I wrote this in the comments area of my grumpy post below, but it's long and explains things a little bit further, with the perfect amount of The Rambling Factor that you've come to expect from this site:

John (in the comments of my grumpy post) is right, of course: "it's sad that everyone [at the protests] gets lumped with the folks holding the most hideous [signs]," a sin of which I'm ostensibly guilty in this post.

The post grew out of an email I'd sent to Greg (comment #1 in the thread) about how much today's lunatic lefty fringe resembled the lunatic righty fringe of the Clinton era — shrilly latching on to any conspiracy theory out of zealotry that seemed medieval; "Clinton murdered Vince Foster!" and "Bush Was Behind 9/11!" are two sides of the same tinfoil hat. I used to make fun of the Gingrich crowd with the same fervor that I apply to a guy stepping out of a BMW with a "No War for Oil" sign he's bringing to a local protest. Apparently the Germans have found a way to make cars run on happy thoughts and warm feelings, which is a hell of an accomplishment when you think what most Germans are like.

But something about the signs imploring US troops to shoot their officers is genuinely evil to me, and tripped my circuit breaker. My dad once commanded the 1st Brigade of the 3rd Infantry Division, one of the front-line units currently in Iraq. If this war happened fifteen years ago, a lot of those marchers would be celebrating a disgruntled sergeant rolling a couple of frag grenades into my dad's tent. But the two people holding that sign were at the very least showing their true colors, displaying their true political philosophies — poisoned though I think they are.

I believe that most of the people at the rallies have a vague feeling that they should be against the war for some reasons of morality, but aren't clear what those reasons exactly are. I don't think they're attending the protests to be brainwashed by the organizers (the Workers' World Party, et. al.) into soldiers for anarcho-Communism (does such a thing exist? it should, it's a neat term). But there seems to be a clear level of misrepresentation, both by normal citizens attending these things ("Hey, there were a thousand people against the war there!") and by the organizers ("Hey, we've got a thousand new people fighting for Socialist overthrow!"). I guess that's what I was clumsily trying to address in this post, even though I ended up sounding like someone's great-grandfather shooing some skateboarding kids out of his driveway.

Something that is genuinely disturbing to me, though, is the amazing depth of visceral hatred that has been projected toward this President and his predecessor. I never bought into the Impeach Clinton movement, and I certainly don't abide the Impeach Bush jones that the protesters are raging on today. I used to think that was the predominant political attitude in the country. But Christ, there are so many people that can't hold a conversation about either of them without devolving into sputters of rage, like personal wrong has been visited upon them from 1600 Pennsylvania. Some might say that it's comeuppance to the Republicans for the way they treated Clinton, but I remember similar bile for Bush the 41st and Reagan. Only it seems louder and more vicious lately. And much more unreasonable.

But what do I know. I live on a rock off the coast of Maine.