Sheehan not going away

by Mary McCarty, Dayton Daily News
September 30th, 2005

Everyone thought Cindy Sheehan would simply go away.

Not merely from Texas, from Camp Casey, but from the public consciousness.

Common wisdom had it that she was the media's "Movie of the Week," blown away only a few days prematurely by Hurricane Katrina.

Even before meeting Sheehan last month, Deb Hagerman knew that wasn't true.

"She's not going to go away," said Hagerman of Beavercreek, "and neither are any of the strong, dedicated women she has empowered to speak out."

Hagerman counts herself among them. She never considered herself an activist before Sheehan started her crusade in memory of her 24-year-old son, Casey, who was killed last year in Iraq. Yet in late August, Hagerman traveled to Crawford, Texas, in support of Sheehan's 26-day vigil near the Bush ranch. She was accompanied by Steve Fryburg of Bellbrook, an Army veteran, and veteran activist Beth Lerman. All three are members of the anti-war group Military Families Speak Out.

Something about Sheehan's story touched a deep chord within Hagerman. "There is an unspoken rule among moms — 'I'll look out for your kid and you'll look out for mine,'?" she said.

Hagerman is married to a reservist who was deployed overseas for five months in support of the Iraq war. She has endured much criticism, even ostracism, for her stance. But at Camp Casey she encountered hundreds of other military family members like herself, "people who love our soldiers but hate this war."

Joan Baez sang at peace vigils, night after night. "It was supposed to be one night," Lerman said, "but she just couldn't leave."

Among their duties the Miami Valley volunteers set up a crafts table for children who came to Camp Casey with their parents. They scored a big hit with Play Dough and bubbles and crafts such as making peace cranes. They cuddled babies. "Intense tears scalded my eyes when I held this little baby who will never meet his father," Hagerman recalled.

It angers Hagerman when Sheehan is vilified as a pawn of the anti-war movement. "She strikes me as very sincere," she said. "She is steadfast in her belief that this is an unjust war, and she doesn't want anyone else to die in the name of her son."

Lerman, Hagerman and Fryburg participated in a massive anti-war protest over the weekend that brought tens of thousands of protesters to Washington, D.C. They came home to Dayton before Sheehan was arrested Monday when she engaged in a planned act of civil disobedience, along with some 200 other protesters, sitting down in front of the black iron gates on Pennsylvania Avenue and chanting ''Stop the war now!''

It was Sheehan's first arrest. "It bothers me that she felt forced to do this to get attention to bring our troops home," Hagerman said.

She worries, too, about all the other ordinary citizens whose names we will never know.

Sheehan has put a face on the movement, but she shouldn't be confused for the movement itself. "She freed a lot of people to speak up," Hagerman said.

Like her, they're not going away any time soon.