Fidelis Cloer takes aim at competition seen and unseen in Bulletproof Salesman. “I want war. I don’t want peace,” says German armored-car merchant Fidelis Cloer at the beginning of Bulletproof Salesman. An hour later, in the doc’s final moments, he offers a slightly more nuanced view, pointing out that he did nothing at all to instigate or sustain the protracted conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan than have proved such a windfall for his company.......

K Street, Tuesday, 5:41 p.m., photo by llunardi2 The Post is reporting that participants in today's Iraq war protests were disappointed by the turnout. What did you see? Here's some of the images that have already been uploaded to the DCist Flickr Pool. 17th Street, Wednesday, 8:44 a.m., photo by Fredo Alvarez 17th Street, Wednesday, 8:42 a.m., photo by Fredo Alvarez......

In addition to the long list of anti-war protests planned throughout the city today (we'll have some photos up from some of them later on), around 200 activists staged a "Freeze-In" protest at Union Station on Tuesday. In the video above, you can see several dozen people who "froze" in place for about a minute at 5 p.m. yesterday to mark the fifth anniversary of the Iraq war. The group, situated in the middle......

Violent, bloody and chaotic; these are the images that come to us from Iraq on a daily basis. But in My Baghdad, now at Irvine Contemporary, local photographer Phil Nesmith presents another view of Iraq, one that captures the quiet moments of the every day. His photographs are small vignettes, short snippets of life, printed onto glass. They are pieces of time, capturing a small moment in the motion of a waving flag or birds......

>> The Senate might have to work all weekend, in advance of a possible vote on Sunday on whether to take up a $50 billion war funding bill that calls for a troop withdrawal from Iraq in 12 months, Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) warned. Be prepared to hear all your Senate staffer friends complain about this at happy hour tonight. [The Hill] >> Foxhall Road will be closed to traffic between MacArthur Boulevard......

When posters appeared on the GW campus early last month bearing the message, "Hate Muslims? So Do We!", some people laughed, others got offended, and the university got a ton of media coverage unrelated to its exorbitant tuition. Today the GW Hatchet reports that the students responsible for the posters have each received a $25 fine and probation. As you all may recall, the posters were part of a campaign to mock Islamo-Facism Awareness Week,......

DCist's highly subjective and hardly comprehensive guide to the most interesting movies playing around town in the coming week. Major Release: No Country for Old Men We'll be covering the latest release from the Coen Brothers in more depth tomorrow, but in the time being, we'll tell you this: not only have the filmmakers recovered from the mediocre doldrums of their last couple of outings, but they have returned with a bloody vengeance with a......

Though modernizing the Odyssey is hardly new territory, Woolly Mammoth’s production of Melissa James Gibson’s Current Nobody still manages to feel fresh. We’ve got a gender flip, and a modern setting. Penelope, now merely "Pen", has been sent to Troy to take war photographs (the Trojan war here doesn’t feel much removed from the Iraq one), while Od is left at home with Tel – for 20 years. The story has kind of a weird......

A rainy Friday night was enlivened by the return of hometown heroine (and Richard Montgomery High alumni — Go, uhm…Rockets! Right? Y’all are the Rockets?) Tori Amos, who took to the DAR Constitution Hall armed with her giant black Bösendorfer piano, her touring band, and a new record. That record, American Doll Posse, is an odd sort of concept album revolving around a bunch of different characters that Amos invented, costumed, and, I believe, even......

Morning, Washington. We hope you were out enjoying the fantastic weather, especially since the environment has been front and center in the news this weekend. As you must have heard, our former Vice President turned Global Warming Guru had to shove over the Oscar on his mantle to make space for half of a Nobel Peace Prize. Maybe after the news you were inspired to go check out the 20 amazing houses built on the......

MONDAY: Atlantic Monthly correspondent Robert D. Kaplan will be at Politics and Prose to discuss his latest book, Hog Pilots, Blue Water Grunts. According to Kaplan, journalists are too quick to report on the negative aspects of the military. Commence with bickering over the Iraq war ... now. 7 p.m. TUESDAY: Blogger Diane Vadino will be at Olsson's in Dupont Circle to read from her first novel, Smart Girls Like Me. 7 p.m. She'll also......

Since 2001, the Smithsonian American Art Museum has honored one artist annually with the $25,000 Lucelia Artist Award. In order to be eligible, artists must be under the age of 50 and either American or living in the United States. Each of the five distinguished jurors, including artists, critics, curators and scholars, nominate three artists in recognition of their contribution to the art scene in the U.S. and abroad. Following initial selection, the jurors examine......

MONDAY: Democratic presidential candidate and Connecticut Sen. Christopher Dodd will make an appearance at Politics and Prose to talk about his book Letters from Nuremberg, which has nothing do with 2008 and everything to do with 1948 (or thereabouts). Dodd's father, Thomas, was an attorney during the famous Nuremberg trials, in which members of the Nazi Party in Germany were prosecuted for their crimes, and the book consists of letters written by Thomas to his......

Via PreservationNation, the National Trust for Historic Preservation has started a campaign to save the original Tomb of the Unknowns, or Tomb of the Unknown Soldier as it's commonly called, at Arlington National Cemetery. Who would want to mess with the tomb? According to the National Trust, it's the folks who run Arlington National Cemetery themselves, as well as Sen. Jim Webb (D-Va.) -- perhaps one of the senate's most famous military veterans and fathers......

Those of you who watched the Joint Hearing of the House Armed Services and Foreign Relations Committee know that the hearing itself was disrupted several times, both by technical issues and by protesters in the room. You may not have been aware that there was a ruckus in the hallway outside the hearing as well. This video shows U.S. Capitol Police speaking with Hip Hop Caucus President Reverend Lennox Yearwood, Jr. on Monday after......

>> President Bush is set to announce plans to reduce the American troop presence in Iraq by around 30,000 by next summer -- which is the same, pre-surge level it was about nine months ago. [AP via WTOP] >> D.C. firefighters put out a fire in the parking garage at Union Station this morning. [AP via WTOP] >> The 2007 American League of Lobbyists Hoops for Hope Charity Game is tonight at GW's Smith Center,......

"Petraeus Says Objectives in Iraq Are Largely Being Met" [WaPo] "Slow Progress Being Made in Iraq, Petraeus Tells Congress" [NYTimes] "We are winning in Iraq, General Petraeus says" [London Times] "Petraeus says U.S. troop levels can be cut" [Reuters] >> A noose was reportedly found hanging in a tree near a building that houses several African American campus organizations at the University of Maryland. School officials are treating the incident as a possible hate......

You may have already heard about the small group of ANSWER Coaltion members who staged a lunchtime event Thursday to protest the District's attempts to get them to stop gluing posters on to utility boxes. Two demonstrators, one an Iraq war veteran and the other the mother of another veteran, were arrested on charges of defacing public property. DCist Tom stumbled on to the scene and snapped these images with his phone -- it's......

>> 9:30 Club has Editors, Ra Ra Riot, and Biffy Clyro. $15 tickets still available, and don't miss our full preview of Ra Ra Riot by clicking here. >> Michael Powell's 1969 erotic drama Age of Consent features a young Helen Mirren in her film debut. Screening for free tonight at 7 p.m. at the Library of Congress’ Pickford Theater. Call (202) 707-5677 by 4 p.m. to reserve a seat. >> Malcolm MacPherson covered Ambassador......

Happy first weekend of September - and happy Labor Day weekend, too, for our American cities! Let's take a look at what's been happening around the Ist-a-verse. The deaths of two firefighters shook Bostonist this week. Boston's firefighters bent over backwards all week long - first, they fought flames pouring from the Boston Tea Party museum, and then a restaurant fire killed two and injured many more. Their efforts make everything else - like Tom......

Months after a fire gutted the interior of Eastern Market's South Hall and almost destroyed the District landmark, vendors will be back in business tomorrow in a temporary structure built across the street. The structure, which looks like a big white tent, cost $1.5 million and will be used while $25 million in repairs are completed on the South Hall, a process that could take up to two years. We're happy to see things slowly......

Some details are now available regarding the alleged scuffle involving Rep. Bob Filner (D-Calif.), who represents San Diego, at Dulles Airport on Sunday night. It seems that Filner got a little frustrated while trying to find his bag in a United Airlines baggage claim office, and according to a Metropolitan Washington Airports Authority police statement, then "attempted to enter an area authorized for airline employees only," and "pushed aside the employee's outstretched arm and refused......

When Open Circle Theater company announced it would be reworking Jason Robert Brown’s Songs For A New World to revolve around the Iraq war, it was hard to squelch images of flag-waving, canons booming, and rewritten lyrics resembling "I’m not afraid of anything/be it religious extremists, guns or sand." Fortunately, Open Circle’s take has much more sincerity, skill and imagination driving their interpretation, though ultimately, the work stands up better unadorned. Songs, which recently was......

>> A federal administrative appeals court has struck down the District's drug-pricing control law, saying it violates federal patent law. The ruling is considered a major win for the pharmaceutical industry. [WaPo] >> The city has agreed on a settlement of $1 million to about 120 protesters who were improperly detained by police during demonstrations in D.C. against the invasion of Iraq, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund in 2002. [AP via......

>> Fort Reno's got Garland of Hours, Aerialist, and Lady in the Radiator. 7:15 p.m., call 703-318-2197 for rain updates. >> Screen on the Green has the excellent, often overlooked thriller Wait Until Dark, which stars Audrey Hepburn as a recently blinded woman who is terrorized by a group of criminals while they try to get to a doll stuffed with heroin they believe is in her apartment. Films start at sunset, call 877-262-5866 for......

For all you liberal/progressive internet/Netroots types in town who are heading to Chicago later this week for the behemoth 2nd annual YearlyKos Convention — and we know there are more than just a few of you — allow us to recommend some programming. On Friday, August 3 from 9:15 a.m. to 10:15 a.m., the panel you'll want to make sure not to miss is Taxation Without Representation: Alive and Well in the Nation's Capital, which......

Too Much Light Makes the Baby Go Blind (30 Plays in 60 Minutes), the long-running signature show of Chicago’s the Neo-Futurists that we reviewed yesterday, requires each of its performers to be a hybrid of improv artist, actor, athlete, and polemicist. Notwishstanding the fact that the team currently performing the show in the Fringe Festival is 40% female, it also takes some serious balls. Because although you can rest assured that if a “play”......

MONDAY: A Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist and the wife of Ohio Sen. Sherrod Brown, Connie Schultz will be at Politics and Prose to discuss her book ... And His Lovely Wife, which is her behind-the-scenes look at Brown's campaign and their marriage. 7 p.m. In Last One In, Nicholas Kulish, who was embedded with a Marine attack-helicopter squadron for the Wall Street Journal, spins a slightly unbelievable tale of a gossip columnist who ends up covering......

MONDAY >> Today's Fort Reno show features local indie poppers Greenland (***) with Statehood and Kitty Hawk. The weather report calls for clear skies, but bring water. 7:15 p.m., free. >> How about another free event? The Black Cat backstage will feature movies about punk rockers Murder City Devils and Anti-Flag. 9 p.m., free. >> This week marks the sixth year of the Hip-Hop Theater Festival, sponsored by the DC Commission on the Arts and......

MONDAY >> We've made no secret of our love for Benjy Ferree, and judging from the amount he seems to be playing around town, everyone else must be enjoying him as well. He's headed out into the great wide open for some of the summer touring season though, so better get over to the Black Cat backstage tonight before he hits the road. With Chicago's The 1900s. $8, 9 p.m. >> Nü metal may be......