On Saturday, March 20, a large and diverse group of dissenters gathered in Midtown Manhattan to protest not only the war in the Middle East, but also U.S. involvement in Haiti and Palestine.

“It was a good time,” said Joshua Coppings, president of SFP. “The weather held out, everything went smoothly.”

Although Mayor Michael Bloomberg estimated the crowd's size to be about 30,000, protest organizers say more than 100,000 people participated. The event was largely peaceful and without incident , resulting in a total of just four arrests for disorderly conduct.

The crowd convened in the early afternoon along West 42 nd Street, near 6 th Avenue and Bryant Park. The park served as a general meeting place for various groups and organizations, and after a brief and scattered rally the march commenced.

Protesters marched the few blocks along 42 nd Street, then turned south on Madison Avenue, which was closed to traffic and patrolled at every intersection by groups of about 20 or 30 police officers . At every cross street were loudspeakers, which broadcast political speeches and entertainment from a stage at Madison and East 24 th Street.

Marchers displayed signs, banners, buttons and T-shirts voicing intolerance with the Bush administration and demanding troops be brought home from overseas .

“We're saying bring the troops home now,” said Sabrina Keete, 24, of Lawrence, Kan. “It's clearly a war and an occupation the American people do not support.”

As the march approached East 23 rd Street, the crowd became congested and slowed almost to a halt. There was a good deal of chanting and percussion, with much of the activity centered around the East 24 th Street speaking platform.

Rep. Dennis J. Kucinich (D-Ohio), a favorite among young and optimistic Democrats, spoke to the crowd as the sun set. The presidential candidate talked about his ten-point plan for withdrawing U.S. troops from the Middle East and turning Iraq over to the U.N.

Another rally was scheduled for Madison Square Park, at Madison and East 23 rd Street, but the park was barricaded and closed to the public. The crowd proceeded west on 23 rd Street, then slowly back up 6 th Avenue toward their original meeting point at Bryant Park.

Besides the standard-issue protest signs, which read, “The world STILL says no to war,” protesters held a variety of other banners and signs overhead. Some of the more notable were:

• Bush lies, who dies?
• Elect a madman, you get madness
• Impeach that son of a Bush
• White House of mass deception
• Stop the 9/11 cover-up
• Love our troops, bring them home
• I'm 2 sexy for this war

In addition to the numerous police who lined the streets and parks, a number of helicopters patrolled overhead .

Some protesters were dissatisfied with the amount of police presence , and said the Police Department was deliberately trying to incite confusion.

“They're almost trying to create a panic, sending us down the wrong side streets, then turning us away at Madison,” said Joseph Kirk, 33, of Rochester. “Earlier they were harassing people for jaywalking.”

According to the New York Times, the demonstration was considerably smaller than last year's, which drew between 125,000 and 250,000 participants and resulted in multiple arrests.

Email: patricksawers@buffalo.com