Bart Whiteman
Hello. This is ABC’s Nightline and a special report: Cindy Sheehan Day 4128. We are coming to you live from a remote location just outside Crawford, Texas. We were hoping to actually get into downtown Crawford for this special edition of Nightline, but the traffic is so backed up coming into town from the brand new Crawford International Airport that we just couldn’t make it there before show time. We do have at least one correspondent on the ground, Fred Turnweather, at the end of George W. Bush’s driveway where Cindy Sheehan is well into the twelfth year of her vigil to meet with the President. We will be cutting to him periodically for updates.
Construction has also been completed on Ms. Sheehan’s new two-bedroom, one-bathroom, single-story modular home that was erected on the .25 acre of land Mr. Bush deeded from his 1600-acre estate to Ms. Sheehan in a reputed effort to buy her silence. The President’s new press secretary Ron Flatland – I believe it is the twenty-sixth Mr. Bush has had since being in office – claimed yesterday that this was merely a “gesture of goodwill from the President to one of his deserving citizens.”
Ms. Sheehan was quoted as saying: “I know it is modest, but at least it has air-conditioning. That’s all that matters to me now.”
Now, we will cut to St. Vincent’s Hospital in New York City where they are wheeling Ted Koppel’s adjustable bed up to our cameras so we can talk to Ted. Ted, this is Bob Cornreddy out in Crawford, Texas, and we just wanted to get your reaction to day 4128 of the Siege of Crawford. It’s been going on a long time, hasn’t it, Ted? What’s that? I think Ted is agreeing. It reminds you of the good old days of the Iran Hostage Crisis, doesn’t it, Ted? Ted? Is that a nod? Yes, I think it is. Well, Ted, it’s good to see you again, as always. We are carrying on the grand tradition that you started. You can take him back to his room now, nurse. Bye, Ted. Ted? Was that a wave?
- I think it was, Bob.
Okay, we’re going to you now, Fred, at the driveway entrance to the Bush estate. Can you tell us what has been going on there today, Fred?
- Well, Bob, it’s been a busy day here today. As you know, they had the opening of the new U.N. headquarters built on land donated by George Soros just across the street from the Bush estate. Numerous international dignitaries were here for that event, but they all stopped over at Cindy Sheehan’s house beforehand to pay their respects. Ms. Sheehan told me she never thought she would see the world at her doorstep, but she guesses miracles can still happen.
Any sign of President Bush during all this?
- No, he stayed holed up in his ranch house yet again today. Actually, the last time anyone has seen him in these parts was three years ago when our helicopter crew got some footage of him taking what appeared to be a full bag of trash out to the garage. I think we’re running that same footage right now.
We are, Fred. What do you think was in that bag?
- No one knows for sure, Bob. Several members of the press asked that same question at the time, but the official White House response was “No comment.”
How has Cindy Sheehan been passing her time lately, Fred?
- Well, with gasoline at $26.99 a pint for regular she says she doesn’t do much driving any more. She used to go down to the local McDonald’s for an Egg McMuffin breakfast combo every morning, but not any more. However, McDonald’s now delivers a dozen each morning to her front door for free. She was recently the Guest of Honor at the opening of the tenth Crawford area Wal-Mart. The Walton family donated a home entertainment center for the living room of Ms. Sheehan’s new home.
Thanks, Fred. As all our viewers know, the federal government has been shut down for the past eleven years ever since Mr. Bush has refused to return to Washington to conduct the government’s business. All federal elections have been suspended, and the day-to-day management of the government has been in the hands of two retired elementary school teachers from Indianapolis. Remarkably enough, with no outside help at all, they retired the federal debt just last year using a magazine sale and loose change found in their purses. Speaker of the House Dennis Hastert was asked about this development yesterday outside his D.C. suburban home.
- Look the NHL took a year off. We can take eleven. It’s the same thing. And as for those two teachers in Indianapolis, I could have done the same thing if the Democrats hadn’t gotten in my way. I think they’re on steroids anyway.
Since the Senate has been on hiatus all that time, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist returned to his private medical practice and is now credited with finding the cure for all forms of cancer at his stem cell research plantation located just outside Nashville. This discovery won him the Nobel Prizes for both Peace and Medicine two years ago, the first time one person has won two of these awards in the same year. We caught up with Dr. Frist last week in Paris.
- That (bleeping) woman shut down the whole (bleeping) government, and I’m (bleeping) happy she did it to tell you the (bleeping) truth. I was never comfortable in that (bleeping) job, anyway.
This is just in. The Iraqi General Assembly has torn up and shredded the 636th draft of the new Iraqi constitution. Alizar Crankshaft, head of the General Assembly was interviewed on his way to the George W. Bush airport outside Baghdad.
- I not discouraged. We try again next week. We were close. You must excuse me now. I have to catch plane. I make appearance tomorrow on “Oprah.” Then I play in pro-am golf tournament with Tiger.
The Iraq War continues despite the fact that no one has fired a shot during the past two years. Oddly enough, the American military ran out of ammunition on the same day that al-Qaeda claimed that their suicide bomber pool had gone to zero.
Fred, I understand Ms. Sheehan has joined you.
- She has, Bob. Good evening, Ms. Sheehan. This has been quite a day, hasn’t it?
- It has.
- Is there anything you’d like to say to America?
- Is that America?
- Right there in that lens.
- My, it’s smaller than I remember. But I suppose things change after awhile. All the cards and e-mails have been so uplifting. And I’m still hoping that one day Mr. Bush will come walking down that driveway and talk to me.
- If he does, will you be going home?
- No, I don’t think so. I think of this as home now.
That’s going to wrap it up, Fred. I don’t blame Ms. Sheehan for not wanting to leave. A whole new Crawford has grown up around her. Indeed, a whole new world. She has become probably the fourth most famous woman in the world after Queen Elizabeth, Madonna, and J.K. Rowling. But none of those women brought the American government to a screeching halt. Has her vigil been worth it? That remains to be seen. Until then, this is Nightline from somewhere outside downtown Crawford. Good night. Fred.
- Good night, Bob.
And goodnight, America.
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As transcribed on the Veterans for Peace site (http://www.veteransforpeace.org/convention05/sheehan_transcript.htm ), the following is what Cindy Sheehan would like to say to the President at a second meeting (excerpt from the middle of the speech):
But I don't care, I'm goin'. And I'm gonna tell them, "You get that evil maniac out here, cuz a Gold Star Mother, somebody who's blood is on his hands, has some questions for him."
And I'm gonna say, "OK, listen here, George. #1, you quit, and I demand, every time you get out there and say you're going to continue the killing in Iraq to honor the fallen heroes by continuing the mission; you say, except Casey Sheehan.'"
"And you say except for all the members of Goldstar Families for Peace' cuz we think not one drop of blood should be spilled in our families' names. You quit doing that. You don't have my permission."
And I'm gonna say, "And you tell me, what the noble cause is that my son died for." And if he even starts to say freedom and democracy' I'm gonna say, bull----.
You tell me the truth. You tell me that my son died for oil. You tell me that my son died to make your friends rich. You tell me my son died to spread the cancer of Pax Americana, imperialism in the Middle East. You tell me that, you don't tell me my son died for freedom and democracy.'
Cuz, we're not freer. You're taking away our freedoms. The Iraqi people aren't freer, they're much worse off than before you meddled in their country.
You get America out of Iraq, you get Israel out of Palestine (massive round of applause)/
And if you think I won't say bull---- to the President, I say move on, cuz I'll say what's on my mind.
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Cindy is a gold star mother who has the complete right to say anything she wants in the press or anywhere else. As the father of a daughter in the Army National Guard, I cannot imagine the pain of losing a son or daughter in any manner. Cindy Sheehan has already met with the President once, and many other gold star mothers and fathers have not yet had one chance to meet personally with the President.
There are two sides of any issue - especially a war. The truth is probably somewhere between the stories of lies and deceptions as you state above - and the stories of purple fingers of Iraqi voters as they hope for a better future. Both sides are using facts and spin in an attempt to sway public opinion to their view of the war, the President and the future course for our country.
Cindy Sheehan is in pain from losing a son. From what she has written above, I do not see anything that can be resolved by another meeting with the President. I read a few years ago of a father who lost a son in Somalia that had a chance to meet with President Clinton; that father also spoke in anger to President Clinton in his grief. Other gold star parents who have lost sons and daughters should have a chance to meet the President once before Cindy meets the President again.
Bob Venable
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Mr. Whiteman,
Thank you for standing up and publicly supporting Ms. Sheehan.
The motivation soldiers have for joining is generally not as altruistic as military veterans would have us believe, although there certainly are some, such as Pat Tillman, who genuinely believe in what they are doing. Most of them are young poor kids who want to gain an education and the economic benefits that they don't believe they can achieve through other means.
All they ask of the politicians who direct their actions is that they do not unnecessarily put them in harm's way.
If our system was so superior, why do we have to kill anyone who chooses not to participate in it? Wouldn't that occur naturally?
My son was 20 and a senior at UCLA when he asked me my thoughts. This was prior to the clarification that there were no weapons of mass destruction, when Nancy Pelosi of San Francisco was the only member of Congress that had the guts to vote against it. I told him that our country was run by oil executives and that Iraq was the second largest oil reserve in the world. I asked him if he felt comfortable picking up a gun and killing a stranger, knowing full well that these oil executives could care less about the much worse regimes that exist in many parts of Africa and elsewhere in the world.
Is my son less heroic because he correctly understood the motives of the thieves of Halliburton and Enron and chose not to participate and indeed stand up and speak out against Bush's refocusing away from his former business partners at the Carlyle Group, the bin Laden family, and toward a country that had not attacked any Americans, and posed virtually no threat. Is he less heroic than those kids who joined without questioning or seeking understanding of the motives of the political leaders before they picked up their weapons and began killing our "enemies?" Courage is to be found in seeking the truth, understanding it, and acting on it.
The young men and women who joined trusted that our leaders wouldn't lie to them. Well, let's see. WOMD was a lie. Al Qaeda presence was a lie (and Richard Clarke was fired for telling Dubya the truth about that). What's left? Advancing the cause of "democracy" and labeling anyone in Iraq who doesn't want our form of government as an "insurgent" and then killing them.
Saddam is gone, but the violence rages on. Will it continue until we have finished our genocide of the Sunnis?
Our country is run by killers and thieves who are supported by religious hypocrites, people who can morally justify invading a country, Hitler-like, kill those who oppose us and steal their oil, and then show up into a church which purportedly believes that "thou shalt not kill," and "thou shalt not steal."
We could have frozen the assets of the Saudis who brought down the buildings in NYC had our leaders not been business partners with the bin Laden family and twisted the legal process to avoid illuminating the world with the details of the money trail that paid for al Qaeda. The law firm that was hired by the Saudis to defeat the lawsuit filed by the families of the 911 victims was none other than James Baker's law firm.
I also read an article in your publication by a Joshua Project that attempts to run the tired, old right-wing game of dismissing the pain felt by Cindy Sheehan by claiming that she harbors left-wing political ideologies.
Joshua has no human compassion, and a complete lack of humanity by his weak attempt to represent that the fact that Cindy Sheehan's views do not comport to his mindless, right-wing, pseudo-religious support of the lies which are the true basis for the war, that her pain in losing her son is not real. The only way Joshua will ever understand real pain is when one of his children is killed. Until that occurs, he has no standing to attempt to dismiss her very real pain, as he continues to suck up to the oilmen who are ruining our lives and stealing our wealth and our relationships with everyone in the world except for the British.
At some point, people have to have the guts to stand up. Thanks for doing just that.
Robert Schutz
rschutz7@sbcglobal.net
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I first became aware of Mr. Whiteman close to the beginning of the Iraq war when one of his articles appeared on Google News among commentaries of Washington Post, New York Times et al - someone at Google liked it evidently liked his writing and so do I.
Please continue to support Mr. Whiteman's commentaries. They are reaching a national audience.
I am in Seattle and like me, many people across the country read them.
Silvia Germek
mail@sgermek.com