If we understand the common thread between scores of monks arrested and beaten in Burma and the rationale behind civil rights activists like Jesse Jackson in defending six violent black teenagers in Louisiana, we will get a glimpse into the mind of George W. Bush and the war in Iraq.

The so-called Jena 6 are six black youths charged with the attempted murder of a white teenager last December. Jackson and an estimated fifty thousand others marched on the Louisiana town of less than 3,000 to protest the "unfair" treatment of these alleged criminals. That would be like one million marching on Greenwich (population 62,000). Why did all these people march? Was it really in support of half a dozen violent people?

One of them, Mychal Bell, had already been tried and convicted as an adult but had his verdict overturned because he should have been, and now will be, tried as a juvenile. Did thousands of people really descend on this sleepy landlocked village of five square miles to support the incarcerated Bell?

It's a complex question why and how marches, rallies and protests happen. Look at what's happening in Burma. The Asian country became independent in 1948 but was basically ruled by a single person until 1988, and his military junta after that. In 1990, the junta refused to hand over power to the newly democratically elected government, and it's been under military rule ever since.

This summer, Buddhist monks began what seemed to be a mild protest against high commodity prices, specifically fuel. This is not your typical American protest over high gas prices and "profiteering" private companies. In Burma, the government sets gas prices by fiat. It started with only a few hundred protesters and resulted with dozens of arrests but no stalling. Eventually it grew as more and more people began to march, culminating in estimates of probably a hundred thousand pro-democracy demonstrators marching, of which only a small minority are monks.

Twenty years ago, Burma had even larger demonstrations which resulted in the junta simply shooting and killing thousands. It may be approaching a similar situation now.

Why did thousands join what had been a small protest against high gas prices in a country with a history of violence against peaceful demonstrations? Why did thousands in Jena protest what had been a local arrest?

These protests are similar to the state income tax protests of 1991 in which you or someone you know probably marched on Hartford. More than 40,000 people crowded the Capitol's south lawn to yell, "Repeal! Repeal!" before the tax became law. Connecticut has a proud libertarian history of opposing taxes and big government. The legislature reversed the law, but Gov. Lowell Weicker vetoed the reversal, and legislators fell one vote shy of overturning the veto. But at least we marched.

Marches and protests seem to balloon out from a single small event. Even the Boston Tea Party stemmed from a three-pence tax exemption on tea to the East India Company. In Hartford, it began with the income tax but ballooned into a protest of big, bad government. People held up signs of Hitler. Speeches talked not about Democrats and Republicans but "good guys and bad guys." In Burma, it ballooned from gas prices to political freedom.

In Jena, it has become about race in general and whether blacks are treated equally under the law. That's a critical issue, but in this case, it seems more tacked-on than a natural ballooning from the original incident.

Three months before the six attacked their victim, a group of white high school students hung nooses from a tree. No charges were filed against them, though they faced some academic disciplinary action. That may seem unfair but the noose-hangers did not violate a single federal or state statute on hate or any other crime because the teens could not, according to federal standards, be certified as adults. It was not a crime and therefore the fact the noose-hangers were not charged was not a decision based on race, as the Jena 6 supporters allege.

Also, the kid the six attacked was not one of those who hung the nooses and, according to a U.S. attorney, of the 40 statements taken during the attack, not one mentioned the nooses.

Between the noose incident and the beating, there were a series of race-motivated attacks and retaliatory attacks and Jackson and company allege that the white attackers did not get the same harsh treatment as the six. But just because I get beat up and the guy gets away certainly doesn't mean I can beat up someone else of his race and get away with it!

The ironic thing is that Jackson's rationale mirrors Bush's rationale in invading Iraq. We attacked Iraq using 9/11 as a pretext even though Iraq wasn't involved in 9/11 in any way. Like the Jena 6, we attacked people who weren't responsible for an attack on us, and we probably would have wanted to attack them anyway, but we use the earlier tragedy to justify a new one. And Iraq has ballooned into a seemingly neverending occupation. Who would have thought that Jackson and Bush would use the same logic?

phil@maymin.com