In a post on Saturday, I said that the number of Americans who actually support the regimes of North Korea and Iraq is tiny. I'm supposed to hang my head in shame because that tiny group apparently includes all or some of the organizers of Saturday's D.C. peace demonstration. Well, fine. Now go do a scientific poll of demonstrators and ask how many of them knew that. Even right-wingers trying to horrify us with the most egregious photos of picket signs they could find from Saturday (Bush compared to Hitler! Good heavens! Conservatives would never do something like that!) show nothing in support of Saddam's regime or Kim's ("God bless Iraq" is not "God bless Saddam" -- the U.S. "has no quarrel with the Iraqi people," remember? -- and a demonstrator who sees a moral equivalence between Bush and Saddam, however simpleminded, presumably doesn't think Bush is a good guy, so he's not praising Saddam, either). The 1963 March on Washington is remembered for the "I Have a Dream" speech, but the point of most demonstrations is whatever the majority of demonstrators think the point is. Eric Alterman says people with dubious politics unfortunately organize left demonstrations the most effectively, and maybe he's right. But such people are utterly inept at getting the weird, fringy part of their message across, even to the people who march in their protests. This demo was about stopping an unnecessary war. It wasn't about the Workers World Party's agenda.