Watch speeches from the rally:
Imam Talib Abdur-Rashid
Carl Dix, Spokesperson for the Revolutionary Communist Party
Rabbi Michael Feinberg
Aimara Lin, Not In Our Name Project
Prachi Noor reading a statement from the World Can’t Wait National Steering Committee
Sunsara Taylor, mc at rally
(more to come)
Report from the Protest:
Tonight, people filled about two lanes of Broadway, on the tip of Times Square
in NYC, filled with joyous defiance and determined outrage to drive
this regime from power. Estimates range from 1,500 to close to 3,000
people.
Author Malachy McCourt and
students from three different NYC high schools opened the event with a
heartfelt reading of the call, which the crowd was inspired to join,
getting louder and louder until the final line, “The future is
unwritten. WHICH ONE WE GET IS UP TO US“. Kathleen Chalfant was
next, making very clear that we speak for the majority and “we are the
beginning of a movement to make the majority manifest.”
The night was hosted by Sunsara Taylor and Elaine Brower, whose son will soon be serving in Iraq.
Together with Prachi Noor from the WCW Steering Committee, Sunsara and
Elaine made sure that several key messages were made very clear: the
need to be in DC this Saturday; the fact that everyone there was
‘drafted’ to be organizers and get thousands more to DC and into this
movement; and that Bush stepping down will not happen without each of
us taking independent historical action.
Missy Comley Beattie, of Gold Star
Families for Peace, spoke with a voice that trembled with grief,
outrage and determination as she told the crowd how her nephew Chase,
who was killed in Iraq, was sent home in what the Bush regime has
dubbed “transfer tubes”, but the rest of us call body bags. She told us
how, in the personal items sent to his family, was a letter her nephew
had written that said, “No parent would want their child here.” When
talking about the need to stop this occupation, she said, “The world
can’t wait for Bush to feel pain. He is incapable of compassion. The
initiative rests with us.”
Drums and whistles and the banging of pots and pans peppered the speeches, and a feeder march from International Action Center added to the energy in the crowd, as the night moved toward
Chris Owens was the first to reference the passing of Coretta
Scott King, and the legacy from her and her husband of fighting for a
country that is very different from Bush’s. The crowd roared when he
denounced Bush’s “we’ll do what we want no matter what” attitude,
saying, “that’s not the country we believe in. Not the country MLK
believed in. Or Malcolm X, or Harry Belafonte, or Sindey Poitier.” He
said, “We say NO. If we don’t ( then we begin to slip into a quagmire
of fear, of complacency and no right. That’s why we have a Judge
Alito.” Then he challenged people to ask their friends what they were
doing tonight ( where were you? Sunsara then added the important point
that it’s not too late, but soon it will be, and we have to go and find
those people who needed to be out with us tonight.
Other speakers included young,
injured veterans of the Iraq war; Carl Dix of the Revolutionary
Communist Party; Rabbi Feinberg and Imam Talib Abdur-Rashid; Aimara Lin
of Not In Our Name; Rhadames Rivera of SEIU 1199 Union.
As 9PM approached, Koba of
Kontrast performed a medley that intensified the energy of the crowd (
people jumped and pumped their fists to “the F-word”
and the booming bass until the moment for the noise came ( screams,
yells, chants of BUSH STEP DOWN, banging of pots and tambourines, and
the blowing of whistles consumed the space, beyond what our bodies
could fill. And then Brooklyn-based Outernational took the stage,
compelling all the youth to rush to the front of the stage before
beginning a march that surrounded the heart of Times Square, filled the
area with chants of “Bush Must Go!” and “Bush Step Down!”