Hartford, Connecticut
As the Save the American Dream demonstrators gathered for the noon rally yesterday, at the corner of Capital Avenue and Trinity Street, a group of Tea Party supporters set up with the capital building behind them. About fifteen minutes into the main rally, there were eight of them. Toward the end of the main rally it looked as though their ranks had swelled to eleven. When I approached around 12:18 PM, they seemed relieved that at least someone wanted to take their picture. "They're the rich ones, you know," they told me. "We had to make our own signs. We had to buy our own gas to get here."
That was interesting. It's been reported that many of the Tea Party supporters in Madison, WI (who are outnumbered 30:1 to 50:1 by the pro-union demonstrators) arrive on buses supplied by the Koch-funded astroturf group Americans for Prosperity. It seems this has been spun—perhaps "projected" would be a better word—to a belief that the pro-union people are outside agitators. Just as a matter of observation, I saw no sign of buses anywhere around the Capital, and the hundreds of solidarity demonstrators arrived by the handful. I didn't see a single busload size, or even van size, contingent come marching in. With, call it ten, Tea Party demonstrators on hand, that would again make the ratio in favor of the Save the American Dream group 30:1 or 50:1 here in Connecticut, too.
3 comments:
hey, at least you being fair and unbiased and covering both sides....more than I can say about the media.
Lyle,
It seems that today--this particular day, but there's always an excuse--the "mainstream media" are only interested in covering something happening about the movie industry, and the, if you can believe this, second anniversary of the astroturf Tea Party, whose gatherings of more than twelve people they broadcast with enthusiasm, while they completely ignore, right now as we speak, the largest demonstrations since those against the Vietnam war in the 60s. A score of Tea Crackers is big news. Thousands of pro-union supporters in states 1500 miles away from the center of conflict...not so much.
Just think, how many people, in historically liberal WI, ever assembled in one city at one event to protest the government in 1969? Nowhere near, as I remember, as many as are protesting right now. But you'd never know that from the corporate media.
Paul Krugman made the same point in the NYT, here.
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