Wednesday demonstrations planned for 12 cities
By Sarah Foster. © 2000 WorldNetDaily.com
Americans who support the right of Elian Gonzalez to be stay in this country will have a chance to take that message to the public next week in a nationwide series of demonstrations that organizers hope will focus public attention on the boy's plight -- and what sending him back to Cuba will
actually mean for him.
"A grass roots, ad hoc coalition of private individuals," is how Scott Holleran, southern California coordinator for the rallies, described Americans to Keep Elian Free, the sponsoring organization. "It is not affiliated with any religious or political institution or party,"
he told WorldNetDaily.
The demonstrations, he said, will be held at 10:00 a.m., in front of federal buildings in 12 different cities -- including New York, Washington, D.C., Chicago, Los Angeles and San Francisco -- on Wednesday, May 10, the day before Elian's asylum hearing is presented before the 11th Circuit Court
of Appeals in Atlanta.
The day is also Mother's Day in Latin America, Holleran noted, adding the organizers hope the demonstrations will be an appropriate symbolic reminder that Elian's mother, who died trying to reach America, wanted Elian to be free.
The demonstrations are the brainchild of 29-year-old Mark Da Cunha, who as national coordinator promotes the rallies through his website, Capitalism Magazine, an online publication of essays and news, "in defense of individual rights" -- according to its masthead. To keep people
apprised of the plight of Elian Gonzalez, Da Cunha opened a special page for Americans to Keep Elian Free. The page, which is updated daily, posts complete information about the rallies.
"Elian's right to his own life is the fundamental issue in this case," says the Keep Elian Free website, "and this issue is being covered-up by the false alternative of 'family values' versus 'anti-Castro politics.' The goal of this demonstration is to make Americans aware that
the moral thing to do is the American thing to do: protect Elian's right to his own life by keeping Elian free in America since, according to Cuban law, his life does not belong to him, but to the state."
Liberty for Elian "The purpose of the demonstrations is, naturally, liberty for Elian," Atlanta rally coordinator Scott Hughes told WorldNetDaily. "A lot of the people who are involved are upset because there has been quite a spin on this issue. It's been played-up as if it's Cuba
v. America or Miami Exiles v. Janet Reno. This is, in fact, an American issue It's our freedom that's at stake, because it could be my home that's broken into tomorrow."
Dr. Leonard Peikoff -- founder of the Ayn Rand Institute, a non-profit, tax-exempt group based in Marina del Rey, Calif., that promotes the philosophy of objectivism developed by the late Russian-born novelist/philosopher -- will be the lead speaker at the Los Angeles rally.
Peikoff and his wife Amy, both of whom have been active in defending Elian's rights, last month traveled to Miami to meet the young refugee and his family and address a rally held April 15 held in front of Elian's great-uncle Lazaro Gonzalez's house.
"If you grasp what totalitarianism is, you would never talk about the rights of the father. In that kind of society, [a father] can only watch his son die. You say [Elian] needs a father -- yes, but he needs a life first," Peikoff told the assembled crowd. This was one week before the
April 22 raid in which INS agents stormed the house and grabbed the boy from the arms of his friends and family.
Peikoff, who holds a Ph.D. in philosophy, authored the 1980 work, "The Ominous Parallels" -- a scholarly analysis in which he drew startling comparisons between Germany's Weimar Republic of the 1920s, which led to the rise of Hitler, and the on-going rush of America into socialism.
'Storm troopers in America' WorldNetDaily asked Peikoff if he believed the Elian situation was essentially validating predictions he made in his book that America is headed toward a fascist, totalitarian state.
"In certain respects, absolutely," he answered emphatically. "The most chilling instance is the pre-dawn raid by black-clad agents holding automatic guns at the face of this terrified boy. If that is not out of Nazi Germany, I don't know what is. I agree a hundred percent with
Mayor Giuliani of New York City -- with whom I almost never agree -- that here were storm troopers in America without a doubt."
In Peikoff's view, "The intention of Clinton was precisely as in the Monica Lewinsky affair: to see what he could get away with. That's his entire psychology -- to see whether he's going to be caught and slapped down or not. That's why he engaged in brazen behavior in the White House and
this is another example -- to see how far he can move this country in the direction of totalitarianism and get away with it in terms of public opinion.
"And he did it. So it's a scary thing both in motivation -- parallel to what went on in Nazi Germany -- and in the apathy with which the country agrees with him."
Artist Sharlee McNamee, media contact for Americans to Keep Elian Free for Los Angeles, discussed with WorldNetDaily what the organizers hope to accomplish with the rallies. Specifically, they do not want to allow Elian to be sent back to Cuba without any significant public opposition. "Number
one -- we want to allow other Americans to realize that they're not the Lone Ranger in their outrage, and, to give moral support to those people who do see that what is happening is a travesty of what this country stands for," she said. "Number two -- we're doing it so that we don't lose
Elian by default. It has to be that in America, when issues are this important and this divisive for a country, that principles are aired and principles are addressed so that it doesn't become just one side against the other."
McNamee said she became interested in the boy as soon as she heard about his rescue at sea and his arrival here. She said she watched a lot of television about him and the ongoing controversy, "right up until the time of the raid."
"When that [the raid] happened, the outrage was more than I had ever experienced," she recalled. "I felt deep sadness and disappointment indeed at what was happening in the United States. I thought it particularly bad in that the very foundation for our Constitution is based on
the concepts of the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. That is a universal premise. It is true for all men -- though some countries do not honor it in their laws. But, the United States does have those principles in their laws and the laws should be based on the Constitution. Here
-- in this instance -- we are saying that international relationships are more important than individual rights."
McNamee said it's not her own future she's concerned with so much as that of her two grandchildren -- ages five and eight.
"I'm basically doing this for my grandkids," she said. "I cannot stand thinking about what is in store for them if we don't get back to our idea of freedom and individual rights. If we do not get back to those, my grandkids are not going to have a good life. Things are going to
backslide very quickly."
Scott Hughes, a computer engineering student at Georgia Tech, said he is "very excited" about the demonstrations and the part he's playing as coordinator for the Atlanta rally.
"We're not going to focus on the illegal raid, but that is an issue," Hughes told WorldNetDaily. "When we begin the demonstration on Wednesday, we'll be standing up, peacefully, and saying to the president, 'We're not going to sit idly by while you take away our liberties. We know
what you're doing to America -- and to that little boy -- and it's wrong.'"
'Great opportunity' Hughes said he views the effort as "a great opportunity to let everyone know what's really happening. The polls seem to suggest that most of America believes that Elian should go back to Cuba; but, I'm convinced that's because they are uninformed about the facts. Most
people don't realize that when the boy goes back he won't be with his father until he completes his rehabilitation. Then, he'll spend a few years back at school before he's whisked away to a labor camp where he'll cut sugar cane all day. As soon as he's old enough to fire an automatic weapon, it'll
be time for forced conscription.
"This isn't like taking a child to a beach where people like to read Marx," he added, sardonically. "This is forcing a child to live under a totalitarian dictatorship where neither he nor his father will have any control over his life."
In Florida, where organizers assume the largest rally will take place, coordinator Audrey Toll, a Fort Lauderdale businesswoman, reports that the demonstration for Miami has "grown legs and is running."
"I went down to the police department for a permit and I told them I expected maybe 300 people," she said. "But the word I'm getting now is that there will by upwards of 10,000 to 20,000 people there. I've kind of lost control because I was trying to keep a head count and I'm
keeping all the information of people who are e-mailing me and faxing me. But there are so many other people who are telling of large groups. There are large groups in Miami and these groups number in the hundreds. They've gone to the CapitalismMagazine.com website -- and gone on the air on Cuban
radio, Latin radio, etc. and made the announcement. People I've talked to today have told me it looks like there's going to be anywhere from 5,000 and 20,000 people there."
Toll had high praise for the Cuban Americans -- a group much maligned by the media.
"I cannot tell you what a wonderful group of people they are," she said. "I remember when they came here in the '60s. They were doctors, lawyers, professors -- they left fortunes back in Cuba. They came here and worked in shipyards. They built homes. They swept streets. They did
anything to make a living, and they built a little community. They didn't ask for anything. They didn't go to the government for anything. All they wanted was the opportunity. They were the most industrious group of people. And they kept a certain elegant style even though they had little money when
they came here. So, I was so impressed with them even back in the '60s.
"These people know what communism is. Americans do not know what communism is -- Americans do not even know what capitalism is, let alone communism. So, what can you expect from the average person? They don't know."
She said she hopes the demonstrations will help make a difference in "setting the record straight."
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