Confessions of a rookie protestor

Which reason was it to drive cross-country to protest the visit of Bush to Ottawa? It hardly matters—there are many good enough reasons to go around

by Andrew Gordon Fleming

One needs a very good reason to make the drive from Vancouver to Ottawa in the early days of winter. Like most rational people, I'd spent much of the month of November slowly coming to terms with the harsh reality that the majority of our neighbours to the south who bothered to get off the couch to vote had chosen the unsteady stewardship of George W Bush for one thousand, four hundred and sixty more days, absence of a paper trail to prove this notwithstanding. Having impeached the last guy for lying about his sex life, they had indeed re-elected one who lied about the necessity for a seemingly endless war. But while the choice between a war hero and a war criminal seemed a glaringly obvious one, the people had spoken and it is necessary to accept the things we cannot change. Life does go on, after all.

But the news that Dubya had been invited to our nation's capital to address Parliament was simply too much for this civic-minded sort to bear. The prospect of this man coming to town to inform us of the pressing need to waste billions of dollars attempting to weaponize Outer Space and send our ill-equipped troops to be cannon fodder in Iraq or to lecture us about the errors of our same-sex marrying, health care providing, pot puffing, right to choose choosing and/or French speaking ways - the general tolerance of the true north strong and free - was, in a word, intolerable. Something had to be done.

While there is no small amount of irony in traveling several thousand kilometres by car to protest an administration in the pocket of Big Oil (leaving aside that one of those days of hard driving fell on November 26, official Buy Nothing Day), there were at least other reasons for the trip as well and hopefully the end would justify the means of transportation. Of course, midway through Manitoba, I was to learn the self-described “war president” apparently wasn't up to the possibility of being heckled or booed by Members of Parliament, despite assurances given by Prime Minister Martin that all parties had promised to be on their very best behaviour for his belated state visit, no doubt hoping this muzzling of free speech might persuade Mr Bush that it might be time to start buying dead cows from us again. Bush's recent chilly reception in Chile and perhaps his controversial questioning the previous year by Australian Green Party MPs regarding the unknown status of two of their fellow citizens held in the limbo of Guantanamo Bay had coloured his decision. In any case, the meeting in the capital would be a private affair; the president's handlers having decided it would be more prudent to instead praise Haligonians for their basic human decency of three years ago in sheltering stranded passengers when American air space was closed on 9/11. But it was too late to turn around now.

As the kilometres clicked by, I had ample opportunity to question my motivations for self-mobilization. I'd long considered protesting to only be of any real value if something concrete is accomplished such as, say, shielding baby seals from the vicious blows of impoverished Newfoundlanders, playing tenacious defence on behalf of endangered whales or blocking logging trucks from slaying old growth giants. Realistically, gathering en masse to protest the bloodthirsty policies of the Bush League would have made a lot more sense had the man decided to grace us with his presence a month or so earlier and before American voters had cast their ballots. At least then they might've caught wind of what many notoriously polite Canadians think of their commander-in-chief. Certainly the man himself couldn't care less about what we think. He now has his “mandate” and his four more years but perhaps our own politicians would be forced to take some notice of the opinions of their electorate if they hoped to keep their primo positions at the trough. This would have to be reason enough.

Bush has often claimed certainty that he and God play on the same team but you wouldn't have guessed this from the atypically warm and sunny weather that greeted protestors on the big day. Many of us gathered along the roadside from the airport to offer the guest of honour (as he would later jokingly acknowledge) Trudeau's Salmon Arm Salute as the presidential motorcade made its way downtown before we made our way to nearby Confederation Park, named in honour of the unification of Canada's provinces, for the official beginning at noon. The president often touts himself as a uniter and not a divider. In this he is correct as the crowd (estimated at anywhere between five and ten thousand) encompassed people from all walks of life - young and old, brown and white, informed and uninformed, casually-dressed and costumed, anglo and franco and miscellaneous - united in their opposition to this unpresidential president and his policies of mass destruction. Some were there to sing and dance, others to yell and scream, many to see and be seen while still more were there out of simple curiosity or to seize the opportunity to throw rocks at police (likely none of whom did anything to help Bush 43 regain his throne.)

There seems to be as many reasons to object to the Bush regime as there were protestors. This abundance of axes to grind is frequently used in the mainstream media to disparage Bush's detractors, as if because we can't all agree on the very best reason to object to the current most powerful man on the planet, our various complaints are somehow less valid. Be it lack of accountability, corporate corruption, hosting a Cuban concentration camp, ditching Kyoto and the UN, eroding abortion access or demonizing gays, the list goes on and on and in this Fox News and their ilk are correct. The list is too long. For me, my biggest beefs with Ottawa spending $3 million of taxpayers' dollars hosting this visit are, not only is a Canadian company supplying the bulk of bullets murdering Iraqis (Montreal-based SNC-Lavalin, as Naomi Klein reminded the crowd in a fiery speech), but by wining and dining this Texan tyrant, we Canadians are de facto complicit in the deaths of thousands of innocent civilians. Just saying No to Bush was the very least I could do and may help me be able to someday look my grandkids in the eyes and say: “We tried.”

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