There's been a lot of talk of burnout among the peace movement. No wonder, after six years of war. Now, there's a great idea. Instead of holding one big, massive, expensive to get to event in DC, hold a lot of regional ones-- 11, actually, spread across the USA.

The coordinated event is being orchestrated by United for Peace and Justice. The website is

www.oct27.org

I think it's a brilliant idea and I hope it will bode the future of protests and demonstrations.

It gets even better. Here in the Philly area, I'm involved in the planning for Bucks county. We intend to hold even more local rallies in the county seat and other major areas, then take trains to downtown philly-- Peace trains-- filled with demonstrators who have already begun demonstrating at and near the train stations close to where they live. Our own group will be starting a short march to the train station from in front of our local congressman, Patrick Murphy's office.

Then, we'll arrive downtown, man a block while we wait for communities from all around the region to march through parts of the city, towards Independence Hall, where we'll all meet.

Similar arrangements are being made in Boston, Chicago, Jonesborough, Los Angeles, New Orleans, New York, Orlando, Salt Lake City, San Francisco, Seattle...

Here's what the website has to say:

Momentum is building toward Saturday, October 27th -- from Orlando to Seattle, from New York to New Orleans. On that day, people from all walks of life will gather in 11 cities around the country in a national expression of the breadth and depth of antiwar sentiment in this nation. For many people, it will be their first step in transforming their antiwar feelings into antiwar action. Regional actions will enable much larger numbers of people to participate.

People everywhere want the war to end, but Washington has failed to take decisive action. With each passing month, the Iraq disaster claims the lives of nearly 100 service people and countless Iraqis as it drains 12 billion of our tax-dollars. Our communities are neglected and suffer the consequences.

On October 27th, the people will speak: We want this war to end, and we want it to end now! Click on the images to the left to find out about each regional demonstration, or learn more about national organizing.

Let's try to get together groups of OpEdNEws people in each of these areas to meet. If you want to attend one of these events, and want to meet other OpEdNews folks, add a comment below and coordinate with your fellows. Maybe you can also support OpEdNews, by printing out flyers I can supply you MS Word files to reproduce, so you can let marchers know about an alternative to the lamestream media and NPR, which, I've found, is where many peace marchers tend to get their news.

Frankly, I find the big demonstration in DC to be of decreasing effectiveness. This one promises to reach SOOO many more people, it could be a real winner.

 
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