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January 12, 2005 Inauguration protest 'Activists' hope to stop sales for entire day By Jeremiah Horrigan Times Herald-Record jhorrigan@th-record.com Internet opponents of the administration and its war policies have come up with a novel way to protest next week's Inauguration Day festivities: nothing. No bothersome busing to D.C. No chilly rallies to attend. No speeches to listen to. Just lots of nothing that anybody can (not) do. They're calling the protest "Not One Damn Dime Day," a day in which they're urging people not to buy anything, or as their Web site puts it, "Not one damn dime for gasoline. Not one damn dime for necessities or impulse purchases. Not one damn dime for nothing for 24 hours." It's all about protesting what opponents see as an administration that fiddles – to the tune of a projected $40 million – while Iraq burns. In addition to targeting corporate entities like Wal-Mart and Kmart, the New England-based effort also suggests boycotting local convenience stores, gas stations or retail shops. Critics of the idea have dubbed it an example of "slacktivism," since it requires so little in the way of traditional physical-political effort. The idea struck Thomas Wanning of New Paltz, an active member of Moveon.org, as a good one. "I'm glad somebody's doing something," he said. "Consumer power is the only hope for popular power – otherwise we'll be forever under the dominion of the corporations." Don Wilen, the New Paltz town supervisor and a Democrat, said he agreed the $40 million in donations that has been targeted for the inauguration could be spent more usefully elsewhere. "That's bordering on the obscene, $40 million. I don't care if you're a Republican or Democrat. There's so much devastation in the world today, how can they justify that?" Ulster County Legislature Chairman Richard Gerentine, a Republican, said that while everyone had a right to protest as they saw fit, people shouldn't lose sight of the long view. "Right or wrong, the presidency, the title itself, should be honored," he said. "Nobody wants a war, but sometimes you have to demonstrate your supremacy." Jason West, the Green Party mayor of the Village of New Paltz, also talked about taking the long view of things political. "I'm less and less convinced of the usefulness of symbolic protest – social change is all about power and leverage," he said. In the case of the inaugural protest, "all Bush has to do is ignore it, then it's back to business as usual." West said he was more interested in building up the Green Party, taking a page from the conservative movement in the mid-1960s. "They were crushed by Johnson then, and what they did was take a look at what they needed to do for the next 50 years. That's why we have George W. Bush today." |
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