9/12 Washington D.C. Tea Party Rally

From the Columbia Independent Examiner:

Saturday's "Tea Party" rally in Washington, D.C. may have far exceeded almost all expectations. According to individual reports on the internet late Saturday The National Park Service had reportedly estimated around 1.2 million people attended the rally. There is no mention of the rally on the Park Service website and I have been unable to confirm that they have released any official estimate.

Some websites citing the 1.2 million number have claimed to be quoting Park Service employees, but I can find no direct quotes from anyone connected to the Park Service that can be confirmed at this time. Phone calls to the NPS went unanswered on Sunday.

There were also several reports Saturday saying that ABC and Fox News had reported that the crowd was estimated to be as high as 2 million. ABC News is now saying they never reported that number. According to ABC they were misquoted by a rally speaker. At this time there is no report on the Fox News website that includes an estimated attendance figure.

Some liberal websites and blogs are putting the number much lower, with estimates ranging anywhere from 20,000 to 70,000. Based on photographs and video footage of the event the numbers would appear to be much larger than those estimates. The ticketed area of the National Mall alone has a capacity of 240,000 and the crowd clearly filled that area and beyond. The public access area of the Mall holds nearly 950,000 and photographs of that area show it to be at or near capacity, although it has been reported that other groups were holding events in that area.

There was also this gem of a paragraph in the article:

On Friday the White House claimed they had no idea the rally was even planned. A ridiculous assertion that shows how dismissive the Obama administration and the Democrat-led Congress are of those who oppose their agenda. It is impossible to believe that President Obama knew nothing of the event. The denial is a perfect example of why the President is losing the trust of many Americans. He stretches his credibility to its limits, and beyond.

The Tea Parties

All over the country there is a simmering anger at what is going on in Washington. I've been alive for forty years, and in my short lifetime I have never seen average working Americans this stirred up and angry. I see it first-hand every day here in east Texas and I hear it in the media, both main-stream (Left) and alternative (Right). The tea parties are a prime example. While there have been some Republican leaders who have tried to make hay by appearing at these tea parties (our esteemed Texas Governor Rick Perry would be an example) I know first-hand that these events are not organized by the Republican Party. In fact, many if not most of the people attending these are as angry at the Republicans as they are at the Democrats. At the heart of the matter is a feeling of disenfranchisement and a growing fear of our liberties being taken away.

After one of the local tea party events got a huge attendance I was talking to my boss about the event the following day. My boss is a liberal and he began spewing the leftist talking points about the rally. He said, "I don't understand what these people are angry about, Bush is the one who drove up these deficits in the first place."

That was true as far as it went. But I informed him that these people were as angry at Bush as they were at Obama. Bush started it, Obama has escalated it. It is a mistake to think that these tea parties are a Republican-driven vehicle. In fact, if you go to the Texas tea party web-site you will find that the only political party they are promoting is something called the Constitutional Party. If this is a Republican opposition effort, then they are not doing a good job of promoting themselves. (But when was the last time a Republican really did a good job of anything politically anyway?)

The next claim my boss tried to make was that these were a bunch of racists. That's typical leftist. When in doubt, pull out the race card. When I asked him for evidence of this, he pointed out that someone had brought in a placard claiming Obama was a Muslim.

Yep, that's it. Talk about a leap in logic. I told him that all this placard proved was that the guy was a nut-job and that events like that always attracted a few nut-jobs. You can't judge a crowd by one or two members. I also pointed out his non sequitur. This caused him to mumble back something about he knows people from the South (he's originally from up north) and he just knew that it was racially motivated.

Again, this is what the Left does. Stand against them and they demonize you. It's not possible that average, working, freedom-loving citizens would get upset about encroaching socialism and attempt to do something--within the parameters of the law--about it. No, there must be some high-level Republican operatives behind it. It is to laugh.