I'm always skeptical about Washington protest crowd numbers because organizers often inflate those for their own purposes. The "Million Man March" only drew about 400,000 according to the Park Police, though organizers insisted it was over 1 million and called anyone who disagreed a "racist".
The 2 million estimate is coming from ABC and I'm not sure who their source is, but the fact they're willing to report it means it's probably pretty close. Obama didn't draw 2 million for his inauguration, and that was the biggest crowd ever seen in D.C.
What that number doesn't take into account are the millions more, like me, who would be there in a heartbeat if we could. Those folks on the Mall in Washington are representative of a much larger group throughout the country.
Democrats should be very concerned.
UPDATE: 2 million now seems to be the operative number. That's what's being reported by most outlets. It true, that beats the 1.8 million that showed up for the inauguration.
UPDATE: Here's more on the numbers.
6 comments:
why should democrats be concerned? there are probably many democrats at rally... and with all the disjointed concerns of protesters... what issue best describes the protesters concerns? 10 thousand anti-abortion, 10 thousand anti Obama, 10 thousand anti-government, anti reform, and etc... get the picture? what is it? please let me know.
If you got the number from Tammy Bruce's site? It was a joke... meant to demean the estimates of the organizers of Million ManMarch
I was at the protest. Very hard to judge precisely from the ground, but there were AT LEAST several hundred thousand people. I base that on comparison to football games I have attended.
It was a great crowd. Informed, accommodating. Because of the crowd there were many hassles and inefficiencies. But people pretty much took it in stride. Riding the metro home (packed to the gills), my wife remarked, "you know, I did not hear a cuss word all day". That says a lot.
80k at most...ABC retracted their call..so should you.
Not a chance. Have you looked at any of the pictures, especially the throngs headed down Pennsylvania Ave? There's no way the crowd was as small as 80,000. Daily Mail had it at up to 2mil, along with other sources.
Get over it.
For additional sources, see this: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1213056/Up-million-march-US-Capitol-protest-Obamas-spending-tea-party-demonstration.html
and this: http://michellemalkin.com/2009/09/12/yes-the-picture-is-real-nutroots/
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