Michelle Malkin is claiming 2 million turned out in Washington, D.C. today to “celebrate” the day after 9/11. The organizers, Freedom Works claimed that ABC News was estimating 1 to 1.5 MILLION turned out.
Uhhh…actually? ABC News didn’t say that at all.
They said 60,000-70,000.
Oops.
According to ABC News:
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.
I can believe they turned out 60,000 or even 70,000 people. I’m even skeptical that anyone photoshopped the crouds to make them look bigger. But deliberately misquoting ABC News? Really?
Did you think they’d just let that one go?
Everyone keeps crowing about how “well organized” the tea baggers are. I’d say they are good at rally a solid core of whackos. But when those numbers don’t approach what they fantasized about, they are reduced to lying about it even when there’s no question they’re going to get called on it.
Maybe after 8 years of an administration that was capable of getting away with murder, both figuratively AND literally, in broad daylight and under the glare of media scrutiny, they think they can just do and say whatever they want and nobody will notice.
NEWSFLASH: We notice.
Mrs. E and I attended the inauguration where there were between 1.1 and 1.8 million people. That event paralyzed Washington, D.C. Most of the parking lots in the comuter train stations in the outlying areas around D.C. were closed before 9 a.m. The streets were completely filled with people and everything was basically a complete clusterfuck.
If that had happened today, you can be very, very sure that the congestion would have made the news at least as prominently as the event itself.
Instead? Crickets.
I’m just sayin’…
