CNN - Coverage buried on website. Televised coverage was heckled for pointing their camera in the opposite direction of main crowd.

Reported: 500, later changed to 1000.


Washington Post - Turned off Mall camera. Took some tight shots/kept cameras on edge of crowd and reported "thousands". This proves to be the norm.


DOT Mall Cam - Taken offline.


Earth Cam Capitol Cam - Taken offline.


Traffic cams - Running closed loops of empty streets.


ABCNews - Coverage buried on website.

Reported: 60,000-70,000


MSNBC - Coverage buried.

Reported: "Tens of thousands"


Now, let's take a look at one of the graphics used in playing up Obama's inauguration:



...and then let's look at some wider-angle shots:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1213056/Up-million-march-US-Capitol-protest-Obamas-spending-tea-party-demonstration.html










 More conservative estimate from local protester and park police: 1.3 million

 ...and that's not counting the hundreds of thousands around the country who showed up to protests in their own cities.

What's really amazing to me is that - if 2 million people were actually there - that they'd managed to organize themselves so quickly.

and with so many clever banners.

These protests have been occurring on a local level all summer, where have you been?

 I'm sorry if they do not ride in on buses with matching t-shirts and professionally-printed signs like the pro-Obama (formerly anti-war) Soros-funded grassroots protesters and their union enforcers brethren.

It's funny, I live less than 30 miles away, was in the city yesterday and didn't know it was going on. Unlike the MIllion Man MArch a few years ago where traffic was backed up halfway to Philadelphia.

So I think, as usual, the the bucket of fried right wings is trying to make more of itself than it is.

These protests have been occurring on a local level all summer, where have you been?

I've been under the assumption that the protests were not 2 million strong and were, in fact, at a local level.

I'm sorry if they do not ride in on buses with matching t-shirts and professionally-printed signs like the pro-Obama (formerly anti-war) Soros-funded grassroots protesters and their union enforcers brethren.

From the pictures I've seen since you pointed this out, there's very little repetition amongst the signs these folks are carrying.  Aren't you at all suspicious of 2 million people getting together, but no one writing up the same kind of content on their signs?  That's just really well organized.

 Okay, Zoomie. Same Million Man March that sued Parks and Services for not playing along?

 Are you saying these pictures are fake, or are you saying the estimates and reporting for Obama's inauguration are fake?

Look up, eitje. The point is flying past.

no one writing up the same kind of content on their signs

Well, there are a hell of lot of things to protest when the administration is grasping at everything within its reach.

Look up, eitje. The point is flying past.

Well, yeah, I guess you'll just get to be snide, and I'll continue to be surprised at how structured all of these people were.

edit:  I'm not always trying to bust your balls, dude.  I'm genuinely surprised, and honestly curious about what must have gone into the planning of such an event.  The level of organization this group of people shows (assuming almost 2M is accurate) rivals almost anything I've seen; did they organize via Facebook, or some other medium?  Can you imagine a 2 million person mailing list?

Maybe aliens projected extra people on the ground with lasers and holographs.

There were busses. The heavily publicized Tea Party Express was the flagship.
This was organized by FOX. I watch the channel pretty regularly, and they've been raising awareness for the "Big September 12 March" for the last few weeks. On the 11th they spent the whole day (quite naturally) broadcasting heart-rending imaged of the 2001 tragedy. I think it was intended to really whip up some strong emotions.

Two things I'm struck with on viewing the crowd:
1-Wow we have a lot of middle-class white people in this great country. (Interestingly contrary to the reports of mixed attendance broadcast by FOX)
2-There is even less focus to these protesters than the left-wing protesters in the drawn out months after Iraq began. I've never seen a more disorganized campaign as far as issues are concerned. Yes there are a lot of people who are very mad, but the problems is they're either all mad at different things or they're not sure why they're mad to tell the truth.

Or they've been suckered by party propaganda (read: lies) and are caterwauling about stupid shit that just doesn't exist.

Denial is the first step...

Doormouse knows best.

You can't trust anyone, these days!

I still don't get what people are protesting about. Better and cheaper health care for all?

From a pragmatic standpoint: Because it will be neither cheaper nor better. It will be massively inefficient and payed for through extortion (taxes), the cost of which will result in an increase in the cost of living for everyone. Because it will result in healthcare significantly below what is widely available in the US currently... as is the case everywhere outside the US. You know, like my friend's uncle up in Canada, on a three-month waiting list to have his pancreatic cancer treated. Or... let's say this woman, who had her infant killed as per regulation: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1211950/Premature-baby-left-die-doctors-mother-gives-birth-just-days-22-week-care-limit.html

From a legal standpoint: First and foremost, the Constitution of the United States does not empower the federal government to do such things like this. Not much in there to offer philosophical support for seizing control of 1/6th of the economy, either. Secondly, because the majority of Americans do not want more statist bullshit lumped on top of what we already have to put up with. In your country, you perhaps do not mind being a ward of the state. It is a different culture, here.

 On that note, I should point out that government-controlled healthcare is only one of many, many issues being protested. the common thread amongst them all, however, is taxation without representation, which is why that is the backbone everyone is organizing around... or at least as much as they can before the left, in it's infinite tolerance and benevolence, starts threatening to bomb those not of Correct ideological loyalties: http://hotair.com/archives/2009/09/12/breaking-bomb-threat-against-tea-party-organizers/


As for the accusations that the conservatives and moderates who were protesting were somehow too, suspiciously, able to organize themselves, all I have to say is this: They are, perhaps, actual adults, as opposed to the arrested adolescents which make up so much of Obama's base.

As illustrated:



DC post Tea Party protest





DC post Obama inauguration

I guess, just as with everything else, they expected it was someone else's responsibility to clean up their shit.

I understand your opinion. Personally I think that limiting litigation will cause a plunge in the cost of health care, without handing any control over to the government.

So do most people opposing the current administration's socialist ambitions. We do not nor should we expect anything effectual on that front (limiting ambulance chasers) from a political party dominated by lawyers, and which cultivates a sub-culture of victimhood-as-virtue and entitlement. It certainly isn't what the total strangulation of the private healthcare industry and massive expansion of state authority as outlined in the current bill is about.

Wait, where does Pravda fit into this?

I like Pravda sometimes comrade.

Da.

the common thread amongst them all, however, is taxation without representation, which is why that is the backbone everyone is organizing around...

Aren't all Americans represented, though, through the House and the Senate?

Not Washington DC or some of the territories.  This is about them!

Yes because there aren't enough free medical clinics run by African American charities in DC for African American people. And the same could be said for Guam and Puerto Rico and their residents. When the government ignores your pleas for a few hundred years you leanr how to cope. You shouldn't have to, but you do.

Tom, you forgot the FOX News Fair and Balanced poll.

Also, have you checked in with the Weekly World News?

Secondly, because the majority of Americans do not want more statist bullshit lumped on top of what we already have to put up with. In your country, you perhaps do not mind being a ward of the state. It is a different culture, here.

Then why did quite a large majority of American voters elect Obama? Seems to me that he was pretty clear from the get-go that he intended to shake up the healthcare system.

Not Washington DC or some of the territories.  This is about them!

Hahahaha!

Oh come on now, you know that was election fraud. I mean, outside of the fact that Obama isn't even ELIGIBLE to be president...

Fatt argued these points much better and was more entertaining.

Also, as to the original post:

The left wing media outlet the Wall Street Journal quotes 75,000.

The socialists at Fox News reported tens of thousands.

2,000,000 is a bullshit number pulled out of Michelle Malkin's ass.

I'm still not seeing the connection between having a public option and any reduction in the quality of healthcare. Private options should ensure that the much lauded "best healthcare in the world" is still available to all the rich bastards out there, rights? Isn't this kind of a distortion considering that nobody is suggesting doing away with private options? Are you suggesting that this is the beginning of what you imagine will be a full-scale socialization of healthcare? You need to explain this better, because it doesn't flow logically right now.

 Even the blatantly pro-socialist WHO rates the US as number one in "service". The "public option" rhetoric is meaningless. When the plan on the floor will constrict private ensurers out of existence and requires citizens by law to some form of insurance or pay signifigant fines, it isn't a fucking option.

 Do you seriously believe that giving everyone within the united states "free" healthcare is not going to see an increase in people showing up at the hospital or doctor's office for utterly stupid little matters? Wait... isn't your whole idea to dump 47 million more people into the medical field's work load?

 Do you seriously believe that doctors will enjoy seeing the culmination of the first thirty years of their life being spent in school resulting in a career of having their professional medical opinion overridden by the regulations of bureaucrats?

 Do you think you will see an increase in enrollments toward becoming a "rich bastard" doctor when the plan is to dump as much of the expense of this scam as possible onto those within the "rich bastard" pay scale?

 Do you think increasing the the patient load while decreasing the number of qualified doctors will improve the standard of treatment?

 Do you think it is cool to throw around class warfare slogans, honestly believing that a man who wishes to keep what he has earned for himself is greedy, while someone who wishes to see such a man's finances extorted by the state as a proxy to putting it into his own pocket is virtuous?

 Do you think it is rad for Zoomie to echo your sentiments, while he simultaneously employs illegal immigrants at slave-labor wages?

 Do you believe Zoomie should be legally required to pay for his super-secret employees' health insurance? Do you think Zoomie is, by comparison to them, a "rich bastard"?

Explicit empowerment within the Constitution isn't required for the federal government's every act. If you remember back to grade 8 civics, we live in a democratic society in which elected representatives legislate on our behalf in order to enact new acts and laws which, provided they aren't prohibited by the constitution, become the law of the land. In this sense federal law draws from the demos - the people. Americans overwhelmingly elected left-leaning Democrats into office. The American public has spoken. Is it your argument that any degree of government control overhealthcare is unconstitutional? If so, please point out where in the constitution it is prohibited so the democratically elected representatives can begin work on drafting an Amendment..

 Is fifty-three percent overwhelming? Does it continue to be overwhelming now that so many of the moderates who bought into his farce of being a centrist are abandoning him wholesale?

 What does this suggest: http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/general_politics/september_2009/voters_turn_negative_on_all_political_labels_except_reagan

 What does this suggest: http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/current_events/healthcare/september_2009/78_say_all_americans_should_be_able_to_buy_the_health_insurance_that_congress_has

 What does this suggest: http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/current_events/healthcare/august_2009/support_for_health_care_legislation_has_stopped_falling_but_most_still_opposed

 What does this suggest: http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/obama_administration/daily_presidential_tracking_poll

 Do you think it is awesome for a president to still be constantly in campaign mode almost a year into his term? Do you think it is awesome that, even with a fawning media and a program of constant speech-giving (replete with the soothing, very nearly hypnotic Teleprompter Bob-and-Weave), this president's approval rating has been dropping at a record-setting rate?

 Are you familiar with this:

Section 8. The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States;

To borrow money on the credit of the United States;

To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes;

To establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies throughout the United States;

To coin money, regulate the value thereof, and of foreign coin, and fix the standard of weights and measures;

 Ever heard of this man, and his right-wing fascist national socialist slander:

 

"To take["general welfare"] in a literal and unlimited sense would be a metamorphosis of the Constitution into a character which there is a host of proofs was not contemplated by its creators..."

"If Congress can employ money indefinitely to the general welfare, and are the sole and supreme judges of the general welfare, they may take the care of religion into their own hands; they may appoint teachers in every State, county and parish and pay them out of their public treasury; they may take into their own hands the education of children, establishing in like manner schools throughout the Union; they may assume the provision of the poor; they may undertake the regulation of all roads other than post-roads; in short, every thing, from the highest object of state legislation down to the most minute object of police, would be thrown under the power of Congress.... Were the power of Congress to be established in the latitude contended for, it would subvert the very foundations, and transmute the very nature of the limited Government established by the people of America."

Do you seriously believe that giving everyone within the united states "free" healthcare is not going to see an increase in people showing up at the hospital or doctor's office for utterly stupid little matters? Wait... isn't your whole idea to dump 47 million more people into the medical field's work load?

Of course. More people eligible for medial services will mean more people getting medical services. That's simple mathematics, something I don't normally do, but anything for you, pookie.

Do you seriously believe that doctors will enjoy seeing the culmination of the first thirty years of their life being spent in school resulting in a career of having their professional medical opinion overridden by the regulations of bureaucrats?

You're stuck in the 50s if you think doctors are only in it for the money.

Do you think you will see an increase in enrollments toward becoming a "rich bastard" doctor when the plan is to dump as much of the expense of this scam as possible onto those within the "rich bastard" pay scale?

Fairness isn't getting what you want. Fairness is getting what everyone else has.

Do you think increasing the the patient load while decreasing the number of qualified doctors will improve the standard of treatment?

This is yet to be seen, but I'd like to point out that you're stuck in the 50s if you think doctors are only in it for the money and fairness isn't getting what you want. Fairness is getting what everyone else has.

Do you think it is cool to throw around class warfare slogans, honestly believing that a man who wishes to keep what he has earned for himself is greedy, while someone who wishes to see such a man's finances extorted by the state as a proxy to putting it into his own pocket is virtuous?

Fuck you, whitey.

Do you think it is rad for Zoomie to echo your sentiments, while he simultaneously employs illegal immigrants at slave-labor wages?

 Do you believe Zoomie should be legally required to pay for his super-secret employees' health insurance? Do you think Zoomie is, by comparison to them, a "rich bastard"?

HAHAHAHAHA! Oh man, you've never been to my house, you've never been on my job, you have no sense of humor and you haven't a clue what you're saying.

But for the record, I made (not claimed, MADE) less than $20,000.00 in 2008, I paid taxes on every penny I made, any and all of my employees are documented taxpayers and legally in this country and I have about fourteen bucks in the bank right now. And I will open my books to whatever attack you deem appropriate. Also for the record, my mortgage and MOST of my bills are paid and on time (of late, anyway) and I'm basically at the poverty level for two reasons: 1. I know how to survive here and 2. Conservative fuckheads like you were in charge for 8 years.

Oh and my occasional foreman Manuel is from Peru and lives in a 3500sf house inside the beltway in the upscale suburbs of Northern Virginia because he's a rich bitch's boytoy. His helper Erik is from El Salvador and owns five rental properties, also in Northern Virginia. My team leader David lives in an RV in his mother's back yard and his partner Scott owns a nice house in White Marsh but he's going to lose it because his wife is about to be institutionalized and he will have to take care of their kids full time, with no job. All of them made 2-3 times what I made last year and all of them provide their own healthcare (except David, he has medicare). I have shitty managed healthcare from Kaiser-Permenente for which my wife pays dearly.

So do me a big favor, next time you're in Jersey, fall out of a tall window with Brook in your arms. Just like her, you don't know anything about me, dickwad.

I got Myspace, built a page and never use it. It's basically a place where I ignore old girlfriends and stalkers.

I built and lost a couple empires, now I play with sailboats and occasionally take a job using Mexicans as slave labor to build hotels. I get paid $10,000.00 per month and I pay them $4/hour.

It's a living.

Yes? And? I knew exactly where you got those quotes. You believe everything you read here? So you think Mosh walks around with electrodes on his nuts, Thrash doesn't mind a cock in his rectum on occasion and we all hate Lothar's band.

You're a moron.