Nancy

Documentation. Witnesses. Facts. Truth. That's what they're afraid of.

Sunday, January 29, 2017

Protested Out (Thoughts on the Battery Park Protest)

Whew. I really don't know how all those protesters on Soros's payroll do this, day in and day out!

This was another anti-Muslim-ban protest, and it drew over 10,000 to Battery Park City.

I tried to livestream it, and did what I could, but the reception in Lower Manhattan wasn't great today.

There were a number of distinguished speakers, including (from memory):

  • Senator Chuck Schumer
  • Senator Cory Booker
  • Representative Nydia Velazquez
  • Mayor Bill DeBlasio
  • New York City Comptroller Scott Stringer

I arrived about half an hour after it started, and it continued for another hour and a half. Some of the speeches were especially stirring; I don't remember the names of a few of the best, but the crowd was very energetic (and had some great signs! - I have to remember to take some stills even when I'm streaming). The police didn't give us any trouble and were pretty helpful.

After the protest was over, thousands of people marched up Broadway to Foley Square, chanting and waving signs and flags. I had to part ways with the group to attend an event held in memory of Elie Wiesel. The Museum of Jewish Heritage and the Folksbiene Yiddish theater group had organized a marathon reading of Wiesel's Holocaust memoir, Night. A number of notable personalities took turns reading passages from the book; among the ones I saw were Dr. Ruth Westheimer (pictured below), Ann Curry, Geraldo Rivera, and Abe Foxman. Some read in English, others in Yiddish. It was very powerful. They did three read-throughs during the course of the day. I was hoping to stay for two, but I just didn't have it in me.



Dr. Ruth Westheimer reading an excerpt from Night
A friend of mine was one of the organizers, and I'm pretty sure he told me about this several months ago, so I don't think they knew when they conceived of this that we would have a White House that would refuse to acknowledge the unique victimization of Jews in the Holocaust.
Yeah, that's where we are. Trump and Bannon and company are full of awful surprises, and they just keep on coming. We have hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of people protesting all over the country and beyond every day. Is this accomplishing something? I think it is, but are we going to have to do this for four years? There are going to be so many things to protest -- immigration, racism, civil rights, the Supreme Court, health care, and on and on.


Protesters at LAX

As I said, I'm totally wiped from a few hours of protesting two days in a row and I'm going to have to take a break for a few days. I'm wondering how ragged this entire country is going to run itself if this is what it takes to keep America recognizable.
But if there's a better way, I haven't heard it. So we'll keep marching and protesting as long as we can.

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