War in Iraq

I was talking to my mom the other day about the war in Iraq. We both think it should end as soon as possible. What we were talking about the possibility of the American culture repeating the sixties, with hippies and college protesters, because of the similarities between the Iraq war and Vietnam.

I mentioned this theory to my US history teacher, and he said this was impossible for a few reasons. The first is that, since it's not been the baby boom, there wouldn't be enough university students. However, I think that since people were born in the sixties are still around and have been raising their children with their values, older people would also take part in protests.

The other reasons, though, actually disturbed me.

In the sixties, when there was a march or a protest against Vietnam, it was showed on TV. But with this war, any protests there HAVE been get little or no air time. Without this form of publicity there is a lack of awareness and people interested in the cause aren't able to see that they aren't alone. I know that what gets shown on the news is the news that sells. Well, I imagine that people would like to see more about the protests, even if just to be outraged by them.

I doubt enough television higher ups are opposed to showing the protests, so I'm led to believe this is government intervention.

Also government intervention, is that it's now illegal to photograph coffins returning from the war. If you get caught, you can get jail time. This strikes me as a massive violation of the constitution, on both counts. Even if there is no law stopping television stations from showing protests, and the government is actually paying them to hold off, it seems wrong.

And how can we trust the government if they have to influence our thinking in order to keep people believing in this cause? If Iraq were truly worth fighting in, the majority would support it, casualties or no.