Hawking to lead anti-war protest on election day

[JoFerret]

http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/politics/story.jsp?story=577860


Stephen Hawking, Britain's most eminent scientist, has become the latest prominent opponent of the Iraq war by agreeing to take the lead role in a ceremonial protest to coincide with the United States presidential election.

Peace protesters will gather in Trafalgar Square at 5pm on Tuesday, where they will read out the names of 5,000 Iraqi men, women and children known to have died in the conflict.

The full death toll was put last week as high as 100,000.

Playwrights Harold Pinter and David Hare, actress Juliet Stevenson, the Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone, and relatives of British soldiers killed in action in Iraq have all agreed to take part.

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[lebkuchen]

1. Good thing he's doing it in Europe

How many in the U.S. even know who he is~? Half the population, at least.

[ikojo]

3. You are giving Americans far too much credit....

I say that if I took a poll at work I would find less than 10% would know who Stephen Hawking is.

I quizzed a supervisor on who was running for pres and she thought * and Kerry were running on the same ticket! She couldn't name the VP or secretary of state let alone the national security advisor.

However, I'll bet she knew who won American Idol in the last season.

[Ilsa]

4. Oh gawd. It's like you are living your own mini-version of "Jay-walk".

It's bad enough that some young college students I know didn't know which was Democratic vs Republican, but this person thinks they are on the same ticket? I wish some people would consider disenfranchising themselves.

[JoFerret]

5. We - collectively that is - get the president we deserve

And Hawking and Bush....what a contrast.

Give Bush a Brain at:
http://www.imgag.com/product/full/ap/3067907/graphic1.swf

[Carolab]

18. This is why I think

every voter, to be eligible, must attend public community courses that explain, without bias, and without spin, exactly who the candidates are and where they stand. No one should be registered without a certificate that proves they attended. It might even be required that they pass an exam.

[Bo]

6. lololololololol maybe 3%

[Hand]

7. Definitely!

If he did that here, Repuke brownshirts would dump him out of his wheelchair and beat him senseless.

:grr:

[MADem]

10. He's a character on the SIMPSONS

...so his 'fan' base is a little eclectic!!

[LiberteToujours]

2. Brilliant!

I love that man. He's the Einstein of our day. Einstein was smart enough to recognize a fascist for what it was and get out of Germany early, too. :)

[MADem]

11. Pity he wasn't smart enough to get away from his wife

She beats the shit out of him in his chair. She broke his wrist, left him out in the sun so that he got sunburnt, dehydrated, and almost had heat stroke, and he is bruised suspiciously all of the time. His nurses have a red book, that they hand off to one another when changing shifts, to document all of his "suspicious injuries." His daughter and ex-wife are frantic over it, but he refuses to allow social services in the house. The daughter has filed a complaint, finally. They think she'll kill him eventually.

[Julien Sorel]

8. I wonder how much pressure is building against Blair.

[JoFerret]

9. Great graphic

.

[Julien Sorel]

12. Thank you.

I always wonder how many people get the reference to the film, "Tora! Tora! Tora!"

[fujiyama]

13. Originally

I thought it was the poster for the film, until I looked closer.

It's pretty clever!

[lostnfound]

14. Thank you, Mr Hawking!

For fighting for peace, and just for being you.

[goforit]

15. It is just amazing the number of people wiped off this Earth for Bush!!!

[bvar22]

16. bush* is racking up quite a death toll.

I believe he has surpassed Hitler and Stalin when they were at this point in their killing careers.
If bush* gets four more years, maybe he can bring the mass murder record home to the USA.


Stop bush*
before he kills again!

[leQ]

17. did anybody catch the oxford union debate the other night on cspan?

did the motion pass?

they condemned the war in iraq, but i was getting nervous about the success of the defeat of the republicons' attempt to have an endorsement pass for the monkey-in-chief. fell asleep before they voted.

i sure love how the brits speak so eloquently, and without the rabbledabble mush that fox is famous for teaching our American mediawhores.

[prof_science]

19. I'm not trying to incite a riot here...

...but, I can only hope that the attendees of this event spend as much time and effort staging events that protest the actions of their own government. Of course, I don't mean to say that Blair's government trumps ours in terms of evil at this moment...

Having thought more about this, I guess it makes sense. It should underline the fact that our election day is an important day for Britain, as well as the rest of the world. Perhaps they wish to show that changes in leadership here should correspond with changes there...

anyway, too late to think clearly.