Anyone still think Glenn Beck is anything but bad for the country? Muslim marxist? I guess that's not as bad a data fit as "nazi," but it's still pathetic. "Yep, he's a natsee!"
10,000 looney's two steps removed from the KKK does not represent America buddy. All the things you are crying about is more associated with Bush - he wasted more money, corrupted more, took more of your liberties away, and failed America more then ever, yet these bozo's only decide to show up under the first year of a first term president and blame him for everything. Conservatism in America has officially gone bonkers. There's now only two sides to rationality in America. The left and the middle. The right has gone native. God help us all.
Personally, I'll go for the "Honk for English" little girl. What's the point of promoting one's preference for a particular language if you're not even going to use it, to speak/debate/disagree, but instead would rather listen to the disgusting blare of car horns? That about sums up the rally, to me. (Also, the dude-with-folded-arms looks pissed, as if he's about to smack his little darling if she asks again to go visit the Capitol, or the Smithsonian, or heck, even the bathroom, on their one and only trip to D.C. "...Well hold it in, then. I said no! Dang it, honey, we're making a point here. We don't cotton to no immigrants, not when we're busy marchin' in the capital, promotin' the ideas of our country's immigrant forefathers.") What about when it comes to going breakfast-less and lunch-less, too? I like your interpretation here. These rallies are always ripe for hookups of the like-minded. Do you think the lady was, knowing the rally would occur in the harsh light of midday, consciously doing her best to shield her most unattractive features? Trying to artificially widen her sign to "beer goggle" the available men of the picket crowd? Writing "debt" in contrasting red font (and, by complete coincidence, tagging the nominally homegrown sign with the website of its Astroturfing sponsor), to distract the eye from the terrible insurrection going on with her bluejean shorts, the Battle of the Bulge her crotch is making against its outcropping of fabric? OMG. Awesome. Let's see. In my teenage years I took out a McDonald's application (which, no kidding, was at the time also written in pictograph form), so I believe I am qualified to translate. Let's see, left-to-right: First off, an impressive if redundant use of synecdoche to signify that the White House, by which she means the building, is itself lying. Though, it does mean that she kinda screws up even her own invented syntax. But, onto the rest, which zoo has an actual living African on its grounds? Is this the shameful history of slavery, that in order for us to reflect upon its inhumanity, some well-intentioned Washington zoo has decided to keep it alive, incarnate, in the form of an actual caged African? Is it sort of like pandas, extinct everywhere but in captivity? The National Zoo still keeps a slave or two on its grounds? This is an outrage! I must really write my congressman a letter. (Though, this might explain why "1.5 to 2 million" patriots flocked to become Washington tourists this weekend.) Why a snake, stream? Why do I get the feeling that it doesn't represent Franklin's "Join or Die" cartoon (cause really, why would it, other than Glenn Beck uses it on tv everyday in an equally nonsensical fashion), or healthcare's traditional Asclepian staff, but instead signifies that we're all caught in the same infinitely abysmal, Tea Party ouroboros loop?
we wuz buying guns and all them missiles back then. that's a good god-fearin' use of that there money.
http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/prot...-falsely-attributed-abc-news/story?id=8558055 ABC News Was Misquoted on Crowd Size ABC News Reported D.C. Rally Size in Tens of Thousands, Not 1M to 1.5M as Activist Said. Conservative activists, who organized a march on the U.S. Capitol today in protest of the Obama administration's health care agenda and government spending, erroneously attributed reports on the size of the crowds to ABC News. Matt Kibbe, president of FreedomWorks, the group that organized the event, said on stage at the rally that ABC News was reporting that 1 million to 1.5 million people were in attendance. At no time did ABC News, or its affiliates, report a number anywhere near as large. ABCNews.com reported an approximate figure of 60,000 to 70,000 protesters, attributed to the Washington, D.C., fire department. In its reports, ABC News Radio described the crowd as "tens of thousands." Brendan Steinhauser, spokesman for FreedomWorks, said he did not know why Kibbe cited ABC News as a source. As a result of Kibbe's erroneous attribution, several bloggers and commenters repeated the misinformation.
Wait...if all these [millions] of people are in D.C. right now, does this mean there won't be any new updates on peopleofwalmart.com
To follow up on mc's post, here's the aerial photo of the Obama inaugural... Spoiler By all accounts, the teabaggery was confined to the first block and 1/2 of the mall. Squeezing that number down Pennsylvania Avenue might look impressive to some, but it is nowhere close to one million, much less two.
Yeah, I found that after posting above. I don't see how a flag threatening armed revolt is necessarily the symbol I'd want associated with nominally peaceful tax protests, but that's me. Didn't realize he was the grandfather of the "Gadsden Purchase" guy. If only Vietnam and Iraq War protesters had threatened widespread armed insurrection against our country, I'm sure liberal protests would have been far more successful over the years. (That's the problem with the Seattle WTO riot or the eco-terrorists of today: settling for breaking storefront windows / torching an SUV. Thinking too small.) That is our liberal mistake, though, actually believing in the government and our Union, I guess. (Nice that the "tree of liberty" doubles as a mushroom cloud of stupidity in that placard, though.)
Some of those pictures make you want to punch the **** out of everyone at those rallies. Incompetence is an infuriating quality.
"<s>Amen Sty</s>." Cleanliness is next to godliness, after all? By the way, why so many signs against amnesty, presumably for illegal aliens? That's not even the issue at the forefront right now. Were these people too lazy to redo the signs they made for the last protests they went to?
Actually, today I look back on the turnout with a great deal of pride since I feel I had a small part -- a very small part -- in turning out the crowds. (Oh, yes, I admit that some of the home-made signs were way over the top, especially with the seeming competition to come up with the "cleverest" sign. Of course, the press focused on misspellings, but one expects that from the current media. Haven't you ever been appalled by the lack of spelling ability here on the board?) However, wasn't it great to see so many normally apathetic voters get happily involved in the political process? And they weren't even paid to protest and/or get bused in like the Acorniers. Now the question is whether the passion for politics can be sustained by teaching the Democrat-leaning tea partiers and the Republican-leaning tea partiers to take over their respective precincts. Non-political people like these don't realize that, once they locate when and where their precincts meet, taking the precincts over doesn't require a great many registered voters. It's like re-potting a plant that's been looking puny lately. A little plant food, some water, fresh soil/mulch for the roots, a sunny spot by the window .... and watch that plant grow! Tea partiers as a whole need to be re-taught that politics was and still is America's No. 1 contact sport (pressing the flesh). All that's needed now is to get them off the streets and out of the bowling alleys and into the neighborhoods to recruit their neighbors. Once enough precincts are controlled, the county party machinery -- the semi-pros of politics -- can be taken over. That's not nearly as easy to do, but that's where the passion of the tea partiers needs to be steered. As more people get involved, IMO the natural tendency of people to gravitate to the center will leave moderates in command of both parties. My big puzzlement, Batman, given your passion for personal freedom of speech and thought, why aren't you delighted to see people peacefully expressing their right to disagree with the current administration?
Watch that plant grow with what exactly, the blood of tyrants? I'm sorry, but you seem to be completely whitewashing the crazy that appears to represent a sizable portion of the Tea Party movement. How do you respond to the people who so volubly signal that they're willing to revolt against the government of the United States (over piffle)? They're "unarmed... this time." Is a mob threatening violence really your idea of an informed voting base, a great new start for representative democracy? You went to a Tea Party preaching armed revolution against the government of the United States, and you came back impressed with the hostess' serving tray?
As I stated, there were some signs that were over the top, but big crowds always pull in a few fringees. IMO the media concentrated on the extreme signs because it put the movement in a bad light.
^^ You don't think it's a sizable minority, if not majority? Why else the prevailing "Don't Tread on Me" rhetoric, which is itself a call to arms against oppression? Compare and contrast, in terms of both morality authority and political effectiveness, if similar threats of revolt had occurred during the "peaceful protests" of the civil rights movement: Versus:
I'm not writing your college essays for you, but when should we not be called to arms against oppression?
