Moonbats on Parade

Yesterday, I visited the zoo. Not the National Zoo in Rock Creek Park, home to Giant Pandas Mei Xiang and Tian Tian, but a louder and scruffier display by anti-war activists on the National Mall.

I roller-bladed down about 2pm, stayed for 10 minutes and avoided the speeches. Frankly, I was bored. I didn't bring a camera. So, since other bloggers have more extensive coverage, I'll use theirs.

• A Small Crowd: Everyone agrees the morning events drew few followers. Protest sponsor Answer claims the main event drew 100,000 demonstrators, an estimate relied on and echoed by the Washington Post and the BBC. Again, quoting protest organizers Reuters claimed 300,000. The ever-feverish Armando at Kos ups the ante to 500,000.
  
  As a veteran anti-Vietnam protester in my liberal youth, and a Washingtonian protest observer for a quarter century, this demonstration seemed smaller than clamed. During the annual July 4th concert/fireworks, crowds of up to a half-million literaly freeze any movement on the mall. Below are three tourist promotion photos from 2001:
  
  
  
  (source: DC Pages)
  
  
  
  (source: DC Pages)
  
  
  
  (source: Beyond DC)
  
  In contrast, there was plenty of room yesterday:
  
  
  
  (source: Daily Kos)
  
  
  
  (source: Getty Photos)
  
  There were some dense areas--but in limited-size pockets:
  
  
  
  (source: DC Indymedia)
  
  Objective evidence of crowd size confirms my impression,¹ especially this Reuters overhead shot and its more truthful caption:
  
  (caption: A large rally of anti-war demonstrators gathers on the Ellipse near the White House (top) as seen from the top of the Washington Monument in Washington D.C. September 24, 2005. Tens of thousands of protesters gathered in the nation's capital in support of anti-war protestor Cindy Sheehan, who lost a son serving in the U.S. armed forces in Iraq, and demonstrated for the withdrawal of U.S. troops and an end to the war in Iraq. REUTERS/Jim Bourg)
  
  And, as Jeff at Protein Wisdom points out, not everyone at the mall was at the protest:

  The 2005 National Book Festival, organized and sponsored by the Library of Congress and hosted by first lady Laura Bush, will be held on Saturday, Sept. 24, 2005, on the National Mall in Washington, D.C., between 7th and 14th streets from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. (rain or shine). The festival is free and open to the public.

  Last year, the Book Fest drew 80,000 people.
  
  MaxedOutMama says:

  Perhaps the truth about the "massive" anti-war protest will never seep into DU's collective mind - especially given the best efforts of reporters thinking wistfully of 60's demonstrations, cheap drugs, lots of skanky sex and no gainful employment. Those were their glory days. But for the rest of us, they weren't great days.

  I was on the mall yesterday; it was anything but glorious. Two bloggers said it best:

  Charles Johnson: "What If They Gave a Protest and Nobody Came?"
  
  Gay Patriot: "If Iraq is like Vietnam, how come the rallies keep getting smaller?"

• An Anti-American Crowd: Anti-war leftists insist they're tolerant but not anti-American. This shouldn't fool any objective observer, especially anyone who read ANSWER's own propaganda, such as David Adesnik at Oxblog:

  The global anti-war movement must be a movement of international solidarity against the U.S. empire. (Page 2)
  
  The Iraqi people have a fundamental right to determine their own destiny...Since 1958 when a mass uprising overthrew the British-imposed king, Iraq has been a genuinely sovereign country. (Page 2) [I wonder of the sovereign Iraqi government committed any human rights violations after 1958. Unfortunately, the brochure doesn't say!]
  
  The US kidnapping of President Aristide follows more than a century of U.S. intervention in Haiti...Since the election of Aristide to a second term in late 2000, with 92% of the vote, Washington has maintained economic sanctions against the poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. (Page 3)[Wow, 92%. I bet ANSWER provided all of the elections monitors!]
  
  From its inception in 1948, Israel has been a colonial state based on "ethnic cleansing"...[Israel] launched devastating wars against Egypt, Syria and Jordan. (Page 4)[That surprise attack on Yom Kippur in 1973 really took a lot of chutzpah!]
  
  [The Cuban] revolution remains strong and is a source of inspiration for people throughout the hemisphere. (Page 6)
  
  Korea has been punished ever since [1953] with economic sanctions and the occupation of the southern half of the country by 37,000 US soldiers. (Page 6) [Fortunately, the anti-US insurgency in South Korea hasn't inflicted too many casualties on our force.]
  
  The [Bush] administration has launched a domestic war at home against the people of the United States that complements its global war for empire. (Page 7)[A war at home? Send the troops abroad now!]

  Saturday's signs reflected a movement both anti-American and hateful:
  
  
  
  (source: Michelle Malkin)
  
  
  
  
  (source: GOP Liberty)
  
  
  
  
  (source: DC Indymedia)
  
  
  
  
  (source: GOP Liberty)
  
  
  
  
  (source: Michelle Malkin)
  
  
  
  
  (source: Chris Christner)
  
  
  
  
  (source: EU Rota)
  
  
  
  
  (source: EU Rota)
  
  
  
  
  (source: DC Indymedia)
  
  
  
  
  (source: Mike Freeland)
  
  Quod erat demonstrandum.



• The media's still in the tank: Several speakers addressed Saturday's mall rats. Cindy Sheehan ranted, decrying an "out-of-control criminal government." But she strayed from the script, confusing the crowd:

  Sheehan: We have to show the world that Americans don’t torture and it’s not OK for anybody to torture another human being.
  
  Audience: [Huge applause.]
  
  Sheehan: Americans don’t invade countries and occupy countries preemptively that are no threat to our country.
  
  Audience: [Huge applause.]
  
  Sheehan: And it’s not OK for other countries to do that either.
  
  Audience: [One whistle, half-hearted golf claps.]

  Other kooks filled the gap. Anti-Semite Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney (D-Mars) cautioned that:

  A cruel wind blows across America. . . . It blew disenfranchisement into Ohio and Florida. . . . We were forced to endure fraud in the elections of 2000 and 2004.

  An Arab-American activist called the U.S. a society of fear. GOP Liberty summarizes others, ranging from Community Labor United asking for an end to the "war against poor, black, uneducated people," to AFL-CIO Executive Counsel member Nancy Woolforth charging that "FEMA creeps who would not rescue 150,000 black and poor people." Wait a minute: That's not far at all. Basically, Saturday's activists were protesting Plessy v. Ferguson.
  
  Was any of this reported? Nope, hardly a word, though the media covered Cindy embracing America's head race hustler. But the MSM fired their fact checkers and now prints the far-left's press releases. The AP described Saturday's events as "parents mourning their children in uniform lost in Iraq, and uncountable families motivated for the first time to protest." Yet, no one sends "children" to Iraq and the protesters were professionals, not novices. The British press provided a platform for a grieving parent blaming Blair and demanding the Prime Minister withdraw from Iraq--despite the fact that his son was never in Iraq and died, tragically, in a traffic accident in Kuwait.
  
  Saturday's protest was flat-out anti-American--but few called it so. Hub Blog says, "It's just embarrassing to see the MSM cover up the political dynamics of 'antiwar' events -- while at the same time denying it has a liberal bias." It is embarrassing. But we've seen it before. Don't expect any change.

Saturday proved the anti-war, anti-American "BusHitler" crowd's getting smaller and shriller. That counts as a win. So I declared victory, re-clamped my roller blades, and pulled out.
__________

¹ The Scotsman estimated the protest in London, expected to draw tens of thousands, numbered in the "hundreds."