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We had between 500 and 750 people at our rally today. Put your reports here.
keep bumping me all night long.
Nice meeting you! What a success. We marched with police escort through downtown. The media was careful to take shots that didn't give the true size of the crowd.
Made sure to get out the word on FreeRepublic. Pictures will be posted by a lurker that I met there.
I was there. Wore my Sore-Loserman T-shirt. The crowd was actually only about 250 at the most but we did make a lot of noise. The march through downtown Seattle really shook some liberals up. One lady had a terrible hissy fit as we walked by. Her friends had to restrain her. We returned the three-fingered Dubya salute to any one who displayed the one finger salute. We were vocal but peaceful. We expected some sort of organized Gore support but there wasn't any. One guy with an anti-bush poster was there at our destination. Several media people showed up and I hope we get some coverage on TV. We did the Palm Beach Pokie right in the middle of Seattle's Pike Place Market. I was proud to be there (my first demonstration). I really feel like I have finally done something instead of sitting around having things done to me. I would strongly encourage any other Freepers to take the time to express yourselves. Tell the liberals we will not just go away. We are here to be heard and to fight for our rights.
Congradulations, thanks for representing the cause/constitution/truth/justice & the American way!!!! Thank you for standing in the gap (especially for those of us monitoring from work!!!!!)
I's great! How nice to see such information from the liberal citadel Seatle. Please do not stop to freep! Thank you for a wonderful job.
Bravo, Seattle FReepers!
Way to go, Western Patriot! Keep the heat on the liberals! I just love it that so many are outraged that we would dare to protest against anything that they want.
I just wish that I could visualize where you marched. The only part of Seattle Î remember is the streets between the ferry dock (to Bremerton) and the Sea-First Bank tower where my cousin works.
Excellent work Green Team!
Wonderful job! Thanks.
My crowd estimate is between 400 to 500, and I would conservatively (pun intended) place it at 450.
When we were still at the courthouse, I did a quick tally, and estimated that we stood roughly 15 abreast on average, and about 30 rows deep. It did become harder to count once we began marching, but the turnout was VERY good!
Kudos to Professional who grabbed the mic briefly and preached the FreeRepublic.com gospel. Got the crowd going pretty good (and also thanks to Professional for treating a few of us to some coffee!).
More details: We met in front of the courthouse at 5th and Madison... when I showed up at 10, there was already a good sized crowd. Between 10 and noon, the crowd kept growing. Lots of people going by honking, which always generated a cheer. The speakers were good, and some of them (from the crowd... not planned speakers) were excellent and really spoke from the heart. Those heart-felt, impromptu speeches really conveyed the attitude and mood of the crowd better than anything.
At roughly noon, we began our march to the Pike St. Market. With police escort, we marched through the streets, and, my fellow FReepers, there is nothing quite like the sight of so many like-minded folks taking to the streets in support of a common cause.
Sure, Seattle is a hotbed of liberal idealism, but I must say, I was rather underwhelmed at the opposition. There were no organized counter protests to us, and the number of folks who were giving us thumbs down, or indicating their IQ with a single finger raised upwards, was much smaller than I anticipated.
Most of our fellow marchers simply waved and responded with a 3 finger (W) salute and a smile. WTO protestors we are not!
Once at the market, we assembled for a while in the small park just North, waved at passers by, and a group of us confronted a solo Gore "activist". This Gore apologist made the usual remarks about Bush being an idiot, etc. etc. and resorted to the tried and tired rhetoric of ad hominem attacks on us conservatives. I didn't see any other Gore folks who were willing to actively involve themselves though. So I counted this rally as a major score for Seattle conservatism.
After a brief stay at the park, we marched up in small groups to the Westlake Center, which, since it is the Christmas shopping season, was bustling with lots of folks. Met some PLO agitators there calling for Israel to stop shooting Palestinian children (to which I only responded "If the PLO quit enlisting kids into their army and putting them on the front lines, they wouldn't get shot"), but still no Gore folks.
Stood for a while at Westlake, along 4th, waved at people, got more horn honking and also some IQ indicators from the opposition... Around 1:30-2, we finally dispersed.
Media coverage was sparse to non-existent. A few cameras of professional looking quality were seen at the start, in front of the courthouse. I got interviewed, but unfortunately lacked the presence of mind to ask who the cameraman worked for. They took some shots of whoever was speaking, and they did get in some crowd shots. If they were local TV (my hunch), then we might be lucky to see some cuts in the final edit which actually show the real size of the assemblage.
Unfortunately, I spaced out and forgot my camera, which was unfortunate. There were some great photo ops... like the 2 nuns that were there, proudly holding up their "Bush/Cheney" signs. Man, that would have been the ultimate Kodak moment. Sigh... perhaps someone else got a shot of those adorable two?
Again, many thanks to the hundreds that turned out. FreeRepublic.com got several good bumps... hopefully we'll get more folks logging on here because of this. Several folks in the crowd asked about FR and I think we all (Professional especially) did a great job of getting the word out.
Can't wait to meet more Puget Sound Freepers... hope to see you all at the Christmas party. :)
WOW! WTG!
Thanks to all who FReeped for FREEDOM TODAY!
prisoner6
WE ROCKED DOWNTOWN!!......it was so much fun!!!!...kids, Nuns,every group was represented.The Police escort was thrilling!The Bike Cops were riding down the sidewalk clearing it !...The Libs were jumping back into the Stores!....LOL!....We Got Our Point Across...BIG TIME!
What Christmas party? Where? When?
BUMP
It was Great To Meet You!
Contact "Publius" for Info!......PUGET SOUND FREEPERS RULE!
I bought two Sore/Loserman t-shirts, one (I thought) for myself, one for my younger daughter who has lately become a big O'Reilly fan. But when I got home, my older daughter also wanted one of the Sore/Loserman shirts, so now I'm walking around bare-chested. Meanwhile, on tv the lawyers in Florida are arguing about the relative durability and strength of various rubber compounds. Will arguments about rubber compounds determine the next President of the United States? Bill and Al - will you and your lawyers please crawl back into your ratholes?
BUMPS FOR FREEDOM!!!!
Lets See if we were on the News!!!!.....Kiro was there....was King or Komo?
To all Puget Sound FReepers if you are Interested in joining our group Contact "Publius " for Info....We Have a Great Christmas Party Planned!!!!!
BTTT!
We were just five blocks uphill and five blocks north of the ferry you spoke of.
This Block Party at Joe's Freeper salutes ya'll!!!
I just counted groups of ten and when I got to 500 I quit. If you stood up top on the steps you could make a circle with your two hands and count the number of people in it. make the circle the size of ten people then count the number of groups of ten on the square and add them up. There were people on the grass as well that I did not count and I used them as the "margin for error". LOL
That solo Democrat also blamed the CIA for the voting problems in Florida. I am not sure if it was the black helicopters or the fluoride in the water, Ha Ha.
Thanks Buddy!
We Missed You!
Thanks for letting us know about this.......I had a Great Time..I am Proud To Be an American!
Great job Puget Sound Freepers! I will watch for you on TV this evening - sorry I couldn't make it........but am very proud of all of you!!
Bravo, way to go Freepers.
If you join the Tyranny Response Team of Washington you can get notified a little earlier and help protect the Bill of Rights. it is at http://www.v1.net/trt/index.html
It was sooo cool!!!!!!!The Cops were great and that escort.......Yee Haaaaaa!
JUST GOT ABOUT 45 SECONDS ON KIRO NEWS WITH AN INTERVIEW OF A FEMALE PROTESTER.
We got thirty seconds on King 5.
Okay, I realize this isn't a personals column but... you were at the Courthouse 1145-1200. Deep, Big Brown Eyes, 5'6", 30?, beautiful brunette, perfect teeth & smile. You must have been one of the 'monitors' as you seemed new to communications gear. You wore light blue, followed by dark blue tops. I saw you with another woman - mom? My apologies for embarassing you, as I surely have for those who know you, BUT if you're single and available drop me a line at joeuser52@yahoo.com. You were the highlight of the march!
GOOD for YOU! Did you catch any ornaments? You might have saved a few $$$
JUST GOT ABOUT 45 SECONDS ON KIRO NEWS WITH AN INTERVIEW OF A FEMALE PROTESTER.
I was happy to see that they at least showed some of the crowd shots... As someone mentioned, KING also did a brief segment, but they included a long shot from across 5th that didn't look as cool.
The KIRO footage, right towards the end, did a little shot where the cameraman was walking through us as we sang "We Shall Overcome"... notice the handsome looking fella in the blue coat -> that's me. :)
Oh... and I hasten to add that there were indeed some gorgeous conservative women there. Republican women are so much more attractive, wouldn't you all agree? :)
News coverage - BTW...the gal they interviewed happens to be a WESTPOINT GRADUATE who gave up the ARMY/NAVY game to be there.... (I was standing right behind her as they interviewed her).....but never heard the news people give that part of the interview.....WAS A GREAT DAY - it's beginning to look like WE WILL TAKE BACK THIS COUNTRY!!!! HURRAAAHHHHH!!!!
OUTSTANDING you guys and gals!!
Thanks Buddy......BTW nice pics from your military days on another thread!
I think the crowd was around 450-500 but I'm not a professional crowd guesser. When we marched through downtown and into the Pike Place Market the LIBERALS DIDjump back into alleys and storefronts. The market in particular is THEIR place and we were defiling it in their minds, interrupting their latte, French pastry and Seattle Times. (which is on strike by the way and greatly improved because of it, almost reduced to "just the facts")
Several people gave us fingers (we had nuns marching with us mind you) but many thumbs up. I saw a look of disbelief on the liberals faces. They could not believe that conservatives were actually engaging in the kind of activism that they employ so often (usually for no good reason).
On to Bellevue, the lady who organized it did an excellent job. It was a very busy Christmas shopping day. She had all four corners of the busiest intersection massed with Bush supporters. One lady was dressed up like a voting booth, lots of kids, some teenagers getting their first thrill of standing up for what you believe in.
Hey, if liberals are willing to recongnize and argue the "deterioration of rubber" theory, when it comes to voting machines, maybe we can finally get them to extend that logic to the rubber found in latex condoms.
Go, Seattle FReepers! We're proud of you!
Anybody have any pictures? I was there. I even saw someone I knew giving us the finger.
Thanks Buddy!
YES PICS!!!!!.....I WANT THEM!......A Sgt.with King County was with us taking pics...I will talk to him Monday.I hope we can get pics fron another freeper soon!
He had no shirt on and was giving us the single digit salute. I just waved at him. Their was a slight glint in the sunlight, I'm not sure but I think it was a nipple ring. LOL
Hey! That's Buddess to you, Mister!
OOps!!!! I did it again!!!!........he,he. Thank You!
LOL! That's so sweet!
We had in Minnesota 5000 plus gathered today. Sorry we have 2 of the most leftwing nut cases ever!! I have pics but not sure how to post them. I am too new at this but they are great even someone dressed as gore with a bib and passafire. And a Clinton in mask and a travel bag with a monnica barret waveing goodbye.
Yeah, that's it, the CIA did it! (never mind that the CIA has been controlled by Clintoon/Bore for eight years) I've heard that whine in D.C. as well. Where do they get this stuff? I guess they have even for tin foil hat wearers than F.R. does at times.
Sorry we have 2 of the most leftwing nut cases ever!!
Same for Us Puget Sound FReepers as well!
Thanks for the kind words. I think we have to share the FreeRepublic.com story as often as we can.
Hey MPB! Met you at the rally and enjoyed our coffee (Thanks Professional for buying the "round"!) and discussion with Professional and cmsgop. Great report, I don't know what to add to what everyone has said so far.
I had a great time and cannot more highly reccommend this protesting thing to all! What a refreshing thing to get out and meet like-minded individuals and learn that you're not the only one out there that thinks like we do LOL!
Sounds like I missed even more fun in Bellevue! I'm sorry now that I had to miss it.
Somehow cmsgop and I ended up "leading" the march with our eight-page Sore/Loserman signs right behind the "Help is on the Way! George W. Bush" banner being held by two ladies. We yelled ourselves hoarse, but we had the best seats in the house to watch the incredulous disbelief on people's faces as they realized what was coming down the street towards them. It would only have been better if we could have watched them freak out even more as they saw that it wasn't just a handfull of people, it wasn't just a few dozen, it wasn't just a hundred, but that it was several hundred people stretching a block to two blocks long sidewalk to sidewalk chanting NO MORE GORE!!! The reports of people scurrying into shops and restaurants were not exagerations.
It was a beautiful thing.
bttt
On to Bellevue, the lady who organized it did an excellent job. It was a very busy Christmas shopping day. She had all four corners of the busiest intersection massed with Bush supporters. One lady was dressed up like a voting booth, lots of kids, some teenagers getting their first thrill of standing up for what you believe in.
Thank you, The American People, for organizing the Bellevue Rally! It was loads of fun for those of us who couldn't make the morning rally.
It looked like we had at least 150 people freep the shoppers. Out of all the drivers who reacted to us, most of them gave us thumbs up, a few gave the three-fingers salute. Maybe 1 out of 4 gave thumbs down or the one-fingered Gore salute.
I was holding a hand-sign someone had provided that said "RE-CONCEDE". I think that one deserves to be a large poster! (If we have to do this once again next week...)
I have to second the commendation for Professional. He gave a very impassioned speech that was perfect in it's message and really fired the crowd up. Way to go, Professional!
The reports of people scurrying into shops and restaurants were not exagerations.
LOL - Maybe they were afraid you were really leftist anarchists in disguise!
Heavy sigh. I wanted to be there so bad, I'm jealous and proud of everyone at the same time.
Being a mobile Disc Jockey, this is a pretty busy time of the year for me. Unfortunately, I'm booked the night of the Christmas Party too.
What a great group we had, mostly non Freepers. They got a kick out of my "GOP Thug" sign and leather biker jacket.
We had a Harley Davidson Crew with Bush signs buzz around a few times too.
Libertina was also there. She gave a great speech. Out of the country for 10 years and couldn't believe the change. Sometimes we don't see the drastic change because of its incrementalism.
I met several Seattle area lurkers. It is time for you to join the Forum. Sign up and get involved. Nice meeting all of you and hope that we can continue to make our presence felt on the North Left coast.
Steve, yeah, you are a punk. Yeah, I was the guy talkin about you. If I ever see your commie face around, well, you will wish you brought a good set of earplugs. I truly hate you.
5000?! Nice job. You must have really stirred things up. I'll have to read your thread.
Bttt.
5.56mm
A BIG Thank You to all of you who rallied in Seattle/Bellevue today!
I hope to be able to join you next time.
BELLEVUE: Thanks so much you guys!!
My fantasy came true - Freepers carried the day! I want all of you to know how much I appreciated your presence; I know there were people there who'd been rallying all day in Seattle, but they took the time to come over and help us out. Amazing!
KCPQ (13) was there. We should be on the news tonight. Remember that their broadcast is at 10:00PM, if you want to watch.
Nice seeing you again, ethical, and very nice meeting you, jennyp! Thanks to you and all the other Freepers who made our rally a bigger success than I imagined it would be. I almost heard the theme from "Rocky" when I walked up and saw the crowd! :)
P.S. Great job Seattle Freepers!
I watched part of KOMO news tonight and they had coverage and crowd shots from a newspaper strike rally that got about as many or less people as we had. It was after a story about the WTO violence where they showed that this years protests were a handfull of people in a room discussing issues. Either way, I thought it would have been a good lead in to show our peacefull, non-violent "protest". They apparently did not agree as I saw nothing about us.
Did KOMO or others show anything? Details anyone?
Excellent summary, MPB. The weather was perfect! Yeah, about 450 people were there. I took several 35mm slides of the event and did get a close-up photo of the two nuns. Should anyone need photos of the event, please give me an e-mail.
All the folks there were enthusiastic! The young men and women were really neat and I saw some beautiful little children. I also met Professional!
Merry Christmas.
I was clean-up. Cops were right on my rear. Neat fellas. Gave me several thumbs up! I thanked 'em.
Nothing on KCPQ 13 about Seattle at all, that we saw. Amazing. They gave Bellevue about five seconds.
EFFING Q-13 just did what we were warned the media would do: they showed up after the rally had broken up when there was just a handful of people along 4th by Westlake and showed video of them. They said "dozens" of people showed up to protest Al Gore. It was a less than 10 second coverage and did not say or show any of the hundreds of people marching down the street through Pike Place Market!!!
If I was not there to see it with my own eyes and my only news was Q-13, I would have thought that just a handful of disgruntled Republicans were protesting something or another.
MAN, AM I PISSED AT Q-13!!!!!!!
Pirate and I (wildflower) had a blast. We both went to the Seattle rally and I went to the Bellevue afterglow. I am now hoarse, but I really had a great time. I am silent no more. Tired of all the whining, would they like some cheese with their whine. Not only that, the dems are constantly suiting - shall we call them suitors (pronounced sewers). I will be rallying up a lot of folks from Snohomish County for the next one. I need to know when the next one will be. You people all acted decently yet assertive. No whiners in the Whitehouse!!!! President Bush!!!! I am also a minority, a Mexican-American if you will. So there. And I am not rich either - so the democrats need to get and keep a job.
BTTT
Beautiful Seattle rally day - patriots, motivated speakers, signs galore.
Happily Earnie was there (the only person I knew) but I was lucky to meet some other local FReepers thanks to FR names on their signs.
Rudy (organizer?) started us off with the Pledge of Allegiance, which brought tears to my eyes. Big Ern spoke and gave others the courage to do so. Professional gave massive PR for FR! A woman introducing herself as minority patriot and Republican was a great natural speakeras well. Michael (the bullhorn guy with the impressive lungs) talked about outrage and prayer.
Our march to Pike PLace Market netted a few spontaneous joiners. Even though Seattle had some thumbs down and a couple of rude gestures, there were horns honking and some applause that kept us going.
When we got to the little park near Pike Place and sang the National Anthem, I wondered if the people listening across the street felt pride, as we did.
Thank you to the organizers - SUPER JOB! And a pleasure to meet everyone.
PS Vicki, you were missd but we did our best to rally hard for you! See you next time
I just called the KCPQ newsroom (206-674-1305) and the woman I talked to was very nice. She said she was very familiar with the story, but she only knew about the rally in Bellevue, so that's all they covered. Maybe the footage I thought was Westlake was actually Bellevue and they showed nothing of Seattle.
I told her we had a permit and that 400-500 or more people were there, we marched down 4th and through Pike Place Market - kinda a hard thing to miss! She said she was unaware there was anything like that in Seattle today and that we need to notify them when we have rallys and then by all means they would cover it.
DIDN'T YOU GUYS CONTACT ALL OF THE TV STATIONS ABOUT THE RALLY IN ADVANCE?!!?
I was in charge of the Bellevue rally, and I faxed Q13 about it last night and this morning - that's how they knew. We did have "dozens" in Bellevue (maybe nine or ten dozen?). I was absolutely shocked that there was no coverage of Seattle, but I suppose it's possible they weren't aware of it.
Gotta correct my own post - I emailed Q13. I faxed several newspapers and emailed every local television station. Only KCPQ bothered to cover us this time; two weeks ago, KING, KOMO, and KIRO came out for us.
Rudy and the crew were in charge as I have pointed out several times on other threads. I was just a town crier on freerepublic, as Rudy is affiliated with my other organ. the Washington Tyranny Response Team. They contacted media including Television, but other than KVI radio I couldn't give you the names.