The Museum

Here are some pictures from the United for Peace and Justice protest that 2.0 and I went to on August 30, 2004, instead of packing our apartment to move. We joined up at Union Square at noon, and made our way along 17th Street to 7th Ave, where we marched up to Madison Square Garden. The walk usually takes a half-hour, we made it in four and a half. There were people everywhere, of all walks of life, and it was a whole mess of fun. Hopefully it will do some good.

Here are some of my favorite signs and sights from the march.

A seven-year old girl was carrying this inflatable Dumb-ass doll. He has a Pinocchio nose you can only kind of make out.

Pasted on someone's back, this was one pretty popular. That expression seems to imply that a dingo-dog is chomping Dumb-ass nuts. Since I don't recall that occurring (it would easily unseat his getting taken out by a pretzel as the funniest thing to ever happen), I'm assuming this was Photoshopped. Man, Photoshop is a Godsend.

The Abu Ghraib scandal, as you can imagine, was a common theme of the protest. There were some dudes, once we got to 7th Ave, with a fifteen-foot canvas painting of this picture that was quite impressive.

I think this may have been my favorite sign.

These, I guess, are the Greene Dragons. I don't know anything about their organization, but I think theirs was the float that some anarchistics burned at the protest, giving, as Fox 5 reported, one policeman first-degree burns to his hand. As 2.0 said, "That's a sunburn. He got a sunburn on his hand." Anyway, these guys were dressed in colonial garb and playing on penny whistles and snare drums. They had lyric sheets to their songs, which I thought was hilarious.

Here they are again. Oh, in background you can see a lady with a sign that says "Here's a bag, start packing." We joined the protest at Union Square, and kept running into this woman over and over again. Perhaps she was our guardian angel at the protest? Right around here, we met a very nice woman from Houston.

Lady: "Hi. Where are you two from?"
Me: "Queens. Well, about to be Brooklyn, but Queens right now. And you?"
Lady: "Houston."
Me: "Wow! Thank you for coming!"
Lady: "Everyone keeps saying that. We owe a real debt to the rest of the country. I figured this was the least I could do."

That sign is actually sponsored by A Perfect Circle, Maynard from Tool's other band. I have the Thirteenth Step - it's pretty good, but only the tenth song, Boogeyman, really rocks. Although, by really rocks, I mean it *really* fucking rocks. You can check out the sign here.

This is about the part of the march where 2.0 and I unwittingly joined the Communist Youth Brigade. Why I take things from people - in this case, a flag - is beyond me. To the Communist Youth Brigade of NYC: I have no doubt that you are in fact the baddest motherfuckers in the protest, and I would probably enjoy rolling with you, as you offered so kindly, but that one girl, while energetic, also scared me, and I will focus on the massive redistribution of wealth after we at least get Bush out of the White House. I'm sorry that I took your flag and then gave it back, and that 2.0 and I ran about forty yards upstream in the March to get away from you. You are excellent marchers, I'm sorry that I failed you. But you're really kind of scary.

I dunno, I've been awake and pissed since November 4, 2000, assholes still haven't fallen.

The artwork on this one was really good, I thought.

For non-NYCers, the subways all around here have anti-terror signs that say If You See Something, Say Something. Sorry this is so blurry - her points are probably good.

Me, I've always wondered what exactly it is that you're supposed to register as 'something' on a subway. 2.0 was riding the F-train at two in the morning once when some magician made a bird appear. Now that's something. Should she have called Tom Ridge?

See, there's our bag lady again, to Bart's left. The other side of her sign said 'Hair-dressers against Bush.' I have no idea. Oh, the back of Bart had Comic-book Guy saying, 'Worst President Ever.' That's good stuff.

This was an inflatable Bush doll that we were allowed to stick with pins. I have no idea what 'Osama Marries Bush Twins' means. But I stuck the fucker twice.

Right up there with Yee-ha is not a foreign policy.

This old dame was the belle of the ball.

Another marching band. These guys were pretty good. 2.0 thinks I should pick the trombone back up and join a protest marching band.

Note that those quotes are exactly six months apart. Fucking fuck squirrel, this guy sucks.

Lady Liberty on stilts, talking to a lion who was tied to a lamb. I'm not sure exactly what the lion and lamb were - they had the Bible quote and the lion shall lay with the lamb, and I can't believe I'm blanking on what the context of that was, but I am. Anyway, those guys a) must've been sweating their balls off in those costumes, and b) were a little too close to being furries for me. Furries freak me the hell out. As for Lady Liberty, I tried walking on, like, three-inch stiltes once back in elementary school. Couldn't do it. Protesting in 90-degree heat on stilts with a few hundred thousand people? God, that's skill.

We saw this great sign as we were finally joining the main march on 7th Ave. Took us an hour to go about two blocks.

We saw a few counter-protestors along the way. One guy had a sign that said, 'Bush loves God. Pray for NYC.' Another's sign said, 'Peace has always had a price,' and then had a picture of a bunch of guns, tanks, and planes. It took me a while to realize either of them were pro-Bush signs. My thought on the first one was, 'Bush loves God, but has the IQ of a dungbeetle, and therefore has started a Holy War, therefore pray for NYC 'cause the mofo's gonna get us bombed.' The second never made any sense to me. I guess I'm supposed to go buy a gun. Really, the only reason I knew it was pro-Bush was because the guy was literally thumping a Bible at me and told us that we don't know the first thing about peace. I told him Jesus was a long-haired hippie, and probably a Communist. I didn't make a friend there.

Anything, the moral is that a good protest sign leaves no room for interpretation. This sign right here leaves me no room for doubt as to which signs of the Cheney-fucking-himself issue this lady is on. That makes it a good sign.

Again, a very good protest sign. The simulated needle-point is a nice touch.

Jan will hate to read this, but I really like the word 'whore.' I dunno, it amuses me. My favorite Blink-182 song is Dysentary Gary, which ends, 'Fuck this place, I lost the war, I hate you all, your mom's a whore.' That has nothing to do with the protest, sorry.

The sign in the middle says 'Apologize and go away,' in case that's hard to read. There's a little one there that's kind of blurry that says 'Bush is an evil fucking liar.'

Some of the many protestors carrying cardboard coffins draped in flags.

2.0 likes the way this one came out, with the flag cap all in focus. I was, of course, trying to take a picture of the sign. Hey, accidental art. What can I say?

There were some glams out protesting. They looked like a fun bunch. At the time, we were marching behind a lady minister. She seemed really cool. The sign with the blue boa thing around it says 'Stolen elections are SO 2000.' The other side said, 'The Patriot Act is SO 1984.' Oh, one of the best signs I didn't actually see but was reported in the newspaper: 'Bush/Orwell 2004.' Good times.

I'm really mad this one didn't come out better. Last Halloween, Tree and Mike showed up at the party both dressed as the Dude. How fucking random is that? I, of course, had not yet seen the Big Lebowski. 2.0 and I rented it a few months ago - man, what a great movie.

I apologize to this lady for posting a picture in which she's making a face, but anyone handing out balloon hats to peaceful protestors is a hero in my book.

We're outside of MSG right now. You can see the smug bastards in the background - I don't know what the fuck they were doing out there. I guess looking at all the deluded masses, or whatever their beady little brains conceive us as. At one point, they started chanting U-S-A! at the protestors. So the protestors chanted U-S-A! right back at them, utterly confusing and eventually dispersing the Republicans. Ah, Republicans. If they weren't so goddamned evil, they'd almost be cute in their cluelessness.

That's the other side of the 'Call me crazy sign,' pictured above. Unfortunately, the bottom line, 'Our pain is not a photo op!' got cut off. The giant flyswatter is courtesy Smush Bush.

This massive sign is a mere block away from the convention site. Good times, great oldies.

This massive sign was not popular. It's kitty-corner from MSG. Because I guess Fox News needs to remind the Republicans that they're out there? I don't get it.

I loved this thing.

And my Bud-drinking days are over! As if I needed another reason to drink Miller High Life. Nice job, assholes.

Across the street from the bastards' playpen. Tear 'em a new one, Jon.