Design by Michelle Yang. Thank you!
I couldn’t really hear what was going on, but you can read more about it at GOP Mom. The inevitable tricorne hats and other 18th century finery were there, and there were some people with other issues (returning to the gold standard, abolishing the Federal Reserve, etc.), but most of the crowd seemed like normal people fed up with the shenanigans in Washington. My guess is that a couple of hundred people were there at any one time. Michelle points out that she distributed 1,000 postcards like the one above, so my estimate is probably too conservative. More pictures after the break.
Update, courtesy of Michelle Yang again: I missed it, but there was another demonstration today across town, down by the water at Christopher Columbus Park in the North End. The harbor has been getting cleaner in recent years, even to the extent of supporting living fish. The tea dumped there today is not likely to harm them. This second demonstration was sponsored by the local FM talk radio. There was even a third gathering in the morning on the Common. Unfortunately, I was unable to attend that one, either. I spent the morning struggling with extensions for Massachusetts income taxes. Let me just point out that (1) if you put a telephone number in the instructions, you should probably do better than have the answering machine tell callers that they cannot use that number; (2) if you require your victims to use the website and forbid them to use paper forms, it is not really a good idea for all your site search results to point to the paper forms; and (3) if a CPA with web development experience can’t figure out what is going on in your website, your website probably sucks and your web developer should be firmly disciplined. “Bad codemonkey! No donut!”
The gathering was moved from the State House steps (the gate was closed and locked) to the Common. You can see the State House across the street and the the back of the memorial to the Mass. 54th Infantry directly behind the tree.
That’s the Prudential Building and the John Hancock Tower in the background.
Barney Frank represents the 4th Massachusetts congressional district. Barney, you’re doing a heck of a job.
[Comment deleted by Jonathan. Take your vulgar talking points elsewhere.]
No one is suggesting that we dust off the muskets. The problem seems to be that no matter which party gains power, the officeholders use whatever means are available to expand and perpetuate that power. The Democrats do it on the pretext of “fighting” (class warfare?) for the oppressed; the Republicans do it for truth, justice, and the American way. Obama wants universal health insurance; Bush instituted the largest expansion of Medicare since its inception. Bush’s surveillance and warrantless wiretapping policies were unacceptable to Obama the candidate, but quite acceptable to Obama the president. I could go on.
The membership of Congress is capped at 435, which means there is one representative for nearly 700,000 people. The cap was set in 1929, when there were only about 123 million people in the US. There were about 100,000 people in each congressional district when we started out. Most voters have never even seen their representative; unless they come up with a campaign contribution, it is unlikely they will have the opportunity to exchange even a “hello” with him or her.
We are faced with a class of career politicians who dread leaving office the way the rest of us dread being laid off or going out of business. Do you really think this is because they think the country would suffer if they left office? In the unlikely event that the voters turn them out, most of them do not return to the states that sent them, but instead remain in Washington, their true home, and turn their talents to lobbying. I don’t think I’m out of line for thinking that our representative should be one of us: should come from among us, should appreciate our concerns, and should return to us when the job is done.
I just returned home from NY Tea Party.
Didn’t expect it to be so huge.
People were standing at about 4 blocks south and north from the tribune, and across the street, too. There were thousands. And, strangely, very organized. I usually detest big crowds of people, don’t feel safe in it. Not tonight.
It was exciting.
Wait, this can’t be true. I watched MSNBC and they keep saying the tea party people are a bunch of right-wing cranks, racists and militia terrorists, all controlled like puppets by Fox News and the Republican Party. Also, these are tiny “demonstrations” with at most a few dozen participants nationwide. And they are of course no threat to the political Left. That explains why the Left is spending so much time ridiculing, denouncing and trying to distract attention from them.
I attended the Chicago Tea Party (well, the first half anyway, unlike lefty protesters, I have a job to maintain). I took pictures and you can see them, with commentary, here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/misterbixby/sets/72157616729205109/
There were a lot of gold standard, audit the fed, Paulians there, but there were also run of the mill libertarians, republicans and democrats there. I heard someone mention that this was the reformation of the Reagan coalition on some talking heads show last night. Pretty accurate, I’d wager.
Oh, and it was sparsely attended, couldn’t have been more than 1,000 folks there.