Tens of Thousands Protest ObamaCare in D.C., Legacy Media Unimpressed
Tea party protesters today filled the West Lawn of the Capitol in a quickly-convened protest against the Obama administration’s health care reform bill.
According to the Los Angeles Times:
Clogging the sidewalks and streets of Capitol Hill were at least hundreds — no official estimate was yet available — of loud, furious protesters, many of them tea party opponents of the health care overhaul.
Hundreds of people were clogging the sidewalks and streets of Capitol Hill? MSNBC said:
Located at the West Front of the Capitol in the grassy area below the steps, are according to two Capitol Hill Police officers [sic. Don't they teach these kids grammar these days?] between 1,500 to 2,000 Tea Party protesters.
“1,500 to 2,000″?
Fox News made it “thousands,” and the Washington Post first estimated hundreds and then stopped mentioning crowd size at all.
Yes, it’s time for another game of “Legacy media, let’s estimate that crowd.”
Long-time PJM readers may recall that we went through a similar exercise with the September 12, 2009, tea party protests in D.C. (see the articles on the 14th and 17th of September.)
So let’s apply the same methodology.
The troll says you have fuzzy math. 2000 to 3000 max.
As we can see clearly in the photo, not one single individual was there.
In other news: Oceana has always been at war with Eurasia.
Not bad considering that the 9/12 protests were planned two months in advance while today’s protest was planned on the fly.
I was there and I can personally tell you that there were more than a couple of hundred clogging the streets. Subway cars going to Capital South were at capacity and the line to get into the House office buildings stretched around the block. I would say that the estimate of 30,000 is a good conservative number.
Please checkout my blog at http://jhpruitt.blogtownhall.com/ to see how the visit to my congressman went.
It’s not like it was a COFFEE party or anything.
Now THAT would be news at just 20 people showing up.
Those were not Tea Partiers. That was the “Stop persecuting Somali Pirates” rally, sponsored by CAIR.
Was there. The crowd was ENORMOUS. We have TWO DAYS to assemble this and people came from all over. I would have to say while not as huge as 9/12 my guess would be between 35,000 – 40,000. It was loud, angry, and people are just not going to take the fascism from Washington any more. Their time is running out.
From reports and phone calls I received, 25K+/- was the estimate. What is amazing is the lack of coverage by the media, except for the phony racist and homophobic accusations. They did cover the anti war protests, however. I guess Obama lied, kids died is better news than Obama lied granny died.
Firestopper, I’d say you have a future with MSNBC except I don’t think anyone has much of a future with MSNBC.
Here we go loop-dee-looooooooooo, here we go loop-de-lieeeeeeeeee.
The numbers game again.
It’s so pathetic when the ‘under-the-bridge’ people know damned well that the majority of Americans are against KenyanKevorkianKretin care.
The lying abut crowd size is almost a cottage industry. These folk seem to think the public is too stupid to figure it out…
“How many protesters were really at the Capitol today?”
Well, it depends on what do you mean by “is” – we’re living the times of “your narrative” vs. “my narrative”, of “fluid, multifaceted reality”, and serene acceptance of all this crap under the banner of “open mindedness”, “unconditional love” and “non-judgementalism” -
Fact is, most of what some years ago would have rightly rated as garbage, has morphed in an official, almost universally truth – I mean the complete indifference for veracity and correctness –
Hasn’t the climategate’s scientifical debacle been anticipated by academia applauded frauds like “Black Venus”, “Same Sex Marriages In The Eastern Church” and “Steel, Germs etc”.? Aren’t we applauding day in day out Michurin and Lisenko types?
So, how many protesters really were at the Capitol Hill today? I go with my reality, Kipling goes with his reality, Rachel Maddow goes with her reality and we’ll see -
And remember, it’s not the hand that rocks the craddle that steers the world – it’s the hand that controlls the communications, and from this point of view, the left is still in the command of the “narratives” and bullhorns -
Re #1/Firestopper:
FS, when you used to dba as Ellie Light you used to be funnier -
Then – how could an Obamaton like you be funny when Barry slipped to 43% approval today?
And we’ll see Rasmussen’s numbers tomorrow – that’s a special, earlier one day -
More grief to you, Frazier Forrest troll -
You can do your own count-estimate from the photo, best if you can blow it up. Count how many people you can see across the front “row” of the crowd, then estimate the distance from front to back compared to the apparent distance across the front. Apply the ratio of apparent distances to the count across the front, to get an estimate of the count if you were looking at the side of the crowd. Multiply the front view count by the side view count and you have your own reasonable crowd size estimate.
I did this without being very careful with the front view count and got about 10,000. (I didn’t blow up the image, but just counted ten and then estimated how many groups of ten it would take to span the front.)
Hope this helps if you want to ignore the “experts” and do it yourself. (Why does this seem like such a complicated problem???)
OK, I redid this by blowing up the image and counting as carefully as I could – at least 3 times. Pushing it, I could get a count as large as maybe 12,000 for that crowd in the photo. I do notice that there are apparently quite a few across the street on the left, that I wouldn’t hazard an estimate for, other than it HAS to be minor compared to the main crowd. Also, note that the crowd doesn’t appear to be near as deep as wide – not surprising given their interest in getting as close to the WH as possible. So . . . there you have it!
The Washington DC Tea Party was twice the Baby Boomer-famed ’69 “March on Washington” and that was only “tens of thousands” for left/libtards.
#13
I dont know who ellie light is and I dont know who barry is but if I had to guess I would say that you are a teabagger and a birther. Rasmussens poll will tellyou what you want to hear because it always does. I set my number of teabaggers low to light your fire so to speak. There was another rally at the white house for immigrants, so dont you be counting them in on your pity party. The fact is that you wont make a difference, the bill will pas and there is nothing you can do about it. The teabaggers will fade into obscurity until about a month before election time. If you want to see what the teabaggers are really about watch these videos: http://newleftmedia.com
Dont get scared by the web site name . They were shot by an independent movie buff and all he did was ask them simple questions about what they stood for and gave them a chance to voice their opinion.
Sorry Charlie I dont like msnbc or cnn or fox I make up my own mind.
There was an anti-war protest today and that explains crowed trains and buses. More people showed up at the ant-war protest (thousands) than the tebag protest. Give it up baggers, you lose tomorrow.
why would you expect anything but lies from liars
keep up the pressure Charlie
the good guys might stop this monstrosity of progressive bullsh!t yet
Using the “Million Man March” accounting formula (ie. Total Reported Number of Protesters = Nx10, with the variable “N” being the count based on the 1.8 person/meter^2 formula used by the National Park Service, and “10″ being the typical Mainstream Media Bias Adjustment Factor), then the media reports should have stated that there were around a quarter million right-wing racist types out there.
If this was a left-wing protest, the number of protesters could have also been accurately estimated by measuring the amount of trash left behind. But these were polite, tidy and courteous conservatives, so that method would not be practical.
There could be 10 million people there and the media would still say “crowds numbering in the hundreds milled around the mall…” It’s like the sign that was at the 9/12 rally: “No matter what this says, it’ll be called racist”.
So, yeah. They were there by the hundreds….about 2 1/2 thousand hundred.
It’s weird how bad they are at habitually undercounting things until it comes to a Minnesota Senatorial election…
Herb, I think you’re being misled by the lens. Go back to the Google map here — I guess “picture” might not have been the best choice for a link word — and look at the actual area of the lawn, which is roughly twice as deep as it is wide. Checking it from Google Earth, that area is about 55 meters wide, and it’s about 110 meters back to the trees at the back, which also looks like it’s about the back edge of the crowd. So the crowd is actually around twice as deep as it is wide.
That would seem to argue for a rough doubling of your estimate, which would be 20,000 to 25,000. Conveniently, my 22K is right in the middle of that range.
Gee, Sue, it sounds to me like you should be all happy. But you come across as miserable. Problems?
This isn’t really anything new. The only time they report on these rallies is to impugn their motives or minimize their numbers. But my feeling is that the word is spreading via – get this – grass roots. What a concept.
Firestopper, you do know that the White House is roughly 1.5 miles away and around a right hand corner from the Capitol, right? (Zoom that map out: going along the Mall it’s roughly 35 times as far as that crowd is front to back, or as the crow flies it’s about 20 times as far, along Pennsylvania Avenue, which is the right hand one of the two major roads.) Your immigrants aren’t in the picture.
It’s good that you make up your own mind, but it helps if you get your facts straight.
That shot crops the side lawns! Here’s a pan from the Capitol steps taken by Rep. Trent Franks at about the same hour (note the people still arriving – I have friends that didn’t arrive until around 1:00 p.m.):
http://www.twitvid.com/4D722
Whatever one’s estimate from the still may be, based on the pan, I think it needs to be increased by about 50%.
Was there – don’t forget side lawns; and also, if you just count the people on the lawn at one particular time you’re not getting the full count; there was a constant flux of people coming and going.
Overall, it was an unbelievably exciting day! When we sang the national anthem I’ll wager there were few fully dry eyes. There was also a girls choir singing “My Country Tis of thee.”
What a day to remember.
Last night’s ABC “news” covered the crowd as racists. They led with a member of the Tea Party “spitting” at congressman John Lewis as another member called him the “N” word.
Then showing the crowd chanting “kill the bill”…the newscaster said “it is difficult to make out exactly what they are saying”. No it wasn’t. ABC covered the protesters as a bunch of racists, nut jobs, who had violence on their minds.
That’s what ABC has become.
I was there. It was epic–when 3:00pm neared, the concentration of the crowd was along the entrance of the Rayburn House Office Building. Patriots clogged the steps up around the balcony, waving flags, yelling “Nancy! Nancy!” and “Kill the Bill” over and over again. Police tried to keep the crowd out of the street. At one point, about 50-75 just walked right past the police who blew their whistles right in their faces. The line into the building snaked around the corner. The staffers in the Congressional offices were frazzled, to put it lightly.
10, 100, 1,000, 10,000 don’t matter a bit. Congress got an earful yesterday.
Today, Michele Bachman said that they will hold a church service in Congress, a first in a long time, according to her.
The Media sucks. I’m just wondering how and when God is going to punish them for misleading so many people. Even if Obamacare will eventually be a good thing (which it won’t) the fact of the matter will always boil down to that these people are not doing their jobs (and it is my business, in this case), they are misleading Americans to kowtow to their agenda, and they are slandering half the country in the process.
your photo does not include the other side- [ to the right of yr first image] where I spent the 2 hours– there had to be another 2000/ 3000 persons there additionally.
afterwards we went along and protested in LARGE NUMBERS!! along the various offices — Rayburn/ Cannon etc.
maybe the media choose to ignore it, but Ill betcha dollars to donuts wavering dems looking out the windows at what coalesced in essentially 48 hours notice must be really frightened and remember the remark from the French Revolution when the minister replied to Loius question = are my people in revolt again and received back the response– no sire– this is not a revolt– this is a revolution.
{Im going back to the barricades again this afternoon– according to firedoglake count now we have 219 — seems hard to believe as prevailing msm meme is thta this is over!
Demonstrations are a time honoured French sport. The French media usually give two estimates on crowd size – one from the police, presumably an estimate from a helicopter, the other from the organisers who if it is an important one, station people whose job it is to count those passing. Police always seem to underestimate the numbers so I would tend to trust the organisers, who as far as I can tell do it in reasonably honest albeit rule-of-thumbfashion.
Judging from the photo, I would estimate about 4000 max. — No, I have no connection with the French Police, but have played in concerts in front of up to 11000 people, so I know what that sort of crowd looks like and of course, if others turned up afterwards…
Well, I’m on your side and I know as you do that the MSM will of course ignore or at best underestimate this. But I gotta tell you, one can look at that photo and easily tell there are nowhere near 22000 people there. I was disappointed to realize that.
So I wanted to be sure. Do what I did:
Start at the lower right hand corner and mark the width of ten little people ‘dots’ – it’s about a thumb tip’s worth. Count the thumb tip increments right to left across the front row – it’s about eleven. Then count people ‘dots’ front row to back row – it’s twenty-five, tops. That gives you 2750 people on that lawn in that photo.
But this is a very imprecise method. So double it. Sorry, guys, 6000 max. Way max.
NY Post had a story about protestors with signage saying “Kill, Kill” and yelling the N word at Black legislators . . . either those pols were exaggerating, or there were some individuals doing that. If the latter is the case either they are idiots who were part of the protest, or the SEIU planted some folks to get attention and defame the crowd. EIther way this is a weapon aimed at the legitimacy of the movement.
The best defense is a good offense, the shits who used such a word in such a place must be identified and (metaphorically) eviscerated.
@18 firestopper
I watched your video. I would agree that people could have been more infomormed, but the final bill did not come out until 2 days ago! I have not been able to read the whole thing in that time; have you? No one disputes that this constitutes at least 1/6 of our economy or that over 60% (some will say 70) of the country does not want this wide sweeping bill. Perhaps reform is needed. All I have seen in the bill or heard from anyone on the left is what it does to insurance companies. Where are the other reforms? (being allowed to buy health insurance across state lines, tort reform, etc.) Why would people be required to get it? It is a person’s personal responsiblity to get insurance or not. If the government can force you to purchase health insurance, what else can they eventually force you to do? This is why people are so angry (and rightfully so).
Not a bad crowd for such a short notice. Plus there was nothing at the State level. Not everyone can drop everything and go to DC on short notice. It will be interesting this spring and summer. A lot has changed in a year. More people are out of work, this bill will probably passed, and the D=rats plan to charge headlong into more things that will anger people even more. I couldn’t attend anything last year since I still had a job. But thanks to the insane policies enacted here in Wis. I no longer have that problem and can join protests here. And I believe I am not alone. I think the Rats may find this afternoon that all they managed to do was to fire on Fort Sumpter and awaken the sleeping giant.
“Don’t mourn. Organize.” – Joe Hill
Whatever one’s estimate from the still may be, based on the pan, I think it needs to be increased by about 50%.
Right. Notice I said that was a noon photo, and estimated that at noon it was about 22,000. So apply your 50 percent and we get 33,000, which compares pretty well with my 30,000. SO if you wanted to say 35,000 I wouldn’t argue with you, 40,000 still seems a little high to be credible, and 50,000 still seems unlikely.
Similarly,
But this is a very imprecise method. So double it. Sorry, guys, 6000 max. Way max.
That doesn’t seem to jibe with the photo. If people were nice regular rows, like say in folding chairs, you could count heads front to back with some success, but in a randomly arranged crowd you can’t see all the heads. In the photo, though, you can see that the crowd reaches some fairly obvious landmarks, like the trees that are 110 meters back from the edge of the steps. 6,000 people in that area would be pretty scattered, so I don’t think that’s plausible either.
I’m just wondering how and when God is going to punish them for misleading so many people.
You looked at CNN’s ratings recently?
The lawn was squeaky clean when the crowd broke up. There was nary a gum wrapper to be found. Now if that had been a left-leaning crowd the lawn would have been left a disaster area.
It was an almost supernaturally polite crowd and represented people from all over. I met people from Texas, North Carolina, Wisconsin, Washington and who knows where else all of whom paid their own way at short notice. None of these people will back off one little bit no matter what happens today. Almost everyone was taking their signs home with them, for re-use later.
The crowd was at least 25000. And all of these people came on short notice, often from great distances.
I was there and interviewed by Pajamas Media. It doesn’t matter the crowd. I took 3 planes and a shuttle to get there from Texas. We leave our families, our jobs and at the calling go as fast as we can for as little as we can spend. I met two women three days before this event and we shared a room. This is amazing to me. My sign is getting dog eared (KILL THE BILL) and this was my third time. The president lies and even if this passes, we will not give up.
Fox News made it “thousands,”….
Are you sure they weren’t counting the wrong demo … again?
Firewifem
The point I was trying to make was that these poeple have no real idea what they are even protesting. Just because Fox noise said its bad is not good enough.
If the commie scum (oops demonRATS) pass this POS the armed revolution will begin.
Reply to Charlie Martin @39: I think your numbers are spot on.
Reply to tc @30: You are right on in your description. The staff at Solomon Ortiz’s office were locked up tight behind closed doors. They did not respond to any knocks from the door. Eventually a staffer came out to speak with me when I phoned the office and told them I was a constituent. I was never allowed to enter the office for which my tax dollars paid. She had nothing but negative things to say about the protesters.
As to the anti-war protest: There were a few people at the back and across the street that tried to counter-protest. They were easily drowned out by those in the back. I spoke with four of these protesters. One held a sign which said “No Hope in Capitaism.” Due to the misspelling I also assume their is no hope in our education system. They enlightened me to the fact that as Americans we have genicide in our bones. I eventually walked away as I found it useless to argue with such idiots who lived in an alternate reality.
Sue,
After Pearl Harbor was attacked, it was six months before America happened to win a battle. But the end result three short years later was that we stood over a broken and defeated enemy in a charred nation.
You would do well to heed the wisdom of Japanese Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto who said, “I fear all we have done is to awaken a sleeping giant and fill him with a terrible resolve.”
Enjoy your boastfulness while it lasts.
This is like debating how many angels can dance on the head of a pin. If there were 30 million people at the event, do you think it would make a bit of difference? Your congress does not answer to you, only to Obama and Pelosi. This will be shoved down your throat, as will cap’n trade and amnesty for illegals. The legitimate criticisms of such bills have nothing against human interest stories such as the woman who had to use her dead sister’s dentures, saving the planet from “catastrophic climate change” and illegals who “do the jobs Americans won’t do.” You see, liberal elites and politicians are much smarter than the racist American yahoos. As soon as they throw the epithet “racist” at you, the argument is over, you have been discredited as a citizen. There is no hope other than secession from the new USSA of Chairman Maobama.
To quote Ron Rosenbaum
“every member of the tea party is a racist and approves of racism”
Up until 15-20 years ago there was no extensive “forum” we could go to, that made counter-claims to the MSM “stuff.”
Let’s consider how outlandishly ….. the MSM most-assuredly was able to perform ….. before O’Keefe, Breitbart and MANY others were standing on the corner of our figurative Town Square.
So how much of our past can we truly believe? How much of it is trustworthy? Was Barry Goldwater a selfish warmongering bastard? Were some politicians clearly more noble than others? Were the past’s news people clearly more principled than today’s?
I surmise: It’s hard to tell what we do not know.
48. Yes there is- bust out the tar and feathers.
Charlie Martin,
Good points. I attended the “protest” yesterday in DC and would have to estimate that there was at least twenty thousand TPP present.
I was also present at the so called “9/12 Project”. Then, just as now 2/3 to 3/4 of the “protestors” were male baby boomers/seniors; and 99% of them were white. Now there’s nothing wrong with being a white, male, baby boomer/senior but any political movement that is that blatantly exclusionary (deliberately or not), is not a movement that can be sustained in this country.
Now I happen to believe that the financial issues being voiced by the TPP are valid; but it appears that most of the TP movement is not. Perhaps that’s why the MSM is so dismissive of the TP.
25,000 serious individuals earned high praise by their action. When it approaches 5 million we will see significant changes. Phone calls and emails are good, but they can too easily be ignored by the media. When the crowd hits 5 million, they will have to pay attention. Until then, my bet – the opposite of my hope – is that the Progressive steamroller will continue.
Mr Independent, I’m a little curious why you think the Tea Party protests aren’t valid simply because the majority at the protest were white people, including a fair number of Hispanics.
Give the old droolers in the Legacy Media a break, will ya? They’ve only got ten fingers, and anything after that is the “New Math” to them.
I was there all day on Saturday. At noon Michelle Bachman told use that there was an overhead count already completed and at that time there were 25000 people gathered. They just kept coming. Even though the event proper was to be from 12-1:30 pm, people stayed. It was announced that at 1:30 we should go to our Representatives offices, and those on the fence, and share our opinions and desires regarding health care. Not only did we do that, but at 5 pm, people came back in droves and literally surrounded the Capital building. Not single file, but 3 and 4 people deep all the way around the building!! Capital police told me this has NEVER been done before. I have NO trouble believing there were 30+ thousand people there. San Diego’s Tea Party organization brought 800 people. Kentucky, my group, had almost 100 in attendance. I was personally told that the protesters were making the Rules committee so nervous that they couldn’t conduct business for the chanting outside. They Heard Us… They Just REFUSE To Listen.
We can count, and we are counting the days to the election, they have not heard our voice, then let them hear how we vote
I’ve posted this on my blog today. Sorry for the style, English is my second language.
I want my country back!
It seems like the ultra-liberals have been able to bribe and coerce enough congress-scumbags to pass the Obamacare. And as I said before, there would be hell to pay for this monstrosity. Obamacare is the very definition of unlimited government – the threat of which was forewarned by the Founding Fathers more than two centuries ago. The federal government, which is up to its neck in debt and unfunded liabilities, decided to launch the biggest entitlement of all times – the medical care for all. The spending on this new entitlement will surely dwarf many if not most of Federal programs and will make the bankruptcy of federal and state governments inevitable. The time of reckoning is at hand, brothers and sisters. Obamacare is the last breath of the liberal order – and it’s time to take back America from the party of thieves and looters.
All patriots of this nation must stand together and fight back. United we will win! There is no blue or red America anymore – there are only those that believe in America the beautiful, America the free, America the shining city on the hill – and those that believe in welfare socialism and government tyranny. Today, we fight not only for our personal well-being – but for the dignity and honor of this country, for the right to look into the eyes of our children and say – we defended this nation from the perils of socialism. In November 2010, we will answer the crucial questions of our times – are American people worthy of the efforts of the Founding Fathers? Will American people have to right to proudly say “We are Americans” – or they will forever live in infamy and indignity of welfare socialism?
I am glad that the Democratic Party passed the Rubicon. From now on, there is no coming back for the liberal elites, no talk of compromise and middle-ground. Today, it is abundantly clear that we either will live in Obama-America or America that our Founding Father envisioned. You cannot have both.
The November elections will be the most important elections in our lifetime. If you don’t vote for America in November – you don’t deserve to be called an American.
Written by a Russian immigrant who loves America and who loves freedom.
Charlie Martin,
The majority of the TPP weren’t white, they were almost all (99%)white. Not Hispanic/Latino but white. As I stated earlier, there’s nothing wrong with being white but when your movement is that exclusionary it calls into question your credibility.
What we see in the videos of the crowd and the black congressmen is not an example of American racism but an example of how far we’ve come. Let me explain. “Just like Selma,” said one of the congressmen? Hardly. Had these two black congressmen been transported back 50 years in time the mob would have promptly seized them and strung them from the nearest tree, calling them Nigg*** would have been beside the point. The fact that now they were able to march through an angry white mob and were possibly called a name by ONE LONE NUT is an astounding example of the lack of racism among conservative Americans. A black president, voted into office by mostly white Americans, turns America into a socialist welfare state and yet black congressmen are still able to walk through a crowd of white people who have seen their beloved country crushed under the heel of socialist thugs without being torn to shreds.
SFI
The majority of the TPP weren’t white, they were almost all (99%)white. Not Hispanic/Latino but white. As I stated earlier, there’s nothing wrong with being white but when your movement is that exclusionary it calls into question your credibility.
You might think about the selection bias there — who can take a day off to get to DC on short notice? You’ll probably find that an unusual proportion of these folks are independent small business owners and professionals, probably heavily weighted to Republicans and independents, and a large proportion from the South. You might — watch, someone will if they haven’t already, I just got up — you might see an argument that this is the Old Confederacy rising again. When you do, ask yourself “what part of the country is within a day’s drive of DC?”
But that’s all really secondary, as I’m still waiting for an explanation of why a political movement that’s heavily weighted to white people lacks credibility. According to Wolfram Alpha, self-identified white people make up 80 percent of the population.
I was there on Saturday. I would guess 10-15,000 (what you don’t see from the photo are all the folks on the other sides of the walkway). There were 3 pictures of Obama with a Hitler moustache, all set up at the Lyndon LaRouche stand (absolutely no one was interested). I heard not a single nasty comment, racial or otherwise. We had young, old, healthy, sick, civilian, vet, and yes, black (although admittedly only a dozen or so I saw). These people could not have been nicer. They simply came because they see and sense a government that is out of control, careening towards a crisis on a road paved with compassion and good intentions. They recognize charity starts at home, not in the power hallways of the Rayburn building. I am not a Teabagger or whatever other homosexual slur you want to call me to underestimate my strength and lessen your self-loathing. ALl I know is that the people I was with on Saturday were the kind of people who started this country (countdown to race card in 3…2…1…). I was proud to be an American (countdown to redneck card in 3…2….1..). Lastly, we walked from the capitol lawn past the White House to see the anti-war protest. Now I have an appreciation for the counter protest as it provides a healthy balance to power structure, both left and right. However, what I saw and heard was both frightening (from an intelligence point of view) and sad. Plus, it was an unseasonably warm day (75+) and the womyn had their armpit hair out for the first time…..well, let’s just say the Teabaggers were a lot more attractive buch….www.firenancypelosi.com….just donated money to a political cause for the first time in my life and could not feel better about myself.
Charlie Martin,
Re: post 61
As I stated in previous posts is not that the TPP are heavily weighted to white people but that they are almost all (99%) white people. That’s appears exculsionary to me. If the number was about 65% I wouldn’t be making this argument; but it’s not 65% it’s 99%.
BTW you might want to look into more detail about the ethnic makup of our country. Wolfram Alpha doesn’t initially list Latinos as a separate ethnic group but instead includes their portion of the population (15%) as a part of the white population.
Mr Independent, you’re still not quite coping with the question. You assert that the Tea Party crowd “appears exculsionary” [sic] because a lot of the attendees you saw, maybe even a very high proportion, were white. Now, since I know for a fact that a number of the speakers were not “white” in your narrow definition, or in fact any definition; and since I know they were were none the less cheered and applauded, I suspect you’re starting off with a bunch of hidden assumptions. (Actually, not to put too fine a point on it, I suspect you’re a classic “concern troll”, trying to imply racism where there was none.)
But I’m still looking for you to clarify your main point: why is it that a demonstration of upwards of 20,000 people should be discounted because it was heavily white?
Charlie Martin,
I don’t understand what is so difficult to understand about my point. Only about 65% of the US population is non-Latino white. So when I see an “movement” that is so exclusionary I question that movements’ credibility.
On your counter-point, yes not all of the speakers where white. However, 99% of the attendees were. I’ve noticed that you’re not disputing that point. Now I expect that most political movements are going to be a majority white but it shouldn’t be 99%. When it is, that raises red flags for me.
Finally, on your “question” about if think the TP movement is racist; I’m not convinced of that. If you re-read my first post you’ll notice that I also pointed out that 2/3 to 3/4 of the TPP were male baby boomers/seniors.
Charlie Martin:
How about a pic of these apparent large crowd of thousands? This was a crowd not a movement.
The media, like the nation is tired of seeing loud and furious fringe of the republican party.
Even Michelle Malkin showed a pic.
http://michellemalkin.com/2010/03/20/day-of-defiance-nationwide-protests-as-slaughter-house-rushes-through-demcare/
Montana,
I’ve been to several TP events. This isn’t another WMD story by Fox “News”. They are not just small crowds of people. The TP is a movement. The question that I raise is; are they legit? I have serious doubts.
But make no mistake about it. They are not the fringe of the REB party, they are the REB party.
I’m assuming that your a DEM. And with that assumption, I’ll give you some free advise: Don’t underestimate those people. 2/3 – 3/4 of them are baby boomers/seniors. Seniors are they most powerful voting block in this country. Remember that.
How about a pic of these apparent large crowd of thousands? This was a crowd not a movement.
So you didn’t go on to the second page, eh?
Charlie Martin,
Have you looked into more detail about the ethic makeup of our country?
If you have, do you now accept that your previous statement in post #61 was wrong?
And if you believe that, are you now willing to accept that when a political movement is unrepresentative of the USA that that movement has a credibility problem?
If you don’t, can you explain why?
If you have, do you now accept that your previous statement in post #61 was wrong?
Why, no. As a matter of fact, I said
“According to Wolfram Alpha, self-identified white people make up 80 percent of the population.”
And WolframAlpha said:
.
So unless you’re using a definition of “wrong” with which I’m unfamiliar, then I’m afraid I just am not wrong.
But let’s assume, arguendo, that I am wrong. That doesn’t affect the question I’ve now asked several times: just because the tea party demonstration was dominated by whites, why does that mean it should be discounted?
Let’s ask a similar question: the NAACP is heavily dominated by black people, much out of proportion to the general population. Does that mean their credibility is in question?
Charlie Martin,
You didn’t answer my first question, so I’ll asume that the answer is no (correct me if I’m wrong).
On my second question, your referece does not include latinos. As I stated earlier, Wolfram Alpha inlcudes their portion of the population with whites. So the actual numbers should read ~65% white, ~15% latino, ~13% black, ~4% asian, etc.
And it does affect the question. If only 65% of population is white, why are 99% of the TPP white? Why is this movement so exclusionary. Additonally, why are 2/3 to 3/4 of the TPP male baby boomers/seniors?
Concerning your repeated question (that I’ve answered several times) on my view of an ethnicly exclusionary political movement’s lack of credibility; my answer (again) is this: I don’t see how any political movement can claim any kind of credibility if it is ethnically exclusive. If an organization only allows whites, or latinos, or blacks, or asians amoung it’s ranks (delibertly or not) I don’t see how you can claim to be credible.
On your counter-question, yes I think that the credibility of organizations like the NAACP and NCLR are in question.
Finally, if you think I’m wrong on this point; can you name any movement in the U.S. that is as exclusionary as the TPP that you can state (with a straight face) is credible?
Charlie Martin,
Sorry about all the typos in that last post. I had to use my phone for that one.
I get pleasure from, cause I discovered just what I was taking a look for. You’ve ended my four day long hunt! God Bless you man. Have a great day. Bye