The keynote speaker was Matt Gonzalez, a prominent politician, activist and lawyer in the San Francisco area who is currently the running mate for presidential candidate Ralph Nader.

Gonzalez highlighted the numerous broken promises and betrayals of the Democrats, especially pointing out Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s failed pledge to bring the troops home.

"What kind of opposition party is this?" he added.

The war’s imperialist hue, as outlined by Grosfoguel, ethnic studies professor, is not new to the United States.

From the inception of the Spanish-American war on Feb. 15, 1898. to the start of the Iraq war on March 20, 2003, history has seen a repetition of the so-called anti-American incidents preceding major attacks carried out by the United States, Gorsfoguel said.

Iraq Veterans against the War member Joe Wheeler, who recently participated in the remarkable Winter Soldier hearings, which were veteran testimonials of the detrimental realities of war, shared some of his firsthand experiences on the battlefield as a medic.

At one point during his stay, he was commanded by an officer to shoot a driver in the car behind him because the man was "tailgating" them.

Wheeler, shocked and surprised, ignored this order and drove on.

That’s when the reality of war hit him and he started questioning Bush’s war on Iraq.

Wheeler, however, was repeatedly silenced from speaking his opinion. After inquiring about the incident, Wheeler was simply told his pay would be taken away if he spoke out against Bush or the war.

Setting aside all political, social and financial aspects of the war, the loss of innocent Iraqi and American lives is simply astonishing and difficult to bear, but something people must speak out against for the sake of protecting humanity, Shakir said. "One innocent life is one too many, and we have to do everything to stop it."