CodePink, an activist women’s group concerned with combating global militarism, got some street cred for getting John McCain to call them “lowlife scum” after they shook handcuffs at former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and called him a war criminal, as reported by the Daily Mail.
The occasion was the Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on national security. In addition to Kissinger, two other secretaries of state, Madeleine Albright and George Schultz, were in attendance. A group of protesters, mainly women, dressed in pink broke into the session, carried signs, called Henry Kissinger a war criminal and even shook handcuffs in his face. They allege that Kissinger’s order in the 1970s to secretly bomb Cambodia was tantamount to a war crime.
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The protesters were escorted out, continued their chants, and after another outburst, McCain threatened to have the protesters arrested and yelled, “Get out of here you lowlife scum!”
McCain then apologized to Kissinger and said, “I have never seen anything as disgraceful and outrageous and despicable as the last demonstration that just took place.”
One of the main questions arising out of the incident was how the protesters gained access to the meeting and even were allowed to get close enough to shake handcuffs right in Henry Kissinger’s face. U.S. Capital Police spokeswoman Kim Schneider said the force “did not meet the standards expected of the USCP.”
CodePink’s protests take the form of “pranks” and they aren’t considered dangerous, which is a powerful tool in getting their message across. CodePink says it is “rooted in a network of local organizers, online supporters and generous donors with an emphasis on joy and humor … our tactics include satire, street theater, creative visuals, civil resistance and directly challenging powerful decision-makers in government corporations, and of course, wearing pink.”
CodePink’s next target is to protest a screening of American Sniper in Hollywood. Well, we can’t say we haven’t been warned.
