Thousands Rally in Capital to Protest Big Government

[hambubba]

A sea of protesters filled the west lawn of the Capitol and spilled onto the National Mall in the largest rally against President Obama since he took office, a culmination of a summer-long season of protests that began with opposition to a health care overhaul and grew into a broader dissatisfaction with government.

“This is not some kind of radical right-wing group,” Senator Jim DeMint, Republican of South Carolina, said in an interview as dozens of people streamed by him. “I just hope the Congress, the Senate and the president recognize that people are afraid of what’s going on.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/09/13/us...rotestweb.html

OK. This crowd was a "surprise". I don't think that the entire country has gone nuts, but what is happening here? I have some choices:

- people are truly scared
- people are truly scared by false information
- people really, really are serious about goverment issues
- the government has done a pisspoor job in public education
- the president is a black man, "incapable of operating beyond pushing a broom at mikky D's"
- ...you fill in more.

The whole thing, really, really escapes me. I may have lost a friend due to the arguments about this, by simply showing a web site that dealt with falsehoods. He didn't like that, and shut me out. A dissenting opinion was not welcome. Is that where we are? "My truth or no truth?" I seriously can't believe it. People, in general, have NEVER been this vocal about politics.

I personally did not vote for Obama, but I am not on the "fighting side" like these folks are. I may disagree, but you know, there's ways to do that. I can't blind myself by obvious lies, but instead have to work with the truth.

Bottom line, he is the President. I am not sure at this point in his term if he is a good one or not, but as I was telling my wife, he's done nothing any different than any other president.

Other that trying health care... Clinton wouldn't do it, Hilliary tried - and failed. Was it too much? I dunno.

I am confuzzled.

[PatYoung]

The demonstration appears to be three to four times as large as I would have expected. There are a few factors here:

1. The Spring t-bag gatherings were largely unsuccessful in impacting on popular opinion, but they did provide the losing side in the elections an opportunity for solidarity and pointed towards a methodology for "growing the movement".

2. The disruptive town hall protests were effective at moving public opinion and showed, as the Left has known for years, when you are not in power you can keep your issues and opinions on the agenda by getting your feet out on the street.

3. So far, these rallies have mostly drawn in the pre-existing conservative base, but some independents seem to be at least listening now to the Right.

4. Joe Wilson's rudeness seems to have fired people on the Right up, even as it alienated many centrists.

5. A major win by the Right on health care will further energize the movement.

6. Which is why Obama has to win on healthcare.

[lord_feldon]

The atmosphere was rowdy at times, with signs and images casting Mr. Obama in a demeaning light. One sign called him the “parasite in chief.” Others likened him to Hitler. Several people held up preprinted signs saying, “Bury Obama Care with Kennedy,” a reference to the Massachusetts senator whose body passed by the Capitol two weeks earlier to be memorialized.

Stay classy.

A band of protesters in colonial gear wended through the crowd, led by a bell ringer in a tricorn hat calling for revolution.

I trust that the crowd disapproved of this (literally) anti-American rabblerousing.

“I don’t know if anything will come of this or not,” she said, “but this is a peaceful way of showing our frustration.”

So is baking a cake with a rude word on it. At least then you get cake at the end. Now you're just the laughingstock of a lot of people.

[hambubba]

Originally Posted by lord_feldon

Now you're just the laughingstock of a lot of people.

I sincerely hope you are right. To date, I have not met many obama supporters in person (where we speak politics, anyway). I have, however, met a lot, and I mean a LOT of people with similar sentiments as these.

[lord_feldon]

I suppose I shouldn't have said "just." I'm sure there are a lot of people who think this event was the greatest thing ever, because we need our country back from B Hussein Soetoro and his Marxist Czars.

-Lord "she's still the laughingstock of me" Feldon

[wanderwoman]

Originally Posted by hambubba

I sincerely hope you are right. To date, I have not met many obama supporters in person (where we speak politics, anyway). I have, however, met a lot, and I mean a LOT of people with similar sentiments as these.

LA is one of the reddest of the red states, it is not? I see some of this in Indiana, which was pretty red until the last election (When it turned blue! Yay!)

However, I went to my dad's last weekend and they are staunch Republicans. I no more than mentioned Obama's name, and my stepmother went off on a loud rant about how I don't want a health care system like the U.K. or Canada because they kill old people there. I did not argue with her because I love her and because she cooked dinner.

Where I hear a lot of support of Obama is at work (social services) and with my friends, coworkers and clients who are black.

[Simply Madeline]

Originally Posted by hambubba

I sincerely hope you are right. To date, I have not met many obama supporters in person (where we speak politics, anyway). I have, however, met a lot, and I mean a LOT of people with similar sentiments as these.

Originally Posted by wanderwoman

LA is one of the reddest of the red states, it is not? I see some of this in Indiana, which was pretty red until the last election (When it turned blue! Yay!)

It's definitely location-based. The major criticism that I hear about Obama (from real-life friends and neighbors) is that he's not radical/liberal enough, that he gives in to Republicans too readily, and that he's too willing to compromise in the name of bipartisanship.

[MidgardDragon]

Strange that someone else should mention a family-hatred for Obama and an at-work support. I'm in the exact same boat. Whenever I go to my parents' house I'm subjected to Fox News rhetoric both from Fox News and from my parents repeating it word for word like it is law. At work, everyone but perhaps a few who have kept quiet seem to be happy that we have Obama in office and that he's trying to make strides towards true health care reform.

(Full disclosure, in a way you could say I "work" for the healthcare industry, though technically I work in what would traditionally be called "Communications" for Doctors and Patients, so we're bound to attract people who actually *want* a change in traditional insurance due to being witness to its idiocy first hand.)

[Ramblin' Dave]

“This is not some kind of radical right-wing group,” Senator Jim DeMint, Republican of South Carolina

David Duke always said he wasn't a racist, too.

[Simply Madeline]

http://www.salon.com/politics/war_ro...09/12/protest/

The atmosphere and the slogans were, in places, extreme enough that four liberals who'd come to parody the protesters were having no trouble slipping in unnoticed, even cheered. This despite the four -- Jack Neville, Julian Brunner, Tushara Ekanayake and Marina France -- carrying signs like one that read "A whole lot of white people here today" and another that asked "Where's the proof?" and showed an image of Obama's certification of live birth. Ekanayake's sign warned of gay Muslims -- it should have been a tip-off, except that he was also carrying a photo of Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal, a rising star in the Republican Party, and telling people he was Jindal's nephew. That, he said, had allayed suspicion.

[AnglRdr]

Didn't DeMint tell the protesters "Welcome to Waterloo?" As I recall, the significant memory of Waterloo was that it was a lost battle.

Is there some other interpretation of this statement I am missing?

[Simply Madeline]

Originally Posted by AnglRdr

Is there some other interpretation of this statement I am missing?

DeMint is a huge ABBA fan?

[AnglRdr]

Originally Posted by Simply Madeline

DeMint is a huge ABBA fan?

Seriously, I hear "Waterloo," and my brain immediately flashes back to "Muriel's Wedding." So I saw him say that and thought "hey, if someone had done a Waterloo karaoke, I might've gone.

Not really, as I wouldn't be able to deal with all the attention the newsmedia would give me as the sole non-Caucasian in all of Washington DC, but you know what I mean. [I apologize for the stream-of-consciousness post]

[simone]

Originally Posted by AnglRdr

Didn't DeMint tell the protesters "Welcome to Waterloo?" As I recall, the significant memory of Waterloo was that it was a lost battle.

Is there some other interpretation of this statement I am missing?

Waterloo marked the final defeat of Napoleon by coalition forces. After the defeat, Napoleon was exiled for good (he had been exiled earlier in the year but had escaped, returned to France, and tried to reclaim power) and Louis XVIII (brother of Louis XVI, who was executed in 1793) was put on the throne.

So I guess it would be a reference to defeating and deposing someone perceived as an illegitimate leader. And possibly, replacing him with the brother of the last ruler, in which case Jeb Bush is in for a surprise!

[Amigone201]

They're against "big government?" Oh, Heavens, we're free at last! Finally, someone has organized a group to oppose federal restrictions on who we can marry, what we can watch on TV, and what medical procedures women are allowed to have!

[Il-Mari]

Originally Posted by Amigone201

They're against "big government?" Oh, Heavens, we're free at last! Finally, someone has organized a group to oppose federal restrictions on who we can marry, what we can watch on TV, and what medical procedures women are allowed to have!

Well, I can understand how they would be so upset, since the previous Republican president reduced spending, cut the deficit, reduced government surveillance and interrogation powers...

Oh, wait, I was thinking of something else.

- Il-Mari

[Mickey Blue]

Originally Posted by Amigone201

They're against "big government?" Oh, Heavens, we're free at last! Finally, someone has organized a group to oppose federal restrictions on who we can marry, what we can watch on TV, and what medical procedures women are allowed to have!

Its just like Glenn Beck's "9/12" project where amongst their main virtues is "Its not Un-American to question the government" And I"m like.. Yea, you are absolutely right.. I'm just wondering why they just happened to learn that in the past six or seven months or so.. Before that of course it was un-American and downright treasonous.. But yea, its against 'Government" not against "Obama"... Riiiight.

Sometimes I wonder if these people (particularly Fox News) realize that those recorded shows from the past decade.. They are still around and can be watched.

-MB

[BringTheNoise]

Well, at least some people there managed to have some fun.

[Mateus]

This dude was the bravest man at the rally yesterday. If it weren't for the cops, he'd have been assaulted and probably killed.

[Sister Ray]

Originally Posted by BringTheNoise

Well, at least some people there managed to have some fun.

I'm not sure whether I like the lemon party guy or the guy on the far right more.

Sister "i hope they were taken seriously" Ray