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The two JB’s and I made our way down to Washington D.C. last weekend to film and counter-protest the peace march.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1yREimgstiA[/youtube]

It was an enlightening, fun, and infuriating experience.

First, let me admit, I am a complete rookie at this “video-reporting on a peace protest” thing. (See below my top 5 reasons I’m incompetent at this.) The learning curve is significant; but if you want to see how a true professional does it, check out the Age of Hooper’s coverage. Having done this once, all I can say is tremendous effort on his part. Tremendous.

So, if you go to D.C. to cover a Peace Protest, you should probably make your way to where the peace protesters are; not to the wonderful, (but a little nutty), counter-protesters at the Gathering of Eagles. Don’t get me wrong, these are the greatest people in our country , Gold Star moms and dads, veterans, Rolling Thunder bikers, and patriots abound. Truly great people, and where I find my sympathy, but wave-flagging and country songs doesn’t make for the most intriguing video. I had come to film the nut-cases, and I found myself watching a gay, black, conservative, cowboy sing, with a full lisp, patriotic country-western songs. (Actually that is intriguing.)

Not that the speeches weren’t inspiring, because they were. Dads following moms, and moms following wives, all relaying the same message: “Our sons and daughters gave their lives to bring hope to the Middle East, don’t let that dream die with them.” I wiped many a tear away that morning, but the highlight for me was Greg Garvey’s speech below:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhYKnH2ASps[/youtube]
The Gathering of Eagles rally lasted till about noon; when we were dispatched to Navy Memorial on Pennsylvania Avenue equipped with a couple expletives and taunts to be hurled against the marchers. Finally, I hoped, we would get some video , but the moonbats didn’t arrive. One hour we waited, then another hour, then thirty minutes more, till finally, over the crest of the avenue we caught the glimpses of pink. Here’s what I captured.

I few annotations: the man you here yelling, “Thank you, thank you. Osama Bin Laden thanks you for your support.” And “Thank you, I kill you last,” is a man dressed up like a terrorist with a dismembered head in his hand, which I unbelievable did not get a picture of. And the person screaming “Despicable, Despicable…Shame, Shame” is me in the one moment I lost it seeing the flag being carried upside down by some G.I.’s.

Oh, and the man you hear to my right is deranged. He has one comeback to all the lefties..’F_You’ . He eventually gets himself arrested in my second video clip. (This was probably the most surprising aspect of the day for me; there is a good deal of nuts on my side of this debate too. )

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7z4yNpjM3o[/youtube]

In this clip, a girl from Code Pink blows bubbles in my camera. She does the same to the unstable man on my right and he slaps her, getting himself arrested. OF COURSE in my brilliant filming, I turned my camera away just prior to her getting whacked. Such timing. Also catch the Hugo Chavez film crew which couldn’t get enough of the wacko to my right.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v0n0Gx0OXlI[/youtube]

The Grim Reaper, devil-Bush, a free-Palestine, and a UPS guy. Check out the woman with the blue cap looking at us with awe; as if she can’t believe anybody would be holding the flag upright and supporting the troops.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=310jn4iSmJQ[/youtube]

Here my camera ran out of batteries. If you wonder why, see point 1. below.

So some thoughts on the march. It was much smaller then I would imagine it would be. It took just about 25 minutes for the bulk of the crowd to move past my camera, which I would guess it would just about how long it would take to empty Camden Yards if you could only exit at one point on Eutaw street. By this very scientific calculation, I would guess the crowd to be in the neighborhood of 30,000 people.

I was truly taken aback by the anger on my side of the debate. I never had witnessed vitriol from the right, but I its there too, in much, much smaller doses, but undeniable. However most of the anti-protesters took the comedic approach to needle the peacniks; which is more in tune with me. Because after all they are comical. Its as if they truly believe that we who support our efforts have no desire for peace. Who doesnt want peace. Its that next question which none of them can answer, peace at what cost. Any cost? Or rather peace through victory, the only sustainable peace man has ever known.

Addendum:

Why I Suck at Video-Reporting the MoonBat March

1. I have never used a DVR video recorder before. It helps to know that you must turn off your camera when you put it into the bag; it doesn’t shut off on its own. I discovered this issue about a half an hour before the marchers arrived when checking my equipment and noticed my battery was indeed dead. Byrne saved the day though, remembering an outlet in a pizza place nearby, so we grabbed some pizza and re-charged the battery.

2. I have never transferred a DVR recording to a computer. Sebastian was able to point me to the use of FireWire port. My computer is so old that I don’t have one, but the obsolete computer our company gave away to me last year had one, so I was able to make the transfer.

3. I have never transformed the Windows-based WMV recording file into a MPEG file, which all editors require. This was a royal pain in the butt. After searching for free software for a couple nights to do this, I finally broke down and spent the $25 from some half-baked company to convert my files.

4. I have never used a video editor. Thought I was pretty slick with this, in finding the open shareware Jahshaka to use….of course I have no idea how to use it. After fiddling with it for a night, I resorted to trial version of VideoReDo Plus, another fly-by-night software company, to edit the footage.

5. I have never uploaded a video unto YouTube. Clips can not be longer then 10 minutes nor larger then 100,000 KB. This would have been useful information prior to editing my videos.