The protesters, who included students from Swarthmore College and
Drexel University, beat drums, waved cardboard-cutout skulls, and kept
up the chants - "Bush and Cheney have got to go" and "We won't fight
for Texaco."

Many said it was their first participation in public protest.

The group represented all ages, from Penn freshman Melissa Rassas, 18,
to graduate students in their 40s, and Agnes Burke, a South
Philadelphian who is 90.

Burke, who has seen many wars, said she viewed a potential attack on
Iraq as "very foolish, except for the rich, who would be making money
off it."

She said the United States should not act independently or bypass the
United Nations.

The protest slogans students held aloft included "The U.S. needs a
regime change," "End the cycle of violence now," and "Wage peace. It
takes courage and creativity."

Deirdre Burke, business manager at the White Dog Cafe, said she
participated because she thought that "there is no legitimate reason
for the United States to go to war" and said it was just a way for
President Bush to distract Americans from what she called his "lack of
policies to address domestic issues."

"This guy is despicable," said Penn doctoral candidate Tonya Taylor,
35, referring to Cheney and his links to Enron and other business
controversies.

From The Philadelphia Inquirer, 10/26/02:
http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/news/local/4371649.htm

As Cheney visits Penn, students call for peace with Iraq

The vice president was a guest at a building dedication.

More than 400 students marched, chanted and blocked traffic.

By James M. O'Neill
Inquirer Staff Writer

By JONATHAN WILSON / Inquirer

Alex Brodsky, right, makes his anti-war chants heard along with about
400 other protesters.

Penn students, as well as those from other nearby schools, targeted
their protests to a short visit by Vice President Dick Cheney Friday
morning.

About 400 University of Pennsylvania students used a visit by Vice
President Cheney yesterday as the spark to protest possible war with
Iraq.

The students chanted, "We don't want your oil war!" as they blocked
rush-hour traffic from about 8:30 to 9:30 a.m. along Walnut Street
outside the new Wharton academic building Cheney was visiting.

___________________________________________________

Power to the people!

Harry

As a student in the 1960s during the Vietnam War, Cheney received four
student deferments from the military draft.

What is intriguing about this utterly uncharismatic, efficient,
hawkish Vice President is the fact that he never served in the
armed forces.

He says that he was generally supportive of the Vietnam war and
opposed to the demonstrators.

But his hawkishness didn't lead him to volunteer; instead he accepted
student deferments which allowed him to avoid military service.

All Cheney will say is, "As did most other Americans, I watched the
war from afar."

There remains something odd about this hard-line Cold Warrior's
evasion of what would seem to be his patriotic duty.