I'm concerned with the possibility that the simplistic message that will be taken home by the MSM from the sept 24-26 protests will simply and readily be dismissed as unworkable, idealistic sentiments at best.

In part this is related to the problem addressed by Jim's article, since large groups like UFPJ and ANSWER do inherently tend to boil down message to a few sound-bitey demands, eg "Bring the troops home now," or "End the occupation/colonization of Iraq, Palestine, etc."

Here is the most likely historical outcome of the next few years: Some form of stable representative government will take root in Iraq, the insurgency will be brought under control (though likely after much more bloodshed), and US troops will at least be drastically reduced in number in Iraq, if not be gone entirely. And then Bush, Cheney, Rumsfeld et al can point their fingers at all the "naysayers" and say "See? They were wrong." They'll basically say that because the whole endeavor "worked," all of the bloodshed was justified (since all wars, as well all know, result in loss of life). And more likely than not, the mainstream of the American public will buy it, or at least continue their apathetic tendencies and focus their attentions on whatever new crisis might be at hand at that time.

That's why I would like to see more attentioned being focussed on the following question: What right does the US have to decide how many tens or hundreds of thousands of human lives it's ok to destroy in order to obtain a political outcome that is acceptable to the US? I'm not sure how this question could be turned into a sound-bite, and I'm not sure turning it into one would be of any advantage. There are of course lots of questions that flow from the above question (such as why democracy in Iraq is important to us now when we blatantly supported dictatorship there in the 80's, why we continue to support non-democratic countries like Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Pakistan, Jordan, etc) And these would be topics for debates that are more elaborate than the simple messages that can be conveyed in a set of protests.

OK, why don't I just come out and say it? If I were supreme commander of both UFPJ and ANSWER, I would do the following: The protest on the 24th would focus entirely on the lies that the Bush administration used to get us into the war, along with the real reasons for the war (taking out a thorn in the side of US "strategic interests" in the region.) Basically, it would be one big cry of "LIAR!" On the 25th, the protest would focus entirely on questioning Bush's latest rationalizations for the war (ie asking the question I posed above about our right to decide how many people it's ok to kill to achieve our aims; and also asking how it's helped reduce the threat of terrorism against the US). How this could be done in a simple sound-bitey way, again, I don't know. Then the 26th, I would cancel that dumb concert thing (what are we now, Bono-like end-all-the-world's-problems-with-money-from-the-USA party-goers, sponsored by Nike? Visa? Did you go the anti-war concert? Dude. ) and have a final protest calling for: Getting the US to leave the Middle East and Central Asia militarily, financially, covert operationally, and even diplomatically. We have no reason (other than strategic oil and gas interests) for being there. We have already done more than enough damage there to keep us collectively guilty for decades if not centuries. Let's GET OUT NOW!

Would this result in policy change? Likely not, but the advantage is that this set of steps is far more difficult to dismiss as simplistic, idealistic, unworkable hogwash. And perhaps more importantly, it pre-empts the "argument" that (mark my words) the administration is going to be making in the next few years about how their policies are "working."