Protesting

I LOVE PROTESTS, always have. I was just a kid when all the angry protests against the Viet Nam war were going on on college campuses and in the streets of America. I secretly agreed with them, but dared not reveal this to my prents, conservative, patriotic people who,one way or another, would not have put up with it. They probably would have said: "Even if you think the war is a bad idea, you have to support your country". Which is true, to a point, and not true, past that point. History hath shown that teh anti-war protestors were morally,politically, and militarily quite correct. Viet Nam is now a united, communist-capitalist country, and an ally of the United States, and could have jsut as easily been all that without the violence and death. I once made the comment,maybe on this website, that I never met a protest that I didn't like. That turned out to be untrue. When mobs of conservatives and "Proud Boys" or whatever were out in mobs protesting mask wearing mandates during the pandemic, I thought, and still think,they were crazy. Ditto the "Protest" January 6 by the Trump mob at the Capitol. But anti-war, gay rights, women's rights, and Black Lives Matter, count me in. And that spirit I, and I assume most of the world, supports the current protests in Iran, with more than five hundred protestors dead at the hands of a bloody, repressive, theocratic fascist regime. Trump and I agree on this. Where Trump and I disagree is concerning the current protests going on all across America's fruited plain over murder of that nice, harmless, innocent, gay lady in Minneapolis. And, of course, the recurrent "No Kings" movement, which has already had one extrenely successsful day of protest, with more scheduled. Thomas Jefferson said it best: "The tree of liberty shall from time to time require the nourishment of the blood of patriots and tyrants." Unfortunately, this is true, much as we might wish it were not. I was too young to actually attend any Viet Nam protests, even though I did in facr sneak out of the house in high chool and attend a local, rather lame one. I can confess that now that my parenst are dead. I entered early adulthood wondering whether I would actually ever have an opportunity to get out among protestors and try to stop some unjust, wicked war of American imperialism. I hoped not, of course, but suspected that I might. And indeed I got my chance, in January of 1991, when George Bush attacked Saddam Hussein and Iraq, after deceitfully luring Saddam into aggressive military action to justify American aggression. In this the United States was an evil empire, and Bush the first a war criminal, straight up. I was teaching a a major university, and walking through college town with five hundred other people, wearing an American flag like a cape and carrying a sign which said: "No War For Oil". The sidewalks were lined with people unfavorable to our behavior, war wongers, as I called them then, and still call them. As usual, Republicans supporting an an American war of imperialistic aggression. I heard some fascist dude call me a "traitor", and I walked towards him, ready to fight. One of my students, I swear to God, stepped in and stopped the fight, stopped me from losing my job. If Trump goes ahead with his plan to attack one weak country after another just for fun as he put it, and to conquer the entire western hemisphere for the American empire, I strongly suspect that I will be spending a lot of time back out in the streets with the other radical left wing scum and vermin, complaining vehemently and vociferously. Its fun trying to get rid of Trump, however vain the attempt, and I hope and trust I shall henceforth have ample opportunities to do precisely that.