Inspiration for Easy Mark

Like millions of Americans, since the inception of the U.S.-Iraq war, I am torn over it. I do not believe in war, especially not this one. I do believe that American soldiers risking their lives must be supported. I also believe that innocent Iraqis losing their lives and their homes must be defended. The sad thing is that it's now years into the war, and there doesn't seem to be an end in sight. Many of us seem to be hunkering down for more years to come, but clearly the struggles over this war will continue.


When I heard of a Pasadena couple who put up anti-war picket signs in their front yard, I was inspired by their brave action to support freedom of speech, and to speak out against the war. The disturbing thing is that the same couple was bullied and forced to remove those very signs. Neighbors disagreed over them, and it became a charged issue. The couple, with the help of the ACLU, sued the city of Pasadena for their right to express their political opinions. I'm unaware of the legal outcome. Despite that, their actions caused the neighborhood to split along the lines of patriotism and anti-war sentiments. This schism inspired me to explore issues of patriotism, freedom of speech, and war, and how they can polarize neighbors and communities.







Background Article:

A Small Protest Against Anti-War Elitists in Pasadena, California
By Wayne Lusvardi | Published 03/11/2007

A Small Protest Against Anti-War Elitists in Pasadena

Pasadena, California is known as a hot bed of anti-war sentiment.

For example, in 2003, the city council adopted an anti-war resolution. In another celebrated example, Senator John Kerry dropped his infamous anti-war faux paus in front of a receptive audience at Pasadena City College ("if you don't get an education, you get stuck in Iraq")

Pasadena is also remembered for an anti-war sermon delivered by Reverend George Regas at All Saints Episcopal Church, prior to national elections in 2004. That sermon led to an IRS complaint, which eventually made news all across America and the world.

The local newspaper, the Pasadena Star News, was the first to break the story, although the paper failed to disclose that it's editor attends All Saints church.

Moreover, the IRS complaint was not filed until a year after the sermon was delivered, and it was filed by an anonymous person who could have been a member of the All Saints congregation.

All Saints Church eventually hired a New York law firm to handle its legal defense against a simple IRS inquiry letter that involved no administrative law hearing, sanctions, or penalties at that time.

In the end, the church reaped an unknown windfall from this fund raising stunt. And the anti-war crowd received free advertising on a grand scale.

In September 2005, the local newspaper broke a story about Mary and Patrick Briggs, a local couple, who sued Pasadena over a sign ordinance, which prohibited displaying a 6-foot long, anti-war banner in a residential neighborhood.

The sign trumpeted the anti-war nonsense, "Bush lied, people died."

Again, Pasadena made national and international news because of its air-war fervor.

Eventually, Pasadena revised its sign ordinance to allow larger banners. The city also paid the Briggs' legal bills, which, in effect, subsidized their anti-war propaganda.

And once again, the local newspaper provided free advertising for an anti-war message that garnered national attention.

On February 21, 2007, the editor of the Pasadena Star News used his weekly editorial to promote a forum being held at Pasadena City College. The forum was billed as a discussion of "What Families Need to Know About Military Recruitment."

The same editor also ran a lengthy story about the upcoming forum in the Sunday edition of the paper's weekly magazine to persuade low income youth not to join the military. It also encouraged those same youth to withhold their support for the Iraq war.

Unfortunately, the newspaper failed to fully disclose that the forum organizer was a former staff member of the Pasadena Star News, who was apparently working in consort with the editor.

Taking advantage of Pasadena's liberalized sign ordinance, the local Throop Memorial Unitarian Church erected a sign on its downtown property reading "No More Troops," an obvious reference to President Bush's "surge" in the Iraq theater of the war on terror.

Not to be outdone, a creative wag turned the tables by pasting an "H" on that sign, so that it now reads "No More Throops!"

For some strange reason, that clever rejoinder has not received the national attention and hoopla visited upon the editorially "staged" anti-war stunts mentioned earlier.

It did, however, earn a spot in the Letters to Editor section of the Pasadena Star News, on March 7, 2007

That letter reads as follows:

Dear Editor:

As a former Pasadenan, I was in town last week for a doctor's visit and happened to be driving by the Throop Memorial Unitarian Universalist Church on Del Mar and Los Robles avenues.

The church has erected an anti-war sign on the corner which reads: "No More Troops!" - promoting opposition to the Iraq War "surge." In a play on words, someone had added a letter "H" on the sign so that it sarcastically read: "No More Throops!"

I'm sure I was not the only person who witnessed this, as that is a very busy intersection especially around 5p.m. I checked and saw nothing about this in the online newspaper.

I must have been, as the Roman historian Tacitus once wrote, "an eye-witness to what never happened." I guess only anti-war signs, not anti-antiwar signs, are newsworthy in Pasadena.

Sean Christopher, La Quinta

Exactly!