Well I'm glad to hear of this benefit and its hipsterish modality. Unfortunately, there's no reason to hope that Americans will wake up any more than on past occasions and efforts. Besides, there needs to be not just an uptick in anti-war and anti-Bush awareness, but a WILLINGNESS to make serious changes, to give up one's consumptive lifestyle, to dump the SUV and the TV and all the unnecessary trash, to learn of alternative and ecological lifestyle and technological possibilities, and, simply summed, to REFUSE AND RESIST in every way possible. It's not a video game, or an MTV moment -- SACRIFICE is required, yes, even putting our lives on the line to stop this Empire. A mass "metanoia" --change of heart.

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Almost by definition, they live in blue states.

We have to win over all the purple-state midwestern families to have any hope of deposing the Republicans. Hipsters aren't going to help things any.

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Numbers and influence can be slippery factors. Are the people who show up at this event going to tip the scales? No. Are they trendsetters who influence others to get involved, to care, to think it's cool to care? yes.

Hipsters are most certainly not only blue staters. They're youngish people from all over who are increasingly able to access cultural trends without leaving their red/purple states.

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A movement is successful through attraction, and attrition. This one seems to be doing a good job at targeting different age groups so it can catch the varied folks who are increasingly disillusioned with the way things are.

I marched against the war in the 60's, and back then we told ourselves that we were the catalyst for the return of the troops. We were partially right. The groundswell of protest was a factor that contributed to the end of the war, but it was an American press which reported truth from the front lines and put an unblinking eye on the young disabled vets in the hospitals, and a White House under siege by accusations of burglary, conspiracy, obstruction of justice, illegal wiretapping and misuse of campaign contributions among other things, which combined into an unprecedented crisis of confidence for the whole country. Add that to increasingly bad news from the front lines, and the war was over, in no orderly fashion as those of us who were there to see it will never forget.

The situation wasn't that different back then. But some factors are different now:

It was the careful investigative reporting of Bob Woodward and Carl Bernstein which didn't just report on the Congressional Watergate hearings, but actually led to them. I don't know if the mainstream press has that kind of authenticity and integrity anymore. It serves a few different masters, and the public isn't one of them.

Nixon, no matter how hard he fought the charges against him, didn't question the right of Congress to bring them. He left office when impeachment became a certainty. George Bush has stated that Congress has no right to investigate any actions of his first term (the knowingly misleading statements about WMD's in Iraq for just one example) because his election to a second term absolves him of all accountability for those actions. This is without precedent anywhere in history, legal or otherwise, but it went unchallenged.

George Bush out-Nixon's Nixon when it comes to abuses of power. Nixon just had an 'enemies list', who were the subject of illegal wiretaps and investigations. We're all on Bush's list now, and until Congress or the courts say nay, there are no illegal wiretaps and investigations.

Don't dis the Peace Movement. We need it. But the movement needs the support of the culture, in the form of our media and our politics from the ground up if it's going to effect change.

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Now let's make a concert for all of the many Un-Hipsters!

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We need some Honky Tonk Badonkadonk in this movement ...

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Everyone knows hipsters don't like the war. That's like accepted fact. I don't know the first thing about country music but I heard Garth Brooks was pushing Wal-mart stuff. We need guys (and gals) who are gonna persuade Mr. and Mrs. Springfield, MO about the war. Hip cats on the coasts mostly oppose the war. This seems like a typically Media Elite type article...then again, every little bit helps I guess...

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Remember what happened to the Romans with their Goth armies?

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