From One We Can Judge The Rest

We woke up at 3:45 A.M, ate breakfast, and out the door by 4:45A.M. We arrived at a local shopping center in Dover DE, where we met up with the "912 Delaware Patriots" group. I estimate we had about a hundred plus in our caravan alone! I can thoroughly affirm that this group was not bought and paid for by any corporation or anything of the sort. It was simply a grassroots operation from the bottom up, and nothing but concerned citizens, all. Also, I'm a born and raised citizen of New Jersey (please don't hold it against me), yet my father is a recent Jersey "ex-pat" to the "first state" because of the repressive taxation in NJ, hence the reason I went to DE. So, for the day, I was an honorary Delawarean.

There were five buses altogether; three of them luxurious coaches, and two not-so-luxurious school buses. We, of course, rode in an extraordinarily bouncy school bus ( and yes, I was at times airborne, and, yes, my back still hurts).

We were supposed to set off by 5:30A.M., however, we didn't get moving until almost 6A.M. due to some minor unforeseen events. Yet, nevertheless, it took us about two hours to arrive in DC. We filed out of the buses and started to ascend onto Capitol hill via a march befittingly down Delaware Avenue.


When we arrived at the Capitol building we quickly assembled and then ironically divided. According to our bus captain we could either go do the "march", or just stay seated at the Capitol building. We chose the latter. Our bus captain jokingly informed us that the marchers would be referred to on the mainstream media as "the mob", and the people who stay seated would be referred to as the "tin-foil hat" wearers; I guess I'm of the tin-foil hat persuasion, and apparently so was he.



Their were speakers prior to the official start of 1:00P.M, when the place really began to fill up. We were informed about half way through the event that approximately 1.5 million were in attendance and that the beltway was shutdown. That was good news and received well by the crowd!




The people there were mostly comprised of our "seasoned" citizens, however, there were many young families, and many college students as well. The military was well represented, and to my surprise there were many medical professionals there too.

Most of the speakers at the event were pretty decent, some more so than others, but more than half the speakers were grassroots organizers who helped put together this gigantic event, so they were excused if they were, in fact, inferior public speakers. There were a couple senators, a celebrity or two, but most of the speakers were everyday ordinary people you'd meet at the grocery store.

Overall the event was wholesome and respectful. I never once heard anything from any of the speakers or the crowd condoning violence against authorities, speaking profanities, or anything of the sort. In fact the most extreme thing said was, "vote the bums out in 2010". That would be a bloodless and welcome revolution indeed!



The event wrapped up around 4:45P.M. and we began to make our way back to the buses. I must comment on something remarkable (and I wish I had captured a picture of it for proof). As the people assembled on the south lawn of Capitol Hill were able to disperse with little problem or resistance, we were able to see as we passed by, the state of it. One would expect as I surely did that the place would be filled with garbage. However, the lawn was spotless. Not a single piece of trash! After Obama's inaugural address it took cleaning crews about 4 days to clean the place. I wouldn't be surprised if the ground crews had to clean anything at all after the 912 event. I think it was another indicator of how respectful the crowd was that day. Someone even joked that we spent too much money on the place to junk it up!

We got onto our buses and headed home with no problems. We got back to the shopping center from which we originally departed at about 8:15P.M. My father and I at that point hadn't really had anything substantial to eat since about 4:00A.M, so we stopped to get some much needed grub, and boy did it hit the spot. Unfortunately for me I had about another one and half hour drive back up to Jersey. I didn't get home until about 11:00P.M. Yeah, it was a long day to say the least!

Now, if the number of 1.5 million in attendance is correct, that means that roughly 1 out of every 300 people in America was at that rally. That's pretty amazing! Obama dismissed it today by saying that it wasn't indicative of the overall American opinion regarding his policies. I'm sorry, 1 out of every 300 people is a pretty good indicator that a sizable portion of the country believes our President is taking us in the wrong direction. As for congress, I wouldn't want to be an incumbent in 2010. I think there is going to be large turnovers in both parties. Nevertheless, it was an amazing day, and an amazing event to attend. I would gladly do it again!

That's all for now, until next time...
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