US Anti War-War - Demonstrations against the war in Iraq across the US
NAME: US ANTIWAR 20070128Ix
TAPE: EF07/0108
IN_TIME: 10:04:19:05
DURATION: 00:02:53:03
SOURCES: AP TELEVISION/ABC
DATELINE: Various - 27 Jan 2007
RESTRICTIONS: see script
SHOTLIST:
AP Television News
Washington DC
1. Protestors on National Mall
2. Protestors
3. Close up protestor; tilt up to sign
4. SOUNDBITE (English) Melissa Nalevanko, sister of soldier killed in Iraq:
"I'm here to show what the human cost of war is. It's senseless, and it's time for everybody to come home, so no one else has to go through what me and my family have gone through."
5. Close up, effigy of US President, George W. Bush
6. Protestors marching toward US Capitol
7. Protestor playing guitar and singing
8. Protestors holding peace flags in front of US Capitol
9. Protestors marching
10. Wide of protestors marching past US Capitol
11. Wide of protestors marching
ABC (KTTV-TV) - No access North America/Internet
Los Angeles, California
12. Aerial of demonstration
ABC (ABC News One) - No access North America/Internet
Los Angeles, California
13. Protestors marching
14. Protestors carrying flag-draped coffins
15. Anti-war symbol; tilt down to protestors carrying anti-war signs
16. Wide of protestors marching
ABC (KWTV-TV) - No access North America/Internet
Oklahoma City, Oklahoma
17. Wide of protestors outside Oklahoma statehouse
18. Protestors; pan left to display of military boots (symbolising American war dead) on statehouse steps
19. Close up of military boots on statehouse steps
20. Medium of protestors outside statehouse
ABC (WABC-TV) - No access North America/Internet
Des Moines, Iowa
21. Wide of protestor holding peace sign
22. Various of protestors marching
STORYLINE:
Tens of thousands joined protests across America on Saturday in an anti-war demonstration linking military families and ordinary citizens in a spirited call for the United States to get out of Iraq.
Celebrities, a half-dozen lawmakers and protestors from distant states rallied in Washington DC, seizing an opportunity to press their cause with a Congress restive about the war and a country that has turned against the conflict.
"I'm here to show what the human cost of war is. It's senseless, and it's time for everybody to come home, so no one else has to go through what me and my family have gone through," said Melissa Nalevanko, the sister of soldier killed in Iraq.
The rally on the Mall unfolded peacefully, although about 300 protesters tried to rush the Capitol, running up the grassy lawn to the front of the building.
Police on motorcycles tried to stop them, scuffling with some and barricading entrances.
About 50 demonstrators blocked a street near the Capitol for about 30 minutes, but they were dispersed without arrests.
United for Peace and Justice, a coalition group sponsoring the protest, had hoped 100,000 would come.
They claimed even more afterward, but police, who no longer give official estimates, said privately the crowd was smaller than 100,000.
A small contingent of active-duty service members apparently attended the rally, wearing civilian clothes because military rules forbid them from protesting in uniform.
In the crowd, signs recalled the November elections that defeated the Republican congressional majority in part because of President Bush's Iraq policy.
Bush reaffirmed his commitment to his planned troop increase in a phone conversation on Saturday with the Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. The president, frequently out of town on protest days, was in Washington for the weekend.
Protests against the war were held in several other US cities on Saturday. In Los Angeles, several thousand people attended a rally outside the Democratic party's local offices, then marched to the Los Angeles federal building.
In Oklahoma City, a few hundred people took part in a protest outside the Oklahoma statehouse. Protestors lined up combat boots on the statehouse steps to symbolise US troops killed in Iraq.
In Des Moines, Iowa, hundreds more joined the anti-war rally. Most of the protestors voiced their disapproval of the Bush administration but some also criticised Democratic presidential candidate Senator Hillary Clinton, in Des Moines for a campaign event. There were calls for her to repudiate her vote to authorise the war four years ago.