Tom Webb: Knight Ridder Election 2004

Welcome to New York. NOT!

From the looks of it, you'd almost think most of New York City banded together to send an in-your-face message to the Republican conventioneers: Go away.

Even miles away from the big anti-Bush protest march on Sunday, the streets of Manhattan were alive with anti-Bush signs, t-shirts, leaflets and buttons.

Wherever you walked Sunday, it wasn't unusual to come across two or four people in each block sporting an anti-Bush message: "George W. Bush, the Toxic Texan." Or, "Beer not Bush." Or, "Elect a madman, you get madness." Or, "Why change horses in mid-apocalypse?"

By contrast, I saw just one person wearing a Bush button the entire day Sunday.

Some of the protests were more theatrical than others. Republican delegates were each invited to attend a Broadway show on Sunday afternoon. The Minnesota contingent went to "Phantom of the Opera." Delegates from Texas went to see the song-and-dance favorite, "42nd Street>"

A group of protesters was waiting for the Texans, with their own all-singing, all-dancing street production. A dozen women wearing glittery outfits, tap shoes and colorful wigs performed their own sidewalk chorus line, singing a mocking song about "a boy from Crawford, Texas" and performing a raunchy dance. Men dressed in suits, wearing Bush and Rumsfeld masks, strutted alongside and waved.

A few blocks away, a separate protest group, "Billionaires for Bush," stood outside a club where well-connected GOPers were gathering for a bash. Their signs: "Free Kenneth Lay!" and "Global warming = better tans."

posted at # 8:18 PM