A couple of questions for you

[WilliamPitt]

I've been reading a lot of criticism here of Cindy Sheehan, and of ANSWER. I'm wondering how many of you have met Cindy, talked with her, worked with her, watched her deal with 200 reporters asking questions about every topic imaginable, can actually call her a friend? Could she even pick you out of a lineup? Were you in Texas with her, in the heat and the rain with the shotguns going off?

I'm wondering how many of you have gotten 300,000 - 500,000 people to show up in one place at the same time, how many of you have managed the ridiculous process of coalition-building between two dozen Left-wing groups that all think their issue is the ultimate issue, how many of you have done the work to make them all happy so they all advertise for your march and get it of the ground, how many of you have dealt with a permitting process in DC that wends its way through have a dozen police agencies and bureaucracies.

I don't like ANSWERs politics, personally, and I do wish the focus at their rallies was more...well...focused. But I also know you don't get a half million people into one city to protest without making alliances with everyone under the sun. I know you don't make those alliances without letting those groups rock the mike for a bit.

I can't begin to imaging why some here have decided to take issue with Cindy Sheehan and her activism and some so-called "insensitive" remarks. But I have a challenge for you. Become a top-tier activist pretty much overnight and with no experience to help you along. Figure out a series of actions that bring attention to your cause in ways that have not happened in years. Deal with the threats, the attacks, the travelling, the logistics, the sleeping on cots and on the floor. Do all that while giving a dozen interviews a day because the press asks for them, and never once make a slip of the tongue or say the wrong thing. Oh, yeah, and bury your child.

How many of you have organized a protest?

Worked for an activist organization beyond the volunteer level?

Done significant coalition-building?

Been required to deal regularly with the press, and have your words reported in newspapers and on radio/TV?

Been arrested for your beliefs?

How many of you are really in the business?

My friend Cindy Sheehan has done more in the last several weeks to get Bush out and hold him accountable than everyone on DU combined and multiplied by ten. ANSWER threw together the largest street protest in recent memory.

There's a lot of sideline-yapping and couch-potato quarterbacking going on here. That's fine. That's what happens here. But I hope a few of you who are doing it will someday have the sense to be embarrassed by yourselves. Opinions are like that little hole the poop comes out of. Cindy works where the rubber meets the road, as does ANSWER. Pity more of you don't know where that place is. You might talk less, and do more.

/rant