Can a sanity rally inspire people to get out against the Sharron Angles of 2010? We'll soon find out. Let's just hope all this energy might dampen the right-wing and make extremists stand out. Whatever Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert hoped to create yesterday, it was a massive turnout, estimates going as high as 215,000. Having been at the Glenn Beck rally too, all I can say is that everything about the Rally to Restore Sanity rally was different. Anger was out.
An estimated 215,000 people attended a rally organized by Comedy Central talk show hosts Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert Saturday in Washington, according to a crowd estimate commissioned by CBS News.The company AirPhotosLive.com based the attendance at the "Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear" on aerial pictures it took over the rally, which took place on the Mall in Washington. It has a margin of error of plus or minus 10 percent.
CBS News also commissioned AirPhotosLive.com to do a crowd estimate of Glenn Beck's "Restoring Honor" rally in August. That rally was estimated to have attracted 87,000 people. Amid criticism from conservatives that the estimate was low, CBS News detailed the methodology behind it here.
One of the best moments of the day was listening to Tony Bennett sing "America the Beautiful." Maybe because I was at home sipping a cold beer by then. The crush of people overwhelming at times.
"Don't tread on my head," said one sign held by a woman, a shot at Rand Paul's thugs who assaulted a woman for simply being an activist.
"Facts are cool. Reality is for adults," said another sign.
"Sanity is sexy."
"Drinking Age is Too Damn High!"
Not surprisingly, there were a lot of mid-age hipsters.
...and oh, the smell that wafted up in one section of the mall...
Kid Rock and Cheryl Crow sang lyrics, "Screaming on the left, Yelling on the Right, while I sit in the middle trying to live my life." If anything summed up the Stewart-Colbert message this was it. A take off on Bill Clinton's "third way," with a 2010 twist, because it was delivered by a mid-age hipster just under 50, just like Bill when he designed his answer, which progressives hate today, just as Tea Party activists hate the middle of the roader Republicans.
It's the one missing element in Jon Stewart's outreach, because what he's suggesting simply isn't where the political activists today live and breathe, which includes those who hate both big two parties. Missing the mood of Americans and just how disgruntled they are with our political system.
Somewhere in between is the revolution Stewart represented yesterday. The rally more of an ode to Independents; the people with no ideology who sit in the middle and wait for inspiration from one side or the lack thereof from the other.
Politics is about differences, usually stark if the philosophies are worth anything.
That's why Sarah Palin is robocalling against Joe Sestak.
One thing Stewart and Colbert forgot is that modern hate speech began in earnest when Ronald Reagan deregulated the airwaves letting Rush Limbaugh and right-wing radio rise unchallenged, which today has led to a monopoly, but also people like Glenn Beck on Fox News, who have amplified the anger by ten. These early hate hucksters and their offspring led to the hunting of Pres. Bill Clinton and First Lady Hillary Clinton in the '90s, which ended up in an impeachment drive that the American people did not support. This was the launch to where we are today, with the rise of Fox News and the Roger Ailes candidate stream. It has brought MSNBC to the front with several hosts from the left, because Fox isn't going to tell the truth about the assault of a woman, or do documentaries on abortion doctors being murdered, rant about the union working man's plight, or even give hard interviews to Rand Paul, let alone call out Lou Dobbs, or offer special comments that channel how voters on the left are feeling like Glenn Beck does on the right. As Stewart showed, no doubt Keith Olbermann, as well as Ed Schultz, go way over the top sometimes, they both did on Hillary, but nothing compares to what happens on opinion Fox.
Even Stewart wondered aloud what his Rally to Restore Sanity was all about. In a nutshell, he represents the frustration people feel with all media that goes for ratings and rants over perspective, truth and objectivity. Partisanship and lack of transparency, lack of trust and skepticism rules today, with Stewart and Colbert getting laughs out of the circus.
Truth isn't subjective, however, which I'm reminded of every day. Sometimes one side is absolutely wrong, like when Sarah Palin talked about "death panels," or when Rand Paul talked about private business owners being exempt from the Civil Rights Act. That would have been worth Stewart or Colbert pointing out. Pres. Obama and the Democrats were wrong not to fight for the public option, but also a stronger finreg bill, should have stood strong for women instead of selling us out. But that's a hell of a lot different than Sharron Angle's charge that Second Amendment remedies should be used, which is not a way to solve differences. There is no one on the left suggesting such dangerous notions, which should have been said. No one on the left had a reporter handcuffed, like Joe Miller did in Alaska, or threatened to take a reporter out as Carl Paladino did in New York. These things matter, all of which Stewart and Colbert ignored for drawing false equivalents to the right and left.
Partisanship comes with philosophical ego, but it doesn't make you right or your point equal. It's a challenge to decipher one from the other amidst the noise.
"If we amplify everything, we hear nothing." - Jon Stewart
Stewart got that part right. Unfortunately, by amplifying left and right equally Stewart and Colbert did a disservice to the truth, which is not subjective.
If Jon Stewart truly believes that the left talking softly while the right wields a big rhetorical stick can get the job done he's not been paying attention to his own show this year and should review the tapes, starting with the ones featuring Fox.
Taylor Marsh is a political analyst and veteran national political writer out of Washington, D.C.
Follow Taylor Marsh on Twitter: www.twitter.com/taylormarsh
Lisa Solod Warren: What the Rally for Sanity and Obama Have in Common and It's Not Politics
I don't know if the Stewart/Colby rally will bring more voters to the polls. The Democrats lost the narrative a long time ago by being passive in communication their message, policies and agenda to the masses. While the communication arm (Faux noise) of the GOP was yelling loudly with distortions and lies, playing on people's fears and emotions, duping them would be a more accurate term. And the fringe bit into it, hook, line and sinker.
If people can vote for the Angle's, Paul's, and O'Donnell's and follow the leads of Palin, Rove, Gingrich, Bachmann and the like, then yes, the country definitely needs to return to sanity.
Read my take at HuffPo on why the media is out for blood:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/brian-ross/change-the-punditocracy-d_b_775782.html
Onward, through the fog! I know those who hate both the big parties. They don't vote, they snort cocaine and diligently practice their karate. Neat folk.
We all know that Fox is far worse and flat out lies. But coming out swinging against Fox and totally ignoring the fact that MSNBC hosts sometimes go way overboard would do a total disservice to everybody. People keep saying that Jon had no business putting Keith Olbermann in the montage. Yes he did. Keith can be a pompous, name-calling blowhard. (Yes, I realize the irony of me calling him names.) I'm a progressive and even I find him very hard to take. He's childish. Even if you have facts on your side, it doesn't mean you can/should be a total jerk. If you are, nobody will hear the facts you're trying to get across aside from the people who already know them. And what good does that do?
Rachel Maddow, on the other hand, talks about the same things but does it in such a reasonable manner. That's why she wasn't in the montage. And that is what we need to win moderates and independents over.
I am an Independent, and that's not what will win me over.
If the montage were true, it would not have put EVERY outrage by Fox News, and their wannabees, against EVERY outrage by MSNBC, and their wannabees?, it would have put 95% outrage by Fox and 2% outrage by MSNBC.
That would have been truth, because FOX NEWS is a dangerous organ set out to undermine our democracy, with the help of the Republicans, who will do ANYTHING to have power.
MSNBC does not belong in the same sentence as Fox. There is no comparison.
FoxNews set out on a campaign to destroy our President.
FoxNews is an enemy of our democracy, and every American should view it as such.
I say this as an Independent.
Keith Olberman's animation doesn't not get in the way of my receiving accurate information from him.
FoxNews' animus does get in the way of my receiving false information from it.
All they do is put a "pretty" face on it.
I think you make have missed the point in the Rally. If Stewart had spent three hours venting about the right and the media with a right bent, it would have undermined the whole purpose of the Rally.
They keep talking about extremists on BOTH sides, But where are the extremists on the left?
Yes, there aren't currently left wing militia stockpiling weapons--although in the past we did have the extreme left bombing places. Yes, we don't see the left stomping on the heads of activists from the right. And we don't have the left calling for 2nd Amendment remedies. But, when the rhetoric gets amplified, the people in the middle don't always see the difference.
We also can't just lump all the Tea Partiers and extreme right into one group and say they're all racist, head-stomping, scary militia nuts. While I don't agree with them at all, they're not. And it's hypocritical of us to do that and then complain when they lump all Muslims together as terrorists. But we can and should call them out for not standing against the violence.
On the montage that they showed depicting the over the top rhetoric, there was more of what the right do than what the left do. The rally was not where that discussion needed to be.
Both Stewart and Colbert show the distinction on their respective shows.
Perhaps, you might not have seen most of their shows?
My, my, my, Ms. Marsh.
You got that right.
My thoughts exactly.
The right has been distorting the truth, while the left has been responding to their distortions.
Just as you stated, both comedians have been making their living responding to the distortions.
Stewart has gone beyond the call of duty, and Reid hasn't shown up for work yet.
I took job training when I worked in a half-way house and one of the first things they taught us was in a violent situation, keep your voice just above a whisper.
I believe that yes, we have lots of problem. I also believe that every single one of them is solvable (maybe not solvable like some would like.. hey.. the 50's are gone). I also believe that the SANE must prevail, or the INSANE will take this country down and destroy anything that is left.
The false equivalency of the imaginary middle is it's own form of insanity.
John Stewart is a national treasure, no doubt, but even he succumbs to that form of insanity sometimes (see his interview with Condilezza Rice for the definition of media vapidity and willful ignorance in the interest of "getting along").
But leftists are expected to compromise for sake of reconciliation. Why?
Because God so loves the rich?
Strolling down the middle lane is not a sign of sanity--it's a sign of detachment. The problems in the US are deep and permanent, without extreme political action. In fact, the US economy has been trapped on a decline for forty years. What do we know about the reason for the decline? It's an outcome of the capitalist economic system. Try to change that by driving down the middle lane.
From a larger perspective, over all, the Republicans have stood for everything that was rotten in the US.
It does matter which party you support.