Come for the politics, stay for the snark.

Our job is not to persuade republicans but to defeat them.

Let’s not be the monsters we hate.

This fight is for everything.

People are complicated. Love is not.

The worst democrat is better than the best republican.

Insiders who complain to politico: please report to the white house office of shut the fuck up.

A democracy can’t function when people can’t distinguish facts from lies.

JFC, are there no editors left at that goddamn rag?

Since when do we limit our critiques to things we could do better ourselves?

Republicans seem to think life begins at the candlelight dinner the night before.

Thanks to your bullshit, we are now under siege.

Accused of treason; bitches about the ratings. I am in awe.

Republicans are the party of chaos and catastrophe.

Take your GOP plan out of the witness protection program.

Come on, media. you have one job. start doing it.

You don’t get to peddle hatred on saturday and offer condolences on sunday.

Reality always lies in wait for … Democrats.

Their freedom requires your slavery.

Nancy smash is sick of your bullshit.

Motto for the House: Flip 5 and lose none.

If you are still in the GOP, you are an extremist.

This blog will pay for itself.

Yeah, with this crowd one never knows.

Not so fun when the rabbit gets the gun, is it?

You are here: Home / Open Threads / Rally thread

Reader Interactions

278Comments

  3. 3.

    henqiguai

    Everyone is asking for one.

    And yet, three minutes into the entry’s existence, no chatter ! What’s up w’ that ??
    ETA Okay, so right after hitting submit, two entries preceded me (and yeah, I hit <refresh> before typing away).

  5. 5.

    Studly Pantload

    Rally getting all geeky with demographic samplings.

    And now, there’s Stephen, trapped in his Bunker of Fear!

  12. 12.

    BobS

    The comedy sucks.
    However the Roots, with and without John Legend, kicked ass. One of the best live acts in music.

  16. 16.

    Linda Featheringill

    I don’t get it.

    I’ve read articles about the Rally and comments about it and I still don’t get it. What is it for?

    Understand that there is nothing wrong in getting together and having a pleasant time, without a specific agenda. Is that what this is about?

    Or do they actually have something to say?

    ETA: Maybe it’s a “be-in”?

  17. 17.

    Davis X. Machina

    Color me unimpressed.

    You can cut the “all politicians are liars — don’t vote, it only encourages them — we’re too cool for school” ironic-detachment vibe on Comedy Central with a knife.

    This isn’t exactly Woody Guthrie, people….

    When Pete Seeger’s funeral draws this big a crowd — and may he live longer still — then I’ll be impressed.

    You’re seeing 200,000 or whatever Nader voters.

  19. 19.

    Trentrunner

    Love Stewart, but hate hate hate the fucking false equivalency bullshit he’s based this rally on.

    Both sides are NOT equally insane, violent, racist, sexist, homophobic, and just plain ignorant.

    It would be pretty to think so, but ain’t true.

  21. 21.

    stuckinred

    That’s right, spend every fucking second of your miserable ass lives thinking YOU are changing something for the better by being all hysterical and “critical”. Bet they’re having a big time at FDL today too!

  27. 27.

    Uloborus

    @Trentrunner:
    Stewart isn’t a journalist, and he’s barely a pundit. He’s a comedian, and it’s all he’s ever claimed to be. We treat him like a journalist and a pundit because he has higher journalistic standards than actual journalists. And as he’s said many times before, that’s a travesty.

    I think he’s content to take cheap shots at Democrats, and especially Obama, but he’s a comedian and cheap shots are his bread and butter.

    As for the rally… well, let’s face it, the main message is ‘We like TDS and Colbert.’ #2 and #3 are probably ‘Voting is important, period’ and ‘Try not to be completely insane about your political position’. ‘Bull-headedly stupid’ is a breath of fresh air after this political season.

    Wish I was there. It’s something to go to for fun, not to send a message.

  29. 29.

    Phoenician in a time of Romans

    Wow there must be 5,000 people there!!

    So, what, 472,000 by Fox News standards then?

  30. 30.

    WayneL

    Does this prove that insanity is a lot more fun?

    Bummer. Busto. I’m going to do better things, like getting the jam out from under my toenails.

    Somebody write about it if it gets better.

  33. 33.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Trentrunner: Yup. I always liked Stewart better than Colbert, but in the last year or so, Colbert has gotten better and better, and in the last few months, Stewart has flirted with insufferability.
    @BobS: and this

  39. 39.

    Omnes Omnibus

    The rally is not working for me… So far it is a one note joke being wrung dry. Maybe it will get better, but oy.

  41. 41.

    BR

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    Agreed. I have a hard time watching the daily show these days. I wonder if Jon Stewart is feeling pressure (from others or self-pressure) to play the fair and balanced game of false equivalence. He keeps getting profiled in magazines and newspapers as being the most trusted reporter, etc. That combined with a tendency towards cynicism (and granted, I share that) makes him throw the Dems in the same pile and set it afire.

  43. 43.

    Davis X. Machina

    I remember the all-city block-party-cum rally the PCI and L’Unitá used to throw in the dry moat around Hadrian’s Tomb in Rome I was at was in 1978 — back when there was a PCI – and this is the opposite of that.

  44. 44.

    shoutingattherain

    @Phoenician in a time of Romans #29

    Yes well I originally wanted to post the number “150,000” but didn’t proofread before submit. Then the EDIT feature didn’t edit, so I gave up and hoped nobody would notice.

    I blame Obama.

  48. 48.

    BobS

    @Jen7: not very good ones, judging from their performance today. They should just turn the stage over to the musicians.

  49. 49.

    MMonides

    Just went to give some friends metro cars so they could skip the 2-hour line at the station, and get in the 1-hour line for a train.

    Holy heck.

  51. 51.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    @shoutingattherain: I’ve got it worse, I’ve never found Stephen Colbert funny in the slightest. That faux conservative schtick gets old after about ten seconds. Clever, at times, just not funny.

    For me, anyway. He seems just as tedious here, interrupting the song, yes, he’s conservative we get it. Oy.

  52. 52.

    quaint irene

    Cat Stevens in DC? See, that just proves Obama is a Muslim. (Not ruling out someone seriously making that connection.)

  55. 55.

    Davis X. Machina

    Well, over at DemocraticUnderground.com they’re convinced this is the progressive Quatorze Juillet bis, and we’re all just dumb or fossils who aren’t getting it.

    Me — I’m going to go vacuum the kitchen floor where the cats just got to the sugar canister, and sing;

    Avanti populo, alla riscossa
    Bandiera rossa, bandiera rossa…

    Back in a bit.

  61. 61.

    stuckinred

    @Omnes Omnibus: I actually don’t think it’s all that great, often stuff in big settings like this doesn’t carry well on the tube. But it’s not like there were sine claim that this was going to “mean” anything.

  66. 66.

    Cacti

    There is no difference between…

    Chalk and cheese

    11,539 and 1

    Shakespeare and a ham sandwich

    Democrats and Republicans

  68. 68.

    stuckinred

    OK, let’s all bitch about the little girl, I mean the world is about to come to an end on Tuesday and they have a little girl on stage. What IS wrong with these people??

  72. 72.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    @stuckinred: Well, it would be harder to criticize it without having seen at least some of it. Though there are people on the religious right who do that often, hating on some movie that they refuse to see.

    Well, I can say that I loved the first musical act, never heard John Legend before. My first thought was man, is he listening to Donny Hathaway or what? Which he confirmed by doing a Donny Hathaway song as the second one.

    Great album by the way, the original. One of my top few of all time.

    The song.

  76. 76.

    Cacti

    Call me cynical, but from the get go, this event struck me as a giant handjob from the cool kids to themselves.

  78. 78.

    wasabi gasp

    I watched the Rally to Restore Sanity and all I got was distracted and a big bloody gash while stuffing apples with razor blades.

  79. 79.

    Bootlegger

    Oh c’mon, the “Naked Man Running With Scissors Fear Award” is damn fucking funny!

    And giving it to Anderson Cooper’s t-shirt? Bravo!

  82. 82.

    freelancer

    @Cacti:

    I’m in favor of it simply because the major news media got a serious case of butthurt about its existence. “How come we don’t get a handjob?! They’re’s nowhere to fit this in our canned narrative!”.

  86. 86.

    Mnemosyne

    @Uloborus:

    It’s something to go to for fun, not to send a message.

    If anything, the message is, “Look, we can get twice as many people to show up for a comedy show as showed up for Beck-a-palooza. Can the media please STFU about the Tea Party representing anything but angry white Republicans?”

  89. 89.

    Cacti

    Well, whatever my misgivings about it, I’m sure there are at least 11 million billion people in attendance.

  96. 96.

    John O

    @Jen7:

    No kidding. It’s about exactly what *I* expected anyway. Of course, they’re the only TV “news” I watch.

    Different strokes, I guess.

  100. 100.

    You Don't Say

    @Jen7: Yep.

    Reasonable by definition isn’t going to be exciting. But I’m finding it a very pleasant distraction from all the screeching elsewhere. And it couldn’t have come at a better time seeing as I’m depressed as hell that Sharron Angle will soon be my senator.

  106. 106.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    I don’t get this, why is it suddenly verboten or… shocking, that anyone would criticize a comedy show?

    If it is, all I can say is boy, is Dennis Miller going to be happy!

  108. 108.

    Uloborus

    @Mnemosyne:
    What spotlight? Look, tea party rallies are covered because they’re In Narrative and show us how a groundswell of exciting grassroots enthusiasm is going to annihilate the Dems in the midterms. Progressive rallies are not part of the narrative and are ignored.

    The problem with Stewart and Colbert is that they can’t be ignored. They make their own publicity. Presumably that’s why FOX whines about them so much.

  110. 110.

    JPL

    @Southern Beale: oh fuck…not wonder our country is going down the tubes.
    I’m cleaning storm windows and listening. Never before has window washing been so much fun.

  112. 112.

    fasteddie9318

    @Southern Beale:

    CNN, of course, is covering a Sarah Palin rally featuring Ted Nugent.

    Well yeah, but their Twitter feed is just BURNING UP with important twits about Snooki and the Douche.

  113. 113.

    jwb

    Anyone think that Jon looks a little like Evel Kneivel in that stupid jacket. Maybe he’s planning to jump the yawning partisan divide on a motorcycle or something.

  114. 114.

    Cacti

    @Jen7:

    eww, kid rock.

    The Ted Nugent of this generation, minus the guitar playing ability.

    But he’s a double threat. He sings and raps badly.

  115. 115.

    fasteddie9318

    @Bill E Pilgrim:

    I don’t get this, why is it suddenly verboten or… shocking, that anyone would criticize a comedy show?

    I guess the question is, beyond saying it’s not funny (which mostly IMO it hasn’t been, but whatever), what’s left to be critical of?

  116. 116.

    John O

    There are a helluva lot of people on the mall, that’s for sure. Curious about an aerial shot. I have HD, so I should be able to count all eleventy billion.

  117. 117.

    Studly Pantload

    I suspect a highlights reel will do this gig a justice that can’t be conveyed by the real-time unfolding of events. They’re making nice points, but these are somewhat awash in banter and the sluggish reactions from the large crowd (which is why live comedy generally works better in smaller venues).

    And for what it’s worth, TPM is reporting that the event’s organizers seem to have underplanned for the size of the crowd; people are showing up and leaving because they’re too far away with no sound system or jumbotrons with which to monitor events. The local bars, however, are said to be doing great bizz with folks pouring in to watch the rally on in-house teevees. (For my part, I’m finding the rally goes better with a few beers.)

  120. 120.

    stuckinred

    @Cacti: God, I didn’t realize he was in DC, I thought ya’ll we’re talking about Palin/Nuge! Must be part of his community service for jumpin the brother in the Waffle House.

  121. 121.

    shoutingattherain

    @stuckinred:

    Hey, fuck you asshole. I don’t even watch the goddamn daily show. How’s that?

    You’re about 12 years old, right?

    You’re taking this WAAAAY to personally.

  123. 123.

    SiubhanDuinne

    @ChrisZ #82: According to Father Guido Sarducci, when he was importuning God to send some kind of sign indicating his favorite religion and God wasn’t responding, the permit is only good until 3 o’clock.

  125. 125.

    fasteddie9318

    @Studly Pantload:

    And for what it’s worth, TPM is reporting that the event’s organizers seem to have underplanned for the size of the crowd; people are showing up and leaving because they’re too far away with no sound system or jumbotrons with which to monitor events.

    That’s really a shame, because as far as whatever media narrative is concerned, that means they were never there and nobody cared about this silly rally unlike the MASSIVE TIDAL WAVE OF BECKMANIA that’s clearly sweeping the planet.

  126. 126.

    jwb

    @Uloborus: Yes, and since Stewart and Colbert have their own coverage, they will have the images to do compare/contrast on the Beck/Fox rally and this one. CNN and Fox, in particular, are in for severe butthurt when those segments air. One problem, however, is that this rally is happening at least a week too late to do anything except help the GOTV—if it will even be any help on that. It’s way too late to change the narrative.

    ETA: curiously, given how much crap they have been giving the rally all week, WaPo seems to have doubled down on the coverage, with almost its entire home page devoted to it.

  127. 127.

    Bill E Pilgrim

    @fasteddie9318:

    I guess the question is, beyond saying it’s not funny (which mostly IMO it hasn’t been, but whatever), what’s left to be critical of?

    Er, I don’t know. I haven’t said anything about the show except that I liked the music, it just strikes me as extremely odd that people are coming up with this line about “Oh my god, you’re criticizing comedy?? Lighten up!” and so on. Why in the world would comedy suddenly be sacred or off limits?

    This place is filled with snark and criticism night and day about any number of things.

  128. 128.

    ChrisZ

    @SiubhanDuinne:

    Ah, thanks. I guess that means there’s not a whole lot of time for it to get more interesting. In fairness, I don’t think I’ve ever found an actual political rally interesting either.

  130. 130.

    AhabTRuler

    @John O: The trick with crowds is that whatever the number of people, they will expand to fill the space (kind of like a gas). Having seen more than my fair share of events on the mall (everything from regular busy summer days to marches, parades, festivals, &c &c) the visuals can be deceiving.

    OTOH, if you could compress the crowd until they became a superfluid, that would be really cool!

  131. 131.

    Maody

    it’s about how many people went to join Stewart & Colbert. it’s about the M$M not allowing their peeps to go. it’s about satire and fun. jesus h christ on a stick.. it may not be what people wanted to see, but okay, did you really think they would do much more than have some okay music and fun?

    the FENIX and Father Guido Sarducci were good. Roots is awesome.

  132. 132.

    Uloborus

    @jwb:
    If it helps the GOTV that’s well worth it. We cream the Republicans on everything but the mysterious ‘enthusiasm gap’. But I kind of doubt Stewart and Colbert are trying to help the Democrats here. They lean liberal, but they’re entertainers first, you know? This is a good opportunity for a show for them.

  134. 134.

    fasteddie9318

    @Bill E Pilgrim:

    Why in the world would comedy suddenly be sacred or off limits?

    All the “false equivalence” complaining strikes me as a bit over the top; he’s guilty of it, but it is a little insane that we’re looking to a comedian for serious news coverage.

    And the couple of complaints I’ve read in this thread criticizing the rally for diverting resources or whatever from pre-election work are fairly absurd.

    But I agree, some of the reflexive responses to any criticism are just as over the top. How’s that for sanity?

  137. 137.

    fasteddie9318

    @AhabTRuler:

    OTOH, if you could compress the crowd until they became a superfluid, that would be really cool!

    That would have come in really handy for the Beck rally, although you’d have clogged up the DC sewage system flushing his fans down the toilet afterward.

  140. 140.

    fasteddie9318

    @Omnes Omnibus: In Dennis’ defense, it’s hard to do standup when you’re constantly having to change your diapers because somebody in the crowd looks a little too swarthy.

  142. 142.

    BobS

    @Cacti: Journey to the Center of the Mind, Migration, Baby Please Don’t Go, Stranglehold, Just What the Doctor Ordered…I grew up in Detroit. Before he adopted the right-wing asshole persona, he was tolerable, especially when he was with the Amboy Dukes. Being deer hunting season, radio stations in northern Michigan, where I live now, play Fred Bear about every 30 [email protected]Cacti: I don’t get Kid Rock’s popularity either.

  143. 143.

    FlipYrWhig

    @BR:

    I wonder if Jon Stewart is feeling pressure (from others or self-pressure) to play the fair and balanced game of false equivalence.

    Jon Stewart has _always_ been that way. He clung to the McCain mystique longer than almost anybody else. His complaints about Obama and Democrats are not the FDL/wannabe-lefty “they compromise too much”; his issue is that they don’t get shit done. It just feels like the same critique because both Stewart and the Dissatisfied Left talk about the need for Democrats to look and act stronger. But Stewart really is Broderish when it comes to his romantic view of Democrats and Republicans coming together to hash out solutions to problems. That’s not a new phenomenon with him.

  144. 144.

    Studly Pantload

    OK, I’m no Kid Rock fan either (as apparently are most of the rally crowd, based on their tepid response to his intro), but I do give him props for the way-old-school keyboard synth. (Forgive me, but I’ve been pausing the rally on my DVR, and so am about 20 min’s behind the live-feed crowd).

    And here I’d pegged KR as more likely to perform at a Beck or Palin rally that something, er, reasonable.

    Crow’s not unexpected, but always welcome.

  145. 145.

    Ross Hershberger

    It’s a wake. In a week we’ll be bombarded 24 X 7 by the wingers’ top volume triumphalism over their devastating DEVASTATING refudiation of Liberalism (except for the Senate which they won’t get).
    This is a last chance to blow off steam before the partisan divide on Capitol Hill turns into the empty gulf between galaxies and we settle down for 24 months of misery.

    Let them have their fun.

  149. 149.

    gbear

    Nugent just got busted for hunting without a valid license in South Dakota recently.

    Rocker and celebrity hunter Ted Nugent may have run afoul of South Dakota game laws by shooting pheasants after some of his hunting privileges were revoked in California.
    Nugent's loss of his California deer hunting license through June 2012 allows 34 other states to revoke the same privilege under the Interstate Wildlife Violator Compact, though each state can interpret and enforce the agreement differently. South Dakota honors other states' license revocations through both the compact and a state law that doesn't differentiate between large game such as deer and small game such as pheasant, said Andy Alban, law enforcement administrator for the South Dakota Game, Fish and Parks Department. Alban wouldn't confirm or deny whether the agency was investigating Nugent, but said: "In South Dakota, if a person had any hunting privileges revoked elsewhere, all of their hunting privileges would be revoked here.

  150. 150.

    Uloborus

    @FlipYrWhig:
    Yeah, I saw the Obama interview, and you’re right. Stewart was constantly asking Obama why he hadn’t gotten anything done, and Obama was always going ‘Actually, we’ve gotten a lot done.’ I’ve never seen Obama look so off-balance. Usually he’s very suave.

  152. 152.

    PurpleGirl

    @Mnemosyne:I agree with you. That’s what I was thinking. You (the media) want to talk about numbers… this rally has numbers! (And indeed, it has.)

  153. 153.

    Ross Hershberger

    They’re both from Detroit but let’s not confuse Nuge with Kid.
    Nugent’s a known asshole. Back when he mixed with us common people more Kid Rock was a pretty decent guy. I don’t listen to his music, but he was friendly & not a dick. Which for a rockstar I think qualifies you for sainthood.

  156. 156.

    Davis X. Machina

    @jwb: Post readers will want to know where the traffic is bad, and whether and how the Metro is coping. As for the rest, they could care less.

    Company paper in a one-industry town.

  157. 157.

    jwb

    @Uloborus: I didn’t see the interview because I really don’t see the point (besides his interviews with major figures always suck), but if Stewart was pushing that line with Obama that’s telling: I mean, if anyone has taken great pains to take apart the media narrative, it’s Stewart; yet there he is reproducing it without any sign that he recognizes what he is doing.

  160. 160.

    AhabTRuler

    Remember that the post can sic the style and metro sections on the subject, while the ‘A’ section can hold it at arms length. I don’t actually read the Post (nor that little pigfart Express they give away, either) but I seem to recall other seeing a few different articles on the rally in others’ papers this past week or so. Certainly, I have heard more than one person in the office or on the Metro talk about the rally, FWIW.

    More people were talking about that than the Metro bombing “plot”.

  162. 162.

    You Don't Say

    @jwb: The audience was more with Obama, I thought, when Obama countered the suggestion his administration hasn’t done enough.

  163. 163.

    Mnemosyne

    OT, but this is why apartment living sucks: I just found bacon in the communal washer. About half a slice, all broken up because apparently someone managed to wash a load of clothes without realizing they had A SLICE OF BACON mixed in with them.

    I’m now running the washer empty with hot water and detergent to try and get rid of the remaining bacon because I don’t want to have to schlep everything over to the laundromat. Eeeeewwwwww.

  164. 164.

    fasteddie9318

    @jwb:

    I thought the interview started to get at a bigger problem for the White House, which is that the best they’ve been able to convey about any of their accomplishments is the sense that they checked a box on a to-do list. Stewart seemed to be saying that, OK, you checked the box on HCR (for example), but beyond that it’s not clear what you achieved. Part of that disconnect is Stewart’s fault for swallowing the narrative, but part of it is also the WH’s fault for not fighting that narrative more effectively.

  167. 167.

    Southern Beale

    BIG TIME walk back on Breitbart from ABC News:
    FROM THE LINK:

    I want to explain what Mr. Breitbart’s role has always been as one of our guests at our digital town hall event:

    Mr. Breitbart is not an ABC News analyst.

    He is not an ABC News consultant.

    He is not, in any way, affiliated with ABC News.

    He is not being paid by ABC News.

    He has not been asked to analyze the results of the election for ABC News.

    Mr. Breitbart will not be a part of the ABC News broadcast coverage, anchored by Diane Sawyer and George Stephanopoulos. For the broadcast coverage, David Muir and Facebook’s Randi Zuckerberg will contribute reaction and response gathered from the students and faculty of Arizona State University at an ABC News/Facebook town hall.

    He has been invited as one of several guests, from a variety of different political persuasions, to engage with a live, studio audience that will be closely following the election results and participating in an online-only discussion and debate to be moderated by David Muir and Facebook’s Randi Zuckerberg on ABCNews.com and Facebook. We will have other guests, as well as a live studio audience and a large audience on ABCNews.com and Facebook, who can question the guests and the audience’s opinions.

  168. 168.

    jwb

    @fasteddie9318: My other thought was that Stewart was giving Obama a big fat pitch to hit out of the park, but Obama didn’t recognize it for what it was and so whiffed. But again I didn’t watch.

  170. 170.

    Ross Hershberger

    I’ll give it a shot:

    The Fox headline – “Several Hundred Disgruntled Leftists Tie Up Nations Capitol, Litter”

  172. 172.

    BR

    @jwb:

    @Anya: Have you ever been to a rally that wasn’t lame?

    Barack Obama in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, two days before the Iowa caucuses. Maybe 300 people.

  174. 174.

    Baud

    @Uloborus:

    I wouldn’t be surprised if Obama is very tired right now. He’s been campaigning like mad for Democrats everywhere, plus his day job of, you know, being President.

  175. 175.

    Suck It Up!

    @fasteddie9318:

    I don’t get that argument – they checked a box on a to-do list? Isn’t that what they are supposed to do? Isn’t that what all his critics are doing? going over the list of promises he made and checking off what he’s done and not done?

    And I can’t understand how they can fight the narrative more effectively when it always seems like he’s just always fighting by himself. When he tries to defend his policies or point out what he’s done its met with ‘har har checklists and all that blah, blah, blah’ or ‘Obama on defense’ or ‘Obama’s scolding his base’.

  176. 176.

    Mnemosyne

    @Southern Beale:

    Sounds like the pressure is working — we should keep it up.

    ETA: I noticed that the comments are closed on that post. They must be getting slammed. Good job, everybody!

  178. 178.

    FlipYrWhig

    @fasteddie9318: I think Stewart’s point on HCR was different, actually, but even Obama misunderstood it. I think he was saying, in essence, “You didn’t put yourself out there enough to take leadership; you didn’t say what was your vision and your bottom line, and as a result the whole process drifted aimlessly.” He used the word “timid” but what IMHO he meant was that Obama let Congress take control of the process and it was frustrating to watch. Obama reacted to the word “timid” to say that the law was stronger than that, and explained why… but Stewart’s point was about process and optics and less so about the law.

    Of course, what everyone had said for 15 years about the collapse of the Clinton HCR effort was that Clinton pushed too hard and didn’t let Congress have its say, which is why Congress eventually balked. This process may have looked ugly and grueling and meandering, but it worked, insofar as “worked” means “something actually got done.”

    Other than that, I think Stewart’s primary criticism was the not-all-that-interesting point about the difference between rhetoric and reality, and trying to get Obama to admit that he had overpromised. Again, that’s not a “Dissatisfied Left” critique, it’s fairly standard Beltway finger-wagging. Same for the “You said you were bringing change, but what about Larry Summers, neener neener” point.

    My favorite bit was when Obama mentioned the need to take on the misuse of the filibuster.

  180. 180.

    Suck It Up!

    @Southern Beale:

    Whatevs abc! he shouldn’t be part of anything relating to news or reality. Nothing!! They are rewarding liars and cheats. How do they not see that?

  183. 183.

    jwb

    @BR: With 300 people, maybe, because you can actually hear things pretty well. All large rallies I’ve been to, however, have been terribly lame. I much prefer marches, where then you at least have the spectacle of the moving mass.

  184. 184.

    FlipYrWhig

    @jwb: There was no “whiff.” He ran down the list of accomplishments, and people cheered. He was a bit testy, ’tis true, but my sense was that it was coming from Stewart projecting an attitude of “So do you regret having promised so much that you haven’t been able to deliver?” Is there a graceful way to answer a question like that? If you say “Yes,” everyone reports it as your admission that you’ve been slapped in the face by cold hard reality. If you say “No,” it means you’re either defensive or overly proud of your disappointing track record.

  185. 185.

    Suck It Up!

    @FlipYrWhig:

    but Stewart’s point was about process and optics and less so about the law.

    I think that’s a pretty lame thing for him to complain about.

    I can understand though why Obama answered the way he did. A lot of critics on the left have been claiming that his policies weren’t bold enough. So when Obama heard “timid” from Stewart, that’s what he was trying to address. I personally thought it was about policy myself.

  187. 187.

    Southern Beale

    Yeah looks like what the ABC Digital News guy was saying is, “we’re not REALLY giving Breitbart a platform, he’s just participating in this silly little online thingie we’re doing and EVERYBODY KNOWS ONLINE DOESN’T MATTER!”

    I mean, really.

  189. 189.

    calipygian

    @Studly Pantload:

    And for what it’s worth, TPM is reporting that the event’s organizers seem to have underplanned for the size of the crowd; people are showing up and leaving because they’re too far away with no sound system or jumbotrons with which to monitor events.

    I arrived at about 1030 and walked around. The people were streaming in, the Metro was just chaos. By the time the rally started, I couldn’t find a place to watch and/or listen so I fought my way through the crowd from 3rd to the Smithsonian Station on 12th (yes, a solid nine blocks of people) where I found it was jammed. Finally I walked a few blocks and caught a cab at about 1345 to go home and watch on TV.

    It was insane.

  190. 190.

    Mnemosyne

    @Suck It Up!:

    To be fair, it’s the stuff that’s in Stewart’s bailiwick. He’s not a wonk like Al Franken, so he’s going to think more about the entertainment aspect of the HCR spectacle, if you will, rather than the actual legislation.

    Which is exactly what’s wrong with our current media and I wish Stewart could see that, but anyway ….

  191. 191.

    valdivia

    So I was down at the mall getting GOTV word out for the DNC. It was kind of hard to do given the crowd and the event. People on the ground were really jazzed about it, the mythbusters guys were funny and the Ozzie-Yusuf thing was too hilarious. The crowd was HUGE, I was there for the Beckathon, this was much much much bigger.

  192. 192.

    jwb

    @FlipYrWhig: Then it does sound like Stewart fucked up and bought into the media narrative despite himself. Highly disappointing. It’s not that Stewart needs to do Obama’s work for him and ask easy questions, but since Stewart is well attuned to the problems of the media narrative, I think he at least has the responsibility of not asking questions that are locked into the media narrative.

  193. 193.

    Bnut

    The best clip I ever saw was Kid Rock partnered with Jon Daley at some pro-am. They were getting hammered and using empty tall boy cans as tee’s. Was pretty funny.

  194. 194.

    Suck It Up!

    @FlipYrWhig:

    He was a bit testy, ‘tis true,

    I’d be testy too. Seems like all his interviews feature the same questions or memes. I’m waiting for someone to ask questions that the media/blogosphere hasn’t discussed to death already.

  196. 196.

    KDP

    Couldn’t attend, but while setting up the snack bar at the bimonthly Bingo game in our community center, I watched the rally live-streamed on my netbook using my Android phone’s internet connection via EasyTether. Surprisingly smooth, no lag, no jitter. Both the rally and my network connection.

    I found Stewart’s closing remarks moving and honest. I just hope this event inspires some independents to vote against the crazies even if that requires holding their nose to vote for a democrat.

  197. 197.

    JGabriel

    There’s a sign at the rally that should REALLY be a Balloon-Juice banner tag:

    This is why we can’t have nice things

    Please, make it so.

    .

  198. 198.

    RalfW

    @stuckinred: Oh for the love of god, we’ve had 10 years of war and Fox and all this fear, hate, despair. Giving an award to a girl as “the world is about to come to an end on Tuesday” is hardly some travesty that will change the course of history.

    Go buy yourself a bunker in Mizzoula, ’cause you got no joy or optimism in your life.

    This was a giant outdoor TV show for fans of two snarky comedy programs. It was never going to fix next Tuesday or America.

    BTW my doorbell rang while the show was on and someone gave me a GOTV flier. Turned out to be a friend who lives 10 miles away GOTVing on my block!

    So concern trolls, chill on the GOTV-supression mini-meme vis the Rally.

  199. 199.

    jwb

    @Anya: Me, I figured the best we could hope for is something like the Academy Awards, so I was expecting a high suckage quotient relieved by horrible displays of kitsch.

  200. 200.

    FlipYrWhig

    @Suck It Up!: The substance of the complaint was something we’ve heard a lot on the blogs: “Obama didn’t say What He Really Wanted,” thus “Obama didn’t fight for what he supposedly wanted, so maybe he never really wanted it at all.” The whole thing about arguing over whether Obama _really_ wanted the public option, f’rinstance; or the other whole thing about why Obama tended to talk about the outcomes of HCR instead of specific provisions. We’ve heard and argued about it before, a lot.

  201. 201.

    Lauren

    The jokes were a little cheesy and the comic timing was completely hit or miss, but I enjoyed it all the same. And Stewart’s heart is in the right place. That’s what matters to me more than anything.

  203. 203.

    valdivia

    so this is a bit OT but I see that the media’s new meme is that the dems are scared hitless about losing the senate. I heard it yesterday pimped by those commenting on the Meeks story. And now it’s making the rounds pushed by Ed Henry. I have been working down at the DNC and I have not see ANY of this “terror” they are talking about.

    what gives?

  204. 204.

    JPL

    TPM has pictures up… My favorite sign Fear gives me a Boehner
    Unfortunately, it’s probably true.

  205. 205.

    jwb

    @valdivia: You forgot, however, that you need apply the wingnut multiplier for Beckfest and the wingnut divider for the Rally. So Beckfest ends at eleventy billion and the Rally had ten people at it.

    Who are you going to believe, wingnut imagination or your lying eyes.

  207. 207.

    Maody

    @jwb: The Jan. 26 2003 march against the preemptive war on Iraq was huge. 200K people (at least) that warmed most of us since the high was something like 27 degrees. Most of the speeches sucked and no one could hear them. I’m afraid that all marches/rallies/spectacles on the National Mall have become useless. If CNN was covering a Palin shitfest and ABC is having Breitbart anywhere near election coverage… oh, but who’s really surprised by that? Seriously, even if Stewart and Colbert produced a massive fail, what the hell does it matter to the corporate states of america? can’t wait to hear what my neighbors down the road thought. I can imagine 2 different stories.

  208. 208.

    morzer

    Well, speaking as someone who watched pretty much the whole thing, I thought parts of it were great fun, parts of of it were a little flat, but that overall they achieved something that was pretty sane and and fun, and if more people got into the spirit of not taking their precious selves so precious seriously, rather than yapping from the sidelines about how they know better or how it should have been a GOTV/Democrat TV function, we’d all be a lot better off.

  210. 210.

    Bill in Portland Maine

    Who knew the sequel to the “I Have A Dream” speech would be delivered by Jon Stewart with his “We’re all equals stuck in traffic” speech?

    (Certainly not Glenn Beck)

    –

  211. 211.

    FlipYrWhig

    @jwb: Well, to be fair, it’s not _only_ the “media narrative.” There are a lot of alternative media and blogosphere types who say all of those things too. Anyone who has ever said that Obama didn’t fight hard enough for the public option, or should use the “bully pulpit” more, has been using similar rhetoric.

  212. 212.

    cckids

    @Mnemosyne: This, this, this. I cannot express how tired I am of hearing how massive the TP’ers rally & movement was/is. It just isn’t. It is merely loud & overexposed.

  213. 213.

    Mike in NC

    Breitbart will not be a part of the ABC News broadcast coverage, anchored by Diane Sawyer and George Stephanopoulos.

    Does Stephanopoulos still have Sean Hannity on speed dial for his political consultations?

  214. 214.

    valdivia

    @jwb:
    LOL. Yeah forgot ‘facts’ don’t matter.

    @RalfW:
    this has been the hardest thing to fight against when phonebanking. A lot of people don’t even want to talk because they think all is lost. But once you get them talking and tell them what is going on they commit to vote.

    Y’all the signs were the BEST thing there. I was busy working GOTV so did not take pictures but they were amazing.

  215. 215.

    Jules

    The amount of butthurt coming coming from the progressive pundit class (just wth? is up David Corn and Olberman’s asses?) on twitter is amazing and delightful

  218. 218.

    fasteddie9318

    @FlipYrWhig:

    Obama reacted to the word “timid” to say that the law was stronger than that, and explained why… but Stewart’s point was about process and optics and less so about the law.

    I think we’re both making the same point but you’re doing a better job of it. Stewart’s complaint is that they’ve been timid, not in what they tried to achieve but in how forceful they were willing to be about it. That goes in two directions, their timidity with respect to Congress and their timidity with respect to getting the message out to the public. I think the first is unfair, given the lessons the Village Elders wanted everyone to take from Clinton’s failure, but the second is not so unfair. This White House has not been good at messaging. Obama has as much as admitted that they take a certain wonkish pride in trying to do the right thing regardless of the optics, but the problem with that is that the optics really do matter when they start costing you elections. A great example was the decision to spread his tax cut out into everybody’s weekly take home pay instead of cutting everyone a single rebate check. That’s probably the right policy decision if it means increased consumer spending throughout the year, but it’s lousy politics because nobody notices the tax cuts. It’s great that they got the policy right, but now they’re about to lose an election partly because 3/4 of the country has no idea that their taxes were cut last year. Losing that election is going to hamstring the rest of his agenda, so in the long run the right policy made for the wrong decision.

  222. 222.

    JGabriel

    @valdivia

    what gives?

    Republican ops trying to psych up their team, and psych out the rest of us. It’s like a HS football team bragging that the other team is all pussies and oh so scared of them.

    It’s a shame, but utterly typical, that the networks are buying into it and reporting it as news instead of the cheerleading it is.

    .

  225. 225.

    JGabriel

    @morzer:

    if more people got into the spirit of not … yapping from the sidelines about how they know better …

    … this blog wouldn’t exist.

    Hell, absent yapping from the sidelines about how I know better, I’d be mute.

    .

  226. 226.

    Southern Beale

    @Jules:

    The amount of butthurt coming coming from the progressive pundit class (just wth? is up David Corn and Olberman’s asses?) on twitter is amazing and delightful

    Yeah and both seem to be getting a smackdown from Twitter followers too.

  227. 227.

    jwb

    @Maody: Hey, I’m not complaining, and as I said I like the spectacle of the mass crowd, which is why I prefer marches: then you see the mass in motion. Anya complained about the the rally being lame, and I just said I didn’t expect anything else. That’s not a complaint, just reality. Then, too, I think rallies and marches are immensely important from a political perspective because they show that a large number of people are willing to take time out of their day and attend. Would that we had a very large, very lame rally for health care back in spring 2009.

  231. 231.

    morzer

    DavidCornDC To all my pals, pls explain how this satire-some of which is good-will enhance pol. discourse re economy, climate change, health care

    DavidCornDC Yes. RT @KeithOlbermann: It wasn’t a big shark but Jon Stewart jumped one just now with the “everybody on Thr cable is the same” naiveté

  232. 232.

    Uloborus

    @Suck It Up!:
    I felt like Stewart didn’t see the difference. That he felt like nothing must have gotten done because it wasn’t done the way he was expecting it, or… something. I have trouble understanding the equivilancy there, but I hear it a lot. The process didn’t look right, so it must have not succeeded.

  234. 234.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @Southern Beale: Don’t know about Corn, whom I like, but Olbermann, who sees himself as half-Murrow, half-Mencken, may be just leeeetle bit jealous? Just a thought.

  235. 235.

    thomas Levenson

    Working this aft., so missed just about everything, but on reading Michael Goldfarb (Wingnut-Bellevue) on Cat Stevens at the rally, I dialed up my greatest hits collection. Moonshadow’s on as I write this.

    La lucha continua!

  236. 236.

    Anya

    @jwb: The least they could’ve done was to feature musical acts from this century? Don’t get me wrong, I love the Roots, and I don’t mind Sheryl Crow but some cool acts for the younger generation would’ve been nice. This was woodstock for the Gen. Xers.

  237. 237.

    Suck It Up!

    @Uloborus:

    yeah. me? All I have to say is:

    ‘I don’t care how you get there, just get there if you can’

    ***I know that’s not the exact words.

  238. 238.

    Ross Hershberger

    TPM headline:

    “Cat Stevens Appearance At Sanity Rally Angers Right Winger”

    Too many words. “XXX Angers Right Winger” pretty much covers the majority of situations. The all-purpose headline.

  240. 240.

    Maody

    @jwb: whoops, I didn’t mean to knock your post at all though ekes, I messed up there. Meant to commiserate on the march v rally idea. I think this Stewart/Colbert event was good for a lot of people. But it was not powerful and I don’t think it was meant to be EXCEPT in numbers.

    Marches can be incredibly powerful as history has shown us. It all depends on who is listening and with Citizens United, they’re not listening or watching marches and rallies unless they are extreme, contain creepy violence which get lobbyists’ chosen stoopyhaided candidates elected.

    My beef as an organizer is exactly this: The egos of far left (and I am far left, but pragmatic) got everything fucking ass backwards in the run up to Iraq. They kowtowed to too many groups, speakers, political theatres et al so that no speech held attention or had any power.

    Remember the past… March, then rally. March, then sit in. March, then speak. March, then civil disobedience.

  241. 241.

    gil mann

    Hope you guys are having fun spitting on the progressive movement!

    Stewart’s rally is indeed not a political event aimed at informing grassroots progressive activists such as union members. It is an “entertainment event,” in the tradition of Glenn Beck, aimed at increasing ratings so Comedy Central can raise the costs of ads and make bigger profits. The rally is about selling TV time and making money off of the Left’s long-standing tradition of mass mobilizations like Woodstock and the Million Man March. In fact Jon Stewart is doing the opposite: he is spitting on the progressive movement’s proud history of direct action.

    Way too many things these days remind me of an old Dave Barry quote (which I’m totally paraphrasing): “Activists speak for The People, and they hate people.”

  243. 243.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @gil mann: Do you think the guy gets the irony of publishing that at a blog run by Arianna “Will there be TV cameras?” Huffington?

  247. 247.

    Jim, Foolish Literalist

    @FlipYrWhig: I haven’t read him regularly in years, and I don’t watch Hardball anymore so I don’t see him much, but he always struck me as one who had his facts straight and didn’t let whatever ‘winger he was paired with spew unchallenged bullshit. I never noticed him trying to be funny, but that’s how I see Olbermann’s reaction to this, and La Huffingabor’s, who would give half her settlement to be as funny as Al Franken, and often thinks she is.

  248. 248.

    jwb

    Has anyone on the right or in the media yet compared this rally to Beckfest and dared to argue that Beckfest was significantly larger? If not, how long will it take and who will be the first in?

  249. 249.

    gil mann

    @Moses2317:

    Way ahead of ya, buddy. Oh, wait, did you say “turning out the Democratic vote?” I thought you said “getting drunk and making a Halloween costume for the dog.”

    @Jim, Foolish Literalist:

    Eh, you go where the page-views are, y’know? Can’t blame him for that, but Christ, maybe temper your message so’s the audience has at least a chance of being receptive to it. Self-righteous screeds like that just make me look for opportunities to be a scab (don’t worry, Teamsters, I have no skill set).

  250. 250.

    monkeyboy

    Since officials have stopped giving crowd size estimates of Mall rallies, I have come up with a cool proxy: Have the porta potty companies report how many gallons they hauled away.

    Sadly, if this metric was regularly reported some would try to game it by bring an extra liter of water to dump in the loo.

  251. 251.

    Mnemosyne

    @gil mann:

    I think somebody missed the point. Especially since this was specifically supposed to be a reaction against Glenn Beck’s insanity, not a general “progressives rule!” rally.

  252. 252.

    gil mann

    @Mnemosyne:

    I think somebody missed the point.

    Could be, rabbit, could be:

    Perhaps Jon Stewart does care about working people and the labor movement. So, I invite Jon Stewart to cover the story of locked out Honeywell workers that despite its lack of mainstream coverage, Joe Burns writing for a labor publication Working In These Times calls labor’s “highest profile ongoing dispute.”

    And yeah, okay, maybe I’m just busting on this guy out of guilt over my own inactivism (a condition known as “Blue Stater’s Lethargy”), but seriously, the fuck, dude.

  253. 253.

    jwb

    Didn’t expect the Times to report this: “The rally seemed to be channeling something deep — a craving to be heard and a frustration with the lack of leadership, less by Mr. Obama, some participants said, than by a Democratic party that they saw as timid, fearful, and failing to stand up for the president’s accomplishments.”

  254. 254.

    gizmo

    I think we’d be better off if all those people in DC were out on the streets in their hometown, doing GOTV.

  255. 255.

    Suck It Up!

    @jwb:

    “The rally seemed to be channeling something deep — a craving to be heard and a frustration with the lack of leadership, less by Mr. Obama, some participants said, than by a Democratic party that they saw as timid, fearful, and failing to stand up for the president’s accomplishments.”

    That’s certainly one of my frustrations, not sure I agree that this is what the rally was channeling. I do wish the media would stand up for their viewers more often.

  257. 257.

    jwb

    @gizmo: This is hard to say. My sense, judging from the media reaction I have scanned, is that the media seem flummoxed by both the size and constitution of the crowd. Much will depend on whether Stewart and Colbert can effectively press this advantage (and whether they want to) and how well the left’s media and new media can come together and forge a different narrative. My best guess: everyone will be too busy forming the circular firing squad after Tuesday and the opportunity will float away, much like the opportunity after Obama’s inauguration was squandered.

  258. 258.

    water balloon

    Stewart is not a political activist. He doesn’t work to promote liberalism. He is a liberal comedian who is reacting to Glenn Becks’ crazy party by throwing a rally of his own. His decision is not to counter it directly from the Left, like the Ed Schultz/labor rally a few weeks ago, but to promote a less vitriolic discourse.

    Whether Schultz and Olbermann like it or not, they use the same tactics O’Reilly and Beck do. It just happens that they do it for a good cause.

  259. 259.

    gil mann

    @gizmo:

    Not casting aspersions on you personally, but if everybody making that same point on the internet were themselves doing GOTV, I’d have doorbell-induced tinnitus by now.

    So while it’s uncharitable to the point of dickishness for me to say this, I gotta wonder if all the lefty whining about Stewart is just prep-work for the blamefest we’ll be treated to in the wake of the midterms.

    p.s. Not to bring you down, but you do know they’re planning a remake with you as a CGI creation, right?

  261. 261.

    fasteddie9318

    @gizmo: Sure. We’d be better off if the Republicans would catapult themselves into deep space too, or I personally would be better off if my urine could be sold for $50,000/oz on the open market. But just like neither of those things are going to happen, it seems unlikely to me that the people at that rally would have been doing much GOTV had there not been a rally.

  262. 262.

    ET

    Well I got back, rested a bit, took a shower, and just finished some pizza and feel much refreshed after a 34 block walk and standing for 3.5 hours.

    Otherwise it was good. Lots of people. The Right will declare it a failure because Cat Stevens was there. Of course R2D2, Tony Bennett, Kareem Abdul Jabar, and Kid Rock were as well.

    I personally liked the fear award to the 7 year old girl who was more brave than NPR and the other news stations that either weren’t covering it or told not to comer (not clear on that one). The crowd was skewed young but not that young. There were plenty of over 50 crowd. It was also not totally white either. So on those 2 counts Fox will declare it socialist. They will likely fixate on Cat Stevens and promptly do what they can to ignore/minimize the whole thing.

  263. 263.

    Julia Grey

    Whether Schultz and Olbermann like it or not, they use the same tactics O’Reilly and Beck do.

    Except, you know, without the DELIBERATE LYING.

  265. 265.

    Cat Lady

    [email protected]morzer:

    I wasn’t there either, but the reason I would have gone was this exactly. Estimates are putting attendance easily over 100,000, and there were satellite rallies in other cities, so mission accomplished. It doesn’t fit the media narrative which means media is already hitting the Ignore button, but generating enthusiasm the last weekend before the election may just make enough difference.

    /hopey

  266. 266.

    Ked

    Drove to the rally from Indiana.

    It wasn’t quite as cool as I’d hoped, but a lot of that was technical issues and music choices.

    My friend and I walked up to the rally around 1030, and were basically stuck a few yards west of 7th street (looking east). It looked to me like the organizers had planned on this being the main overflow area. All the real amenities were in a gated-off area on the Mall proper, including a couple of tents near the back which blocked about half my sightline to the stage. Besides the people in the Mall itself, the streets on either side were equally jammed. There were speaker stacks rigged about twenty feet behind us, but I don’t think there were any further back. And it turned out there were a metric fuckton of people further behind us.

    I can’t estimate size, I just don’t know crowd density averages to calculate with. I will say that I expect direct comparison of overheads and high angles along the length of the Mall to show significantly more bodies than Beck got.

    Oh, okay. IF I’m right about that front block on the Mall proper being the expected/planned/permitted number (which was reported at 60k) THEN the actual attendance was at least three times that. Take that with a shaker of salt.

    I don’t quite like Roots, and John Legend just doesn’t impress me at all. But the performances were good. Huge Mythbusters fan so I rather liked that bit, but for that segment and the first bits of the actual Stewart/Colbert parts they had the mic levels wrong and unless you were in the sweet spot right in front of the stage you couldn’t hear much. Behind us… well, there’s a shot from MSNBC of two or three blocks behind where I was completely filled on the Mall, and a lot more farther back in the streets (and sidewalks across the Mall, about half of which is apparently closed off for repair). We were chanting “LOUDER” (and eventually they fixed it), but I bet the folks back on 10th or so couldn’t hear anything at all.

    While the rally was technically 1200-1500, the first hour was just crowd entertainment. The second and third hours were the real Daily Show/Colbert content. Stewart and Colbert seemed to be a little out of sync (stage fright? I’d freak out with that many people staring at me) in the first half hour, but as it went along, things got better. Except for Kid Rock, whose new song is screechy miserable crap even with Crow trying to help.

    I enjoyed it. Lots of silliness, lots of surprises. And yeah, Stewart gave his little sermon. I subscribe to the false-equivalency criticism to some extent, at least in terms of magnitude if not wretchedness. But this stuff really isn’t anything new – what he said today was exactly the point of both their shows is, and those of us who have been paying attention know that.

    Ultimately, this rally was TDS & CR “in concert”. Nothing new, just something that a lot of us really like. Insofar as there was new political content, WE were it, the thousands of us who came to represent that we agree with the Stewart/Colbert point of view. I came for the show, and I came to vote feet. And I think, barring unfortunate attempts by MSM to minimize that count (which I’m already seeing multiple places), we accomplished what I wanted.

    And then it took three hours to walk back to the hotel. (Took just one to get there.) Okay, we got split up and a half hour was just finding each other. So many bodies on the Mall nobodies cell worked.

  267. 267.

    FlipYrWhig

    @gil mann:

    The rally is about selling TV time and making money off of the Left’s long-standing tradition of mass mobilizations like Woodstock and the Million Man March.

    Wasn’t the Million Man March organized by Louis Farrakhan? That’s “the Left,” capital L and all, now?

  268. 268.

    Lurker

    If anyone cares, my elderly parents were relieved to see the healthy turnout for the Rally to Restore Sanity And/Or Fear. Up to this point all they’ve seen on TV are angry Tea Party activists. My parents vote in every election, but they felt alone in their point-of-view.

    Seeing a few gajillion Americans show up to rally for sanity cheered them up about the country’s future.

    Many thanks to Ked and the other posters here who attended the rally and contributed to the numbers.

    PS — my mom didn’t get the “I Can Spell” sign until I told her about the “Get A Brain! Morans!” sign and the other misspelled signs that appear at Tea Party rallies.

  269. 269.

    Morbo

    Whatever the rest of the rally was, Stewart’s speech was a pure Broderian jerk-off. What Davis Brooks really should have been worrying about in his columns criticizing the rally was Stewart angling for his job.

  270. 270.

    Zuzu's Petals

    @Ked:

    I can’t estimate size, I just don’t know crowd density averages to calculate with. I will say that I expect direct comparison of overheads and high angles along the length of the Mall to show significantly more bodies than Beck got.

    Well the expert who helped Airphotoslive do the CBS estimate for the Beck rally will also be helping with this estimate, so I feel pretty confident it will be an accurate count.

    ETA: Oops, here it is. Wow, 215,000 !

    ——————-

  271. 271.

    4jkb4ia

    I have read the articles in both the Guardian and the NYT and this thing sounded great, especially the signs. It appeared to be a Mental Health Break taken to a mall in Washington (this was an Obamaism ragged on by orionATL)

  272. 272.

    4jkb4ia

    @valdivia: Nate has spoken. There does not seem to be any new polling of any real consequence except for it all coming down to Washington, which is not news.

  274. 274.

    Cain

    @fasteddie9318:

    Well yeah, but their Twitter feed is just BURNING UP with important twits about Snooki and the Douche.

    Is that a modern version of “Chico and the Man”?

    cain

  275. 275.

    Cain

    @BR:

    Barack Obama, Oregon 60 thousand people.. people on bridges, people along the river banks, people in boats, people every where. Fucking awesome.

    cain

  277. 277.

    Felanius Kootea (formerly Salt and freshly ground black people)

    Just got back to L.A. from DC – I was there for work and stayed on an extra day for the rally. It was fun! The signs were the best part. There was a “Sane Canadians for Sanity” one (apparently a whole group from Toronto drove down in two buses), a “Decaf Party” one, “Adventures of Unemployed Man” (a new superhero), “Palin/Voldemort 2012,” “Atheists for Masturbation,”and my favorite was the one that spelled out IDIOCRACY using Palin, O’Donnell, Fiorina, Boehner, Beck, Gingrich, Angle, McConnel and O’Reilly’s names.

  278. 278.

    bjacques

    But…but…the tens of thousands who showed up for yesterday’s Daily Show lovefest just prove how fed up voters are with both parties. You can be sure that no Democratic rally could get that many people. This just confirms that the Democrats’ partisanship, as well as Obama’s weak efforts at reaching across the aisle, will cost them control of the House and almost certainly that of the Senate. Just as the smart money expects.

    I think I can take Douthat’s job now. Or Jake Tapper’s. Then I can go down to the bus station and give away free blow jobs to regain my self-respect.

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