After an 18-hour bus ride back from Washington, D.C., Madison protestors of the War on Iraq still have the rally chants ringing in their ears.

“Hell no, we won’t go, we won’t fight for Texaco,” protest organizer Jesse Philbin said. “I feel great about going (to the rally); it was amazing to see the sheer number of people there, and I was doing my part to show I oppose the war.”

Philbin joined 250 protestors from Madison and approximately 250,000 others in Washington, according to trip organizer and University of Wisconsin senior Melea Carvlin.

Carvlin said Wisconsin sent at least 13 buses, significantly more than the three busloads it sent to the last war protest in October.

“A lot of people realize that a war on Iraq could be near, and they want to do whatever they can to prevent that,” Carvlin said.

UW sophomore Kyle Myhre said he wanted to protest to send a message to Bush and the nation that war on Iraq is unethical.

“Much of the public doesn’t understand that an anti-war movement is going on,” Myhre said. “Americans have the right and responsibility to make sure the government is doing what they want it to do.”

Myhre has traveled to D.C. protests before and said the protests are inspiring.

“It’s really beautiful to see so many diverse organizations with a common cause; it’s incredible,” Myhre said.

Not all UW students are in favor of protesting the war, however. UW junior Matt Bruch said protesting is a futile effort.

“It’s not very effective, and there are better ways of making change,” Bruch said. “It’s a waste of time and resources for the protestors and the police.”

Despite the arrests of over 650 protestors during the World Bank and International Monetary Fund meetings in October, the protests last weekend were relatively peaceful, culminating in 16 arrests Sunday in a smaller demonstration at Lafayette Square. Block said authorities had anticipated civil disobedience and prepared accordingly. In the end, however, only a few hundred attended.

The larger protest began Saturday with a march from the Capitol to the Washington Navy yard, where the protestors demanded an end to U.S. weapons of mass destruction.

UW student organization Stop the War! coordinated the Madison trip, and the entire protest was organized by International ANSWER (Act Now to Stop War and End Racism).

Block said that although Bush did not acknowledge the event, the protest succeeded in clarifying to other countries the division among U.S. citizens in their feelings on war in Iraq.

“It’s important that the international community sees us doing this,” she said.

Myhre was also concerned about breeding anti-American sentiment abroad, saying the war is simply a tactic for the United States to assert its dominance over the Middle East.

“It would be nice if Hussein were gone, but bombing is not the best way to do that,” he said. “The wrong people are doing this for the wrong reasons; it’s imperialism.”

Other protestors agreed, waving banners that read, “WWJB: Who Would Jesus Bomb?”

Stop the War! member Dawn Block said she was surprised by the diverse ages of those present at the protests.

“You could look both directions and not see an end to the people,” Block said. “This protest was more intergenerational than the last one; I saw everyone from little kids in strollers to old vets.”

Block attended the protests with her mother, a protestor during the Vietnam era.

“We were excited to do this together,” Block said. “A lot of people see the ’60s and ’70s as the idealized time of protest, and now we’re experiencing it for ourselves.”