What a doofus.
Mar 19, 2007 4:58 pm US/Mountain
Protesters Turn Out In Salt Lake CitySALT LAKE CITY Mayor Rocky Anderson called for President Bush’s removal by impeachment Monday as anti-war protesters rallied at City Hall on the fourth anniversary of the invasion of Iraq.
Speaking to a crowd of hundreds, Anderson delivered a litany of accusations. He said Bush lied about the reasons for invading Iraq and authorized a global campaign to detain and torture foreign nationals suspected of having ties to Al-Qaeda terrorists in defiance of domestic and international law.
“I do not say this lightly, but the record is plain: President Bush is a war criminal,” Anderson, a Democrat in heavily Republican Utah, said in another stinging denunciation of the Republican president. “He must be held accountable.”
It was not the first criticism from Anderson, who was on the impeachment-speech circuit as recently as Saturday in Washington, D.C., and has testified at the Washington state Capitol.
Anderson “has been called everything from an embarrassment to a nut case,” said the Rev. Erin Gilmore of the Holladay United Church of Christ, who gave the mayor her full support.
Anderson’s outspoken views have polarized Utah, where many feel his inflamed rhetoric is doing the state a dishonor.
“He should respect the rank of presidency,” said retired Army Sgt.-Maj. Steven Hixon, who was in full uniform as the only visible counter-protester Monday.
“It’s like a flashback to the 1970s,” said Hixon, an ROTC instructor at the University of Utah, who served in Cambodia, Beirut and El Salvador during a 30-year Army career.
“A soldier in a foxhole in Iraq, when he sees this on CNN on his Blackberry, it has to be disheartening,” Hixon said. “Our leaders are doing the best they can. I think it’s winnable. We’ve just got to buckle down and do it.”
Other anti-war demonstrations were staged across the country Monday as Bush pleaded for patience, saying the U.S. can control Iraq but that it will take months longer. The Utah rally was not as large as an event in August that drew thousands to City Hall during an American Legion convention.
Bush’s secretary of state, Condoleezza Rice, defended the decision to go to war in Iraq but acknowledged an initial failure to send enough troops to handle the civil unrest after the overthrow of Saddam Hussein.
Anderson said Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney have squandered the country’s credibility.
“We are sadly becoming like those tyrannical human rights-violating nations which we have always tried to distinguish ourselves from,” the mayor said.
A few hours earlier, a funeral Mass was held for U.S. Army Spc. Brandon Parr at the Cathedral of the Madeleine in Salt Lake City. He was killed March 3 in Baghdad.
http://kutv.com/topstories/local_story_078190248.html
