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Politics : Just the Facts, Ma'am: A Compendium of Liberal Fiction -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Sully- who wrote (81371)	9/2/2010 8:11:01 AM
From: Sully-	1 Recommendation Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 90947

Restoring Honor rally cont'd; One thing we quickly noticed as we worked our way from the Smithsonian Metro stop to the rally was how many people were headed the opposite way. It was around 11:30 AM, so the rally wasn't even only half over. At first there was about 10x more people headed to the rally than going the other way. The closer we got to the Washington Monument there were only about 2x or 3x more people headed to the rally than leaving it. We just couldn't figure out why they were literally streaming out by the thousands [see pics linked below]. Message 26789417 Message 26789464 At about 12:30 PM, we approached the end of the Wash Memorial grounds facing the Lincoln Memorial. The crowd was already packed in solid from here all the way in. And I mean everywhere you could place a body within ear shot of the many monitors & speaker towers there was wall to wall people. The crowd spilled well beyond the Reflecting Pool & the trees lining it on both sides. They packed the open overflow area from the Korean War Memorial all the way back to 17th street [by the Washington Monument grounds]. Then they spilled over into the trees behind the Korean War Memorial all the way to 17th street. On the other side they spilled over into the trees from the Vietnam Women's Memorial all the way back to 17th street. We eventually got a spot in a shady area under the trees a little past the WWII memorial & just marveled at it all. There really wasn't a place to sit or stand anywhere. There were many tens of thousands of folks under the trees that won't show up in any aerial photos. In here there were about as many people streaming out as headed in. We were about 40 away from the mobile Police Tower positioned near the far end of the Reflecting Pool. It was about 12:45 PM. From then until the rally ended the foot traffic in both directions on the sidewalk was as heavy as it was when we queued up [see pics at link below]. Message 26789104 Message 26789584 Message 26790789 Message 26789417 After watching this awesome spectacle & talking to folks, this is what I think happened; I figured that once every possible spot within ear shot of the monitors & speaker towers was filled, folks tried to locate a spot closer in so they too could hear Palin, Beck, etc. speak. At some point many, many tens of thousands of people who had arrived long before the rally began most likely decided they had been in the sun for hours & got tired of being packed in so tight for so long they began to leave. For every spot that opened up there were several people ready to fill it by the folks who arrived later. Soooooo, what's my point here? This was an historic gathering no matter how you spin it. Look at any aerial photos of the grounds near the Lincoln Memorial. Under those trees discussed above, folks were packed in like sardines. The grounds along the Reflecting Pool were at max capacity. The overflow field was packed to the gills. The area in & around the WWII Monument was packed solid. A large section of the Washington Monument grounds was packed with patriots. And many many tens of thousands of people who arrived early left early while an equal or greater number were still arriving. I'm no expert, but I think that between 750,000 & 1,000,000 folks saw all or part of the Restoring Honor rally, maybe more.