Tuesday, Oct. 27, 2009

Peace activist Cindy Sheehan speaks in Brunswick County

SUPPLY, N.C. -- There was a whole lot of dislike Monday night at Brunswick Community College.

Support-the-troops demonstrators outside Odell Williamson Auditorium knew they disliked Cindy Sheehan who was there to speak, but some struggled to say specifically why. Sheehan, a peace activist who gained fame for camping outside former President George Bush's Texas ranch, disliked the demonstrators for wanting to stay at war in Iraq and Afghanistan, which they all didn't.

One time those outside tried to interact with a person who went inside.

"Hi, Linda," Jim Parsch of Carolina Shores yelled to Sheehan appearance organizer Linda Stanley as she walked into the auditorium. "My son and grandson have got your backside."

Unlike others outside, though, Parsch knew exactly why he didn't like Sheehan: She visited Cuba and met with Venezula President Hugo Chavez.

"If you don't support our country, you don't support our troops," he said.

Sheehan said she, too, tried to interact with those outside, inviting demonstration organizer Christy Judah to join her inside through the media, which Sheehan also said she didn't like.

Nearly 40 people, many carrying pro-military signs, turned out for the demonstration despite a drizzling rain. About 70 people, many of whom paid $12 each to hear Sheehan, spread sparsely around the 1,500-seat auditorium.

Retired U.S. Air Force Lt. Col. Bob Bowman was not on stage with Sheehan, as he was scheduled to be. He got sick during an appearance Saturday in Statesville and was still not feeling well enough to rejoin the five-city, North Carolina tour scheduled to conclude tonight in Raleigh.

Sheehan saved her special scorn for those she called the Robber Class, who she said benefit by the discord between groups such as those outside and inside the auditorium. She said they manipulate every aspect of American life, including politics and wars, to enrich only themselves.

Some outside, such as Sam and Karen Hendricksen of Supply, said they empathize with Sheehan for the loss of her son in Iraq in 2004.

They don't think she doesn't support the troops, including their two sons in the U.S. Air Force as did some of the other demonstrators. But they called her drive to dismantle the military-industrial complex silly and said she dishonors her son for speaking out the way she does.

"Everybody has a right to free speech because of our boys," Karen Hendircksen said.

As the Hendricksen's said of Sheehan, she said she sympathized with "the suffering and deprivation" American troops have gone through on battlefields.

"There is a false impression that the peace movement hates our troops," Sheehan said inside the auditorium.

But that's not it at all, she said. "I think the system doesn't support our troops."