Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear recap

Last weekend, Reggie and I went to DC to visit our friend Tara, do some birthday and halloween celebrating, and attend the Colbert/Stewart Rally to Restore Sanity and/or Fear rally on the national mall.  It was a gorgeous day, if a bit chilly.  Unfortunately/fortunately many more people showed at the rally than expected so it was packed and tough to hear or see.  The energy in the crowd was great, the signs witty and entertaining, and the mood optimistic.  As Reg said so perfectly the other day, "our elected officials yell at eachother like children" so it was really great to be in a crowd where I saw only 1 sign about an actual politician, and otherwise, it was all peace, love and understanding.
Some of the best signs:

I love the sign on the right- "Compromise! (if that's ok with you)"

duh

the most interesting man in the world always says it best!

I believe anything Hobbes says.  This one is for my brother!

ie- not a Bush-Cheney-Haliburton conspiracy, not some sort of Jewish plot, or whatever other conspiracy theory you want to dream up.

Reg realized he was an Anchor Baby

Then Tara and Monty realized that they too are anchor babies!

fo real

"Use your indoor voice"

Of COURSE there were yinzers in the crowd!

I dont know what grandmagrizzly is, but I do enjoy the play on calling everything socialism, or facism, or nazism, or marxism.

Hitler is Hitler.  Bush was not Hitler, Karl Rove is not Hitler, Obama is not Hitler, Glen Beck is not Hitler.

"I can see reason from my house"

the only 2 signs I saw directed specifically at a particular "politician"- and I thought it was pretty funny

the crowd

Reg and I on the walk home. A bit tired.  We were rallying for 3, afterall!

more crowd shots on the walk home

Finally, some of my favorite passages from the closing speeches (ie- the point):

If we amplify everything we hear nothing.  There are terrorists and racists and Stalinists and theocrats but those are titles that must be earned.  You must have the resume.  Not being able to distinguish between real racists and Tea Partiers or real bigots and Juan Williams and Rick Sanchez is an insult, not only to those people but to the racists themselves who have put in the exhausting effort it takes to hate--just as the inability to distinguish terrorists from Muslims makes us less safe not more.  The press is our immune system.  If we overreact to everything we actually get sicker--and perhaps eczema.

We hear every damn day about how fragile our country is—on the brink of catastrophe—torn by polarizing hate and how it’s a shame that we can’t work together to get things done, but the truth is we do.  We work together to get things done every damn day!

Most Americans don’t live their lives solely as Democrats, Republicans, liberals or conservatives.  Americans live their lives more as people that are just a little bit late for something they have to do—often something that they do not want to do—but they do it--impossible things every day that are only made possible by the little reasonable compromises that we all make.