in the name of profit. We are living in an age where the enemy has grown to live among us due to the easing of border crossing requirements over the 8 years of the Clinton Administration. Truly, it is a different world that we live in but to these throwbacks and wannabes who suffer from the most extreme case of tunnel-vision since the German people put on their rose-colored glasses and embraced Hitler, it is still the 1960's.

So, to be fair, which the minority in this case has never really been, there isn't any oppression going on here at all. They have had their say and the majority decided it was bovine feces. Perhaps it is time that they simply came to grips with the fact that they have been outvoted in the court of public opinion and that they should accept their defeat with some sort of dignity. What they are doing now just makes them look spoiled, arrogant and quite frankly, stupid.