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On Wednesday, August 22 Finger Lakes For Peace held a vigil of support for Danny Burns, Mark Carver, Chris Tate, Ellen Grady, and Todd Saddler, members who were arrested on August 6th at the office of Congressman Randy Kuhl (R-NY) who continues to support the war in Iraq. The 22nd was the arraignment date for the “Bath 5.”

We began with a small but very visible protest in front of the County Courthouse. I got a chance to chat with a lot of local activists about their activities throughout the summer.

All of the people above have asked repeatedly to meet with Rep. Kuhl but have either been denied, had their appointments postponed indefinitely, or been given the administrative runaround by his office staff. One group, including fellow blogger Kilgore Trout of Quintessential Ramblings made a brief, but funny scene at the office last week. Go here for details.

While the arrests of August 6th got a decent amount of local press, I wasn’t aware that there was a similar protest at Kuhl’s office in Fairport and that there were many “almost” arrests, described in the video below.

The arraignments were complete before we’d arrived, so we moved operations to Kuhl’s office although our “parade” permit (you can see it in the flickr box) didn’t allow it. I got the folks that had been arrested to pose for a group photo at the “scene of the crime” although we all know where the real crimes are being committed.

Ellen Grady described her arrest, and what’s next for her and the rest of the “Bath 5.”

Arrested in Bath from Robert Coats and Vimeo.

Kudos to Finger Lakes for Peace and all the dedicated citizens arrested in their efforts to bring the troops home to safety and end the war. If we want to end this war, we ALL have to get involved.

Technorati Tags: Randy Kuhl

Filed under: Politics on August 25th, 2007