Cindy Sheehan quits as 'face' of anti-war campaign

The peace activist Cindy Sheehan has announced that she is stepping down as the "face" of the anti-war movement after being routinely attacked by both conservative and some liberal circles as an "attention whore".

"I am going to take whatever I have left and go home. I am going to go home and be a mother to my surviving children and try to regain some of what I have lost," wrote Mrs Sheehan on the website Daily Kos. Mrs Sheehan's son Casey, a US army reservist, was killed in April 2004.

"I will try to maintain and nurture some very positive relationships that I have found in the journey that I was forced into when Casey died and try to repair some of the ones that have fallen apart since I began this single-minded crusade," Mrs Sheehan wrote.

I think it is a great loss that Cindy Sheehan is stepping down. She contributed greatly to the anti-war movement by giving a face to the many mothers grieving for their lost children. At times she went too far, but that was easy to forgive given her loss.

And her initial visit to Bush's ranch, where she sat outside waiting for an audience for the President, revealed his cowardice at defending his position, as he simply refused to engage with her on any level. A wiser President would have taken her inside and then publicly stated that they would never see eye to eye but that he understood her loss. Bush attempted to ignore her, and the legend of Cindy Sheehan grew.

Celebrities and politicians beat a path to Camp Casey and, for a while, she became a focal point in the anti-war movement.

"I have spent every available cent I got from the money a "grateful" country gave me when they killed my son and every penny that I have received in speaking or book fees since then," she wrote.

"I have sacrificed a 29-year marriage and have travelled for extended periods of time away from Casey's brother and sisters and my health has suffered and my hospital bills from last summer (when I almost died) are in collection because I have used all my energy trying to stop this country from slaughtering innocent human beings."

What shocks me about all this is that Sheehan claims she was attacked by the left using the same terminology as was used by the right wingers.

It amazes me that people who are sharp on the issues and can zero in like a laser beam on lies, misrepresentations, and political expediency when it comes to one party refuse to recognize it in their own party. Blind party loyalty is dangerous whatever side it occurs on. People of the world look on us Americans as jokes because we allow our political leaders so much murderous latitude and if we don’t find alternatives to this corrupt "two" party system our Representative Republic will die and be replaced with what we are rapidly descending into with nary a check or balance: a fascist corporate wasteland. I am demonized because I don’t see party affiliation or nationality when I look at a person, I see that person’s heart. If someone looks, dresses, acts, talks and votes like a Republican, then why do they deserve support just because he/she calls him/herself a Democrat?

I would have thought that the sacrifice Sheehan has made, both voluntarily and involuntarily, would have given her the right to criticise anyone she chooses, to call the shots as she sees them without fear of reproach; certainly without fear of reproach from the left.

One could look at her and see an inherently decent woman attempting to make sense of painful loss and seeking to make sure no other mother suffered in the way that she was so obviously suffering.

And now, the failure of the Democrats to present a funding bill for Bush to sign that included a deadline for troop withdrawal has apparently proven too much for her to take.

"The most devastating conclusion that I reached ... was that Casey did indeed die for nothing. His precious lifeblood drained out in a country far away from his family who loves him, killed by his own country which is beholden to and run by a war machine that even controls what we think," she wrote.

"I have tried every day since he died to make his sacrifice meaningful. Casey died for a country which cares more about who will be the next American Idol than how many people will be killed in the next few months while Democrats and Republicans play politics with human lives."

I wish Cindy Sheehan well and hope that she is able to rebuild her life and her family. She made an invaluable contribution to the voices ranged against Bush's illegal war in Iraq, and I hope that when she returns home that she is able to find some form of peace.

She deserves it. And we, on the left, should never forget the debt that we owe her. She deserves that as well.

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