The first bout of recognizable campaign activity began on September 26. The president dropped from the sky in a Chinook helicopter onto Liberty Island in New York Harbor, where several thousand schoolchildren had been shipped to listen to him dedicate the American Museum of Immigration. Most chanted “Four more years!” on cue; one knot of disobedient children shouted, “Stop bombing the dikes!” A small contingent of Vietnam Veterans Against the War, who had somehow made it through the awesome gauntlet of security, cried out from the crowd, “Stop the bombing! Stop the war!” The president paused. “I have a message for the television screens,” he said, looking straight into the cameras. “Let’s show, besides the six over here”—he pointed—“the thousands over here.” In the shadow of the Statue of Liberty, the protesters were hauled off by cops. It turned out, mysteriously, that they had all received personal invitations to the event in the mail.