The forces gathering against George Bush are motivated, angry, and determined. One more thing, they are us.

Americans turned out in poll-like numbers for the Saturday antiwar demonstration in Washington and I was among them. So many of us were there, in fact, that my wife (with friends at the back of the march) spent over two hours as it officially "began," moving next to nowhere at all.

This was, you might say, the "connection demonstration." In the previous month, two hurricanes, one of them human, had blown through American life; and between them, they had, for many people, linked the previously unconnected -- Bush administration policies and the war in Iraq to their own lives. So, in a sense, this might be thought of as the demonstration created by Hurricanes Cindy Sheehan and Katrina. It was, finally, a protest that, not just in its staggering turnout but in its make-up, reflected the changing opinion-polling figures in this country. This was a majority demonstration and the commonest statement I heard in the six hours I spent talking to as many protesters as I could was: "This is my first demonstration."

This was an America on very determined parade. Even though the march, while loud and energetic, had an air of relaxed calmness to it, the words that seemed to come most quickly to people's lips were: infuriated, enraged, outraged, had it, had enough, fed up. In every sense, in fact, this was a demonstration of words. I have never seen such a sea of words -- of signs, almost invariably handmade along with individually printed posters, T-shirts, labels, stickers. It often seemed that, other than myself, there wasn't an individual in the crowd without a sign and that no two of them were quite the same.

Hearing this literally gives me hope, in a time when everything seems hopeless. Bush has done more damage in his one term, and a hand full of months, then any previous president that I know of. The destruction seems to be so far flung all around the country and all around the world that I fear there is no repairing it.

How can we get our country back?

How can we ever earn the trust of the world back?

I ask these questions daily. So when I see so many of my countrymen gathering together to stand up for what is right then I do not feel alone nor do I feel incapable of making a change.

Together we are unstoppable. Pay attention George Bush we are coming!