When George Bush came to speak before the Economic Club of
Chicago, on Friday, January 6th, he was greeted by a wide
cross-section of Midwest activist groups. Protestors represented a broad swath of age,
ethnic and cultural diversity. All had a
common goal; to protest the outrages of the Bush regme.
The World Can’t
Wait contingent took this opportunity to drown out the administration’s lies,
which they also plan to do, en masse, during the State of the Union Address on
January 31st. More than 500 people-
from Illinois, Indiana
and Wisconsin-
attended, equipped with whistles, drums, bullhorns, and voices. Every known local activist seemed to be
there, including labor organizers.
Given normal Windy City
weather, Mother Nature cut the protestors a break. The sky was clear with minimal wind, but the
air was cold, and even colder as the day wore on. Still, the crowd grew as the event
progressed.
World Can’t
Wait’s day began at Columbia College, three blocks from the protest sight, where
key people, including Jay O’Neil and Reverend
D. Lake,
assembled our people. Three large
banners were constructed and manned. One
read simply, ‘Bush Step Down’ in giant letters with the web address below and
the other said ‘State of the Union’ with ‘Union’
crossed out and ‘Emergency’ written in red.
It also included the date, time, and place of our central
drown-out. These two banners were so
large that it took five people to carry them, so yes, they made an
impression. Plastic whistles were
prepared for both noise and fundraising, each sporting a small green label that
also included the date and time for our Jan 31st action. Over 150 were sold. Ms. O’Neil provided an excellent run down on
goals and legal issues.
The crowd grew
quickly prior to George’s arrival filling out the better part of a city
block. After a few helicopter sweeps the
streets were closed off providing ample clue George was about to arrive. Sirens, motorcycles, black SUVs, limos, and
emergency vehicles came bounding down from Lake Shore Drive to be greeted by
protestor lined streets.
The NOISE was on.
For the next
several hours this was not the place to be if you wanted a quiet moment. There was plenty opportunity to meet like
minded people and swap stories. As the hour of Bush’s speech approached the
crowd gravitated toward the appropriate side of the building. The decibel level increased and stayed there
for the next hour. Drum troups were in
precense. They were joined by WCW
whistles spinkled throughout the crowd in an impromptu song of discontent. Speeches and open-mics went into full
swing. Rev. Deborah Lake gave a brief
speech for World Can’t Wait , and our chants went of ‘Bush Step Down’ and ‘2008
is too late’ were well represented in the audio mix.
It was obvious when George was leaving. It was
a brief goodbye but there could be no mistake that George was no longer among
friends. As we prepared to leave the
site we had to negotiate our march with the police. An OK was given for a short march up Michigan Ave. back
to the college, which included a police escort.
If anything, this made our message even louder.