ABC News To Teabaggers: YOU LIE!
There’s lots of numbers floating around about the attendance for yesterday’s Million Thousand Moron March. One that has been widely reported on conservative blogs is 2 million (ironically or perhaps not the estimated number that attended Obama’s inauguration). Michelle Malkin’s site, linked to by many other conservative sites, used ABC News as the source for this number. Well, ABC begs to differ:
Conservative activists, who organized a march on the U.S. Capitol today in protest of the Obama administration’s health care agenda and government spending, erroneously attributed reports on the size of the crowds to ABC News.
Matt Kibbe, president of FreedomWorks, the group that organized the event, said on stage at the rally that ABC News was reporting that 1 million to 1.5 million people were in attendance.
At no time did ABC News, or its affiliates, report a number anywhere near as large. ABCNews.com reported an approximate figure of 60,000 to 70,000 protesters, attributed to the Washington, D.C., fire department. In its reports, ABC News Radio described the crowd as “tens of thousands.”
Tags: 9/12 Protest, ABC, Tea Parties
WTF
Nate Silver also talked about this:
“He did the equivalent of telling people that his penis is 53 inches long.”
Doing the math Nate has, that would make Kibbe’s penis actually around 1.75 inches.
Poor guy.
I think my comment is awaiting moderation for a certain “p” word…lol
Yes, it was. Hahaha
I think the protest was modestly successful, in terms of numbers anyway. As DD explained so well, it wasn’t so successful in terms of message coherence nor did it dispel any concerns that these teabaggers aren’t a little bit crazy. However, how can the right explain away that their turnout was at least half of their lowest estimates?
Check out this link. It shows a crowed comparison between the teabagger protest and Obama’s inauguration, from the same spot on the national mall.
A Blog with a political bent, citing another Blog with the same bent as a source doesn’t exactly merit credibility and that’s regardless of the direction of said bent. I’m just saying …
M.O.,
I don’t think the problem was blogs linking to other blogs, after all, Malkin’s piece cited ABC News as the source. It was them just completely making numbers up and attributing them to someone. You’re right, of course, that the blogs linking to Malkin should have checked the primary sourcing. I suppose it is one of those echo chamber effects – they saw something they liked so they believed it uncritically.
The last time I was in Washington making some noise was in December 2000. There were about 700 of us and 70 on the other side on Mass Avenue, The evening News said that our numbers were ‘about equal’ and the camera angles of the images that were broadcast ‘proved’ this.
Most of the other folks were NEA members.
“A Blog with a political bent, citing another Blog with the same bent as a source doesn’t exactly merit credibility and that’s regardless of the direction of said bent.”
FiveThirtyEight has no “political bent.” It’s mainly about polling.
Besides, if you read the whole of Nate Silver’s post — he actually tracks down the originator of the “1.5M to 2M” lie. And, of course, we have ABC news in UI’s original link making it really clear that they were not the source of the wildly inflated number.
there was no protest in DC on saturday!
it’s all a corporate media lie!!
don’t believe your lyin eyes!!!
Really, ATiM? That’s all you have? No one is claiming there wasn’t a protest. But keep being ridiculous… we realize it’s all you have left.
Sorry, I believe my lying eyes, which tell me about 100,000.
Seriously, ATiM, you have to be kidding me. The major news networks covered this relatively modest protest on their front pages and on TV. It was even front page news in the NJ.
I’m glad we keep feeding the trolls. It serves us well.
“Seriously, ATiM, you have to be kidding me. The major news networks covered this relatively modest protest on their front pages and on TV. It was even front page news in the NJ.” – U.I.
U.I. ,
Yes, the NewsJournal had the TEA bag protest, above-the-fold, on the front page with the
breathless headline “Anti-Obama sentiment floods Capitol”
Contrast the NJ coverage of the anti-war demo after the democrats, riding the anti-war sentiment, took majorities in congress.
“Todays Anti-war protests can’t touch the sixties” in the “local” section.
The following year’s demo at the pentagon was placed inside the front section, the only accompanying picture was of the counter-protesters, whose presence was, at best, a tenth of the protest.
The Tea Party has a history of exaggerating numbers. I was at the Tax Day Parties in Georgetown and Laurel, and they claimed 500 signatures in Georgetown… maybe 200 people there. Laurel there was maybe 50 and they claimed 200.
It was a rainy and miserable day, no way 500 people huddled around the Circle in Gtown to not hear the speaches because the sound system crapped out and you barely heard it 20 feet away.
The last protest, the one in which I gave a speech, had maybe 50 people there. They claimed more.
Robert Reich calls for 9/13 ‘march on Washington’ in support of public option
Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0809/26224.html#ixzz0R6gUMb5z
what happend on 9/13? how many showed up?