Iraq war, Bush critic gets warm welcome

Cindy Sheehan says president's policies don't support troops

Bill Scanlon, Rocky Mountain News

Published October 13, 2006 at midnight

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BOULDER - Three hundred people cheered Thursday night when Iraq war critic Cindy Sheehan said President Bush should be put in prison.

They applauded when Sheehan, who lost her son in Iraq, said U.S. soldiers should dress like NASCAR drivers, with decals for Halliburton, Exxon, McDonald's and Coca-Cola.

And they clapped when Sheehan said that when Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez called Bush a devil, "Ninety-nine percent of the world said, 'Well, duh.' "

Sheehan became a lightning rod for criticism and praise when she spoke out against the war after her son Casey, an Army mechanic, was killed in Baghdad in 2004.

Last year, Sheehan and her sister set up "Camp Casey" outside Bush's vacation retreat in Crawford, Texas, where they were eventually joined by 15,000 other protesters.

There, she said that Bush should honor her son by bringing the troops home immediately.

Critics say she is so far from mainstream thinking that she serves little purpose other than damaging the morale of the U.S. troops.

But at Boulder Unity Church on Thursday, Sheehan said it's the policies of Bush, Vice President Dick Cheney and Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld that don't support the troops.

When Bush pushes for the right to torture suspected terrorists for information, he is putting at risk every American soldier who might be captured overseas, she said.

She noted that the three leaders never fought in a war and that Cheney famously said that he had "other priorities" when asked about why he wasn't in the service during the Vietnam War.

"If I ever run into Dick Cheney on the street, I'd have a hard time not slapping him in the face," said Sheehan, who co-founded the anti-war group Gold Star Families for Peace.

"I would ask him . . . 'Don't you think my son had other priorities other than getting killed in a war that is too much like Vietnam?' "

Sheehan's talk, coinciding with the publication of her book, Peace Mom, was sponsored by Boulder Bookstore, KGNU Independent Radio and the Rocky Mountain Peace and Justice Center. Wednesday, she was told she is on the short list for this year's Nobel Peace Prize, which is expected to be announced today.

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