The "Peace Movement" Comes Out In Force

As many of you apparently missed, the "Peace Movement", sponsored by United For Peace, had a rally on Saturday to show the widespread support to bring the troops home now.

January 27th was an extraordinary outpouring for peace in Washington DC and in communities all around the country. On Saturday, the National Mall was filled with the voices of 500,000 people committed to doing their part to end the war in Iraq and bring all of the troops home. And the energy in this massive turnout was electric.

From the website, there are thousands of pictures of not quite 500,000 people at the rally. I have looked at literally hundreds of these pictures and I have yet to see one taken from anything other than ground level showing anything more than a few thousand people. I would have thought if there were 500,000 people at the rally, there would have been some overhead shots of the entire crowd. You would almost think that maybe there were not 500,000 people at the rally. It appears some think there may have been less.

United for Peace and Justice, a coalition group sponsoring the protest, had hoped 100,000 would come. They claimed even more afterward, but police, who nolonger give official estimates, said privately the crowd was smaller than 100,000.

Still, less than 100,000, that could be a lot. That is almost as many as pay a lot of money to go to a Big 10 football game in the fall. Almost.

But that does not count the massive number of people at the local rallies such as right here in Seattle where we could watch

about 2,000 war protesters march, chant and sing their way through the streets

2,000, that is alot, although not quite as many as some rallies:

The biggest rally they ever saw from their perch on Jackson was the march for immigration rights that drew more than 25,000 people in April

But still, if you quadruple that 2,000 and you almost have the average attendance of a Seattle Storm WNBA game. Almost.

Of course there is that other hotbed of NW liberal activism, Eugene Oregon where:

an estimated 40 people gathered by the Ferry Street Bridge, holding signs that read "purge the surge" and "no more war

40, that is about how many people were at my Grandma's 93rd birthday party earlier this year. Personally I never knew 40 was a number that needed to be "estimated".

I think ScrappleFace may be on to something to help increase turnout:

“The speaker roster reminds me of the old Hollywood Squares game show,” said one unnamed staffer of Vegan Lesbians for Racial and Nuclear Justice, whose dozens of members will cross the continent to join the rally today. “I mean Fonda, Sarandon, Glover and Jackson might as well be Charo, Joan Rivers, George Gobel and Paul Lynde. How am I going get my group excited about geopolitical and military strategy with these has beens leading the way?”

In urelated golf news, the FBR Open will be played this coming weekend. 500,000 people are expected to attend the 4 day event opposite the SuperBowl.