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Q&A
Parade of intolerance
BY JOE HEISLER

He is among the most unlikely of war protesters. Anthony F. " Tony " Flaherty is a 72-year-old native of South Boston and a veteran of the Vietnam War. He spent 25 years in the US Navy as an enlisted man and an officer. Yet he found himself in the middle of the controversy over the war in Iraq when he dared to challenge the decision by the South Boston Allied War Veterans Council to deny Veterans for Peace the right to march in the annual St. Patrick’s Day parade. The Phoenix spoke with Flaherty last week shortly after an attorney for the parade committee threatened to sue the City of Boston and the Boston Police Department for allowing Flaherty and a handful of other veterans to march in opposition to the war at the end of the parade.

Q: What is Veterans for Peace?

A: It is a group of veterans who feel there has to be another way to resolve problems other than through war. Since forming in the 1980s, it has grown into a national organization that through peace convoys of medicines and supplies has had a significant impact in the world, especially in places such as Nicaragua, Cuba, and Iraq, where even now we are working to help repair the waterworks.

Q: Don’t most veterans support the war?

A: They may support the troops, as I do, but I don’t believe they support the war. There is a deep divide in this country over the war, and the pre-war polls clearly showed it ... though that is being ignored now. Veterans for Peace supports the troops, but we believe the best support is to bring them home and not have them be party to the slaughter of innocents.

Q: Were you surprised the South Boston Allied War Veterans Council would go to such lengths to prevent veterans like you from marching in the parade?

A: Initially yes, but as things have unfolded, perhaps less so. There has been a nationwide effort by the government and others to suppress any type of dissent. Just this week, a teacher in Lynn was prevented from showing a movie in class about the Columbine massacre [Bowling for Columbine by Michael Moore] because it was somehow deemed to be anti-war.

Q: What was the reaction to your decision to march anyway, and has there been any fallout in the South Boston community since then?

A: There were more cheers than jeers during the parade, but you would not know it from reading the local [South Boston] newspapers. Neither one of them deserve to be considered a journalistic outlet. One of them insulted the Veterans for Peace [by] saying we belonged [at the end of the parade] with the street sweepers. I also noticed that Congressman [Stephen] Lynch enthusiastically supported a demonstration recently which could only be described as pro-war. Everyone knows there is only one voice allowed in South Boston, that is the political establishment and the elites that benefit from it.

Q: What about the lawsuit against the City of Boston and the Boston Police?

A: It is ludicrous. If they are such ardent supporters of veterans and the troops, they should be in court seeking an injunction not against the Boston Police but against the president and the congress for voting to decrease funding for veteran services by $15 billion. As it is, veterans can’t get decent medical care now. For that matter, if the Allied Veterans War Council has so much money [that] it can afford to hire lawyers, why don’t they use some of it to repair Day Boulevard instead of sending [State Senator Jack] Hart, [State Representative Brian] Wallace, and [City Council president Michael] Flaherty to get the state to pay?

Issue Date: April 10 - 17, 2003
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